Aunt Lee's 80th Birthday Party at Chautauqua

Lee (Lenore to her weaver friends) is Arlene's mother's sister. She was an art teacher on Grand Island, NY, for many years (any influence on Arlene's career choice?). Arlene has always been closer to her and her kids than to any of her other cousins. We've been to the Buffalo area many times to visit, but it's a long trip and we don't get to see them as often as Arlene would like. It was a given that we would go out for the big 80th birthday party.

The party was at the Atheneum Hotel in Chautauqua NY, even farther from here than Grand Island. I clicked the trip odometer at the Highlands Post Office, about a mile from home, not too much after 8 in the morning. It read 521 miles when we got to the main gate at Chautauqua around 5 that afternoon. We were on I-90 all but the first 5 and last dozen miles of the trip. The New York Thruway can be boring, but it was lovely last Saturday, with beautiful bright spring green grass all the way. I'm particularly fond of the places where the Thruway runs along the hills above the Mohawk River valley, where you're not sure if the water you see below is the Mohawk or the Erie Canal.