Robert H. Treman State Park: Ithaca’s Different Swimming Spot

When I used to be a freshman at Cornell, Second Dam was essentially the most talked-about swimming spot, excellent for Ithaca’s hotter weekends. I went a full 12 months earlier than listening to about Robert H. Treman State Park, and actually, it’s the extra interesting alternative for a day journey — significantly as a result of it doesn’t require climbing quarter-hour down a steep, rocky hill in slippery flip-flops like I did to get to Second Dam throughout my Orientation Week freshman 12 months. (Yes, it was nonetheless price it for the view and swim, however regardless.) 

Compared to Second Dam, Treman feels much less like a Cornell ceremony of passage and extra like an precise small escape from campus.

The summer season swimming season at Treman runs from late June by way of Labor Day weekend, from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., so make your plans fast! It’s a couple of 25-minute drive from campus, with $10 parking, or you possibly can take Route 67 on the TCAT. I’d advocate getting there a bit earlier on particularly heat weekends when the swimming gap will get significantly busy. 

When I lastly ventured over in late August, a big picket signal learn the water was 63 levels Fahrenheit. And for Ithaca, I’ll take it. Was it chilly? Absolutely. Was that going to cease me from getting in? Apparently not. 

As quickly as you enter the park, the view is, no pun supposed, ‘gorgeous.’ 

There’s an enormous waterfall flowing into a big swimming gap with various depths, starting from the roughly 4-foot shallow finish to the greater than 10 toes deep “Lower Falls,” which has a diving board and lifeguard on obligation. The swimming gap can also be an amazing spot for a photograph alternative, whether or not you’re underneath the waterfall with buddies, sitting alongside the rocks or trying to seize the pure surroundings with out by accident dropping your cellphone into the water’s abyss. 

I did certainly need to get acclimatized within the shallower finish earlier than taking the adrenaline-inducing plunge off the diving board on the Lower Falls. Calling it an “acclimatization period” is a beneficiant approach of claiming I stood there questioning my selections earlier than forcing myself to dunk my total physique underwater. But it was greater than definitely worth the shivering and goosebumps to dive into the recent water beneath. 

I greater than advocate Treman for a day journey and picnic with buddies, or as a mini solo outing to dip your toes in and clear your thoughts as you ponder dropping that PE class you had been already barely convincing your self to observe by way of on. 

The heat weekends of Ithaca are transient. No one actually is aware of when the few 75 diploma Fahrenheit days we’ve been fortunate sufficient to obtain will flip into 30 levels in a single day.

So get pleasure from it whilst you can. Soak up nature. Take the plunge. It actually is beautiful.

---

Read More