Suddenly, my cell phone rang.
“Uh, Kenny?” (it was my wife, Dana, and - yes, my closest family and friends all still call me Kenny) “I think you’d bet- ter come home soon. The winds are really whipping. We just lost power here and the generator’s not starting up…”
Damn fuel pump!
I quickly drove the Lex back to the Lodge, packed up, handed in my room key to Graham and bade my apologies. “If there’s any place I’d like to be stuck in a blizzard, it’s here,” I assured him before departing.
Cruising back down Route 73 toward Interstate-87, now entering the Lake Champlain region, as Radar Love was coming on strong on the radio and I began singing along, I looked at my dashboard and my temperature gauge was pinned on red. Oh, no!
I pulled over at the closest trailhead and popped the hood. Steam billowed and the Lex hemorrhaged antifreeze onto the parking lot. Thankfully, I got an immediate phone connection to the NY state police and a patrol car was there to assist me in 15 minutes. “Yeah, I see this all the time on this stretch…”
The kind officer gave me shelter in his car as the winds began whipping light flakes, and the trees swayed in dancing unison. He called one Jacob Ashe from McGee’s Towing, who loaded up the Lex on his flatbed. “Well, I’ll call the one place you can stay, The Westport Hotel.”
“Does it have Wi-Fi?” “Yep.”
“Food?” “Yep, there’s a restaurant on the premises. It serves breakfast and really good dinners.”
“Do they have beer?” “Yep, a full bar. Oh, and there’s a brand-new brewery across the street.”
Okay, maybe “roughing it” wouldn’t be quite so rough after all!
After calling home and telling my wife about my situation, I walked across the street to Ledge Hill Brewing Company, a simple plywood-y watering hole with a very drinkable IPA, and cool locals who are apt to welcome solo stranger’s com- ing in from the cold. While there I met, among other locals, Kim Reillly, execu- tive director for the Depot Theatre; a community theater that’s attached to the Westport Amtrak station.
General manager, Donnie, quickly found me a comfortable front room (“Twin Peaks” reads the sign over the door) and this is where I stayed - one night because my car was in the local shop getting a new $700 water pump, and one more night due to the big bomb cyclone of 2018. The New York State Thruway was closed, man!
The Westport Inn has a homey, clean tavern where general manager Donnie morphs into cook Donnie, turning out everything from homemade meatloaf to fish tacos to mac and cheese to mighty good chicken parmesan tenders.
My wife, daughter, dog, and our love bird (who lived those two nights in a
still-warm closet), braved the cold with blankets, sort of enjoying the bundled- up snuggling of it all.
As I finally walked in the front door at 5:00 pm that Saturday afternoon (three- and-a-half days after departing), the power immediately snapped back on.
What did I learn from my Adirondack excursion?
I discovered alluring aspects of an area with some of the most beautiful forests and mountain ranges in the entire coun- try; I learned how much is offered in the way of hospitality services in that region, and to consider replacing my next car’s water pump before it breaks, since they typically last for a hundred thousand miles or so.
The Lex is still running (she broke the 200K mark just last week), and my 16- year old daughter is now driving it. And, my new Lexus (an NX200 turbo) is ready for another venture northward; unless, of course, there’s a blizzard waiting for me on the other end of the road.
Ken Alan is a corporate concierge for CBRE. He is the founding member of the Philadelphia Area Concierge Association and the lead restaurant reviewer for Main Line Today.
ken.alan@
cbre.com
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