Reporter Summer 2007

NJSFS c/o P. Dellechiaie 241 Valley Ave. Walden, NY 12586-2526

The Intergalactic Reporter Summer, 2007

Forthcoming Events: BarbeCon 2007: July 13-16

We have campsite #1, the usual site, from noon, Friday, July 13 to noon, Monday, July 16 on camping permit # WAW 100622 (see below). The permit is reproduced in this guide. NJSFS will charge campers $5.00 per person per night and those attending the picnic but not camping $2.00 to defray the cost of the permit. (Hey, it's cheaper than what the park charges, especially if you arrive 1 or 2 per car.) Showing the gate attendant your copy of the camping permit should get you into the park free of charge even at times when the main parking lot by the beach is full and the park is closed to further visitors. In the event that the lot is closed, you'll have to park at the campsite and walk to the picnic. The footpath which goes up past the old iron mill, which you will have driven past on your way in to the campsite, leads past the boat launch area to the beach and picnic grove. The area by the old latrines is now a separate campsite. For those of you new to BarbeCon, neither the Park nor the Society (such as it is) will supply food or other drink than the water mentioned below. You are responsible for your own food/drink, although a lot of food gets swapped around at meals. Think of the dining arrangements as a series of potluck dinners and bring food accordingly. This is a tent-only campsite. There are no cabins and the on-campsite toilet/sanitary facilities consist of 2 composting toilets across the stream from campsite 3. These are now in semi-permanent buildings which are much nicer than the old Port-APotties. There’s a lot less smell and room to swing a dead cat, besides. There is now a permanent building to house bathrooms, showers, etc. at the beach. These may or may not be open outside of beach hours. The nearest potable water tap is at the ranger station/ park office. Due to the park’s elevation, daytime high temperatures vary between 60°F and 100°F (16-38°C), with nighttime lows between 50°F and 75°F (10-24°C.) While it is unusual for the weekend to be a complete washout, it does usually rain (anywhere from drizzle on up to supercell thunderstorms) sometime during the weekend. For more information, call Paul Dellechiaie at (845) 564-7123 (weekday evenings until midnight and days and evenings on weekends) or contact by email at [email protected] and [email protected]. The first address is my main address so try it first. If you don’t hear from me within three days or so, try the other two addresses— Roadrunner generally blocks all email from servers listed by some dumbass anti-spam service to which they subscribe. If you have the misfortune of being on one of them they will just send your email to the bit bucket and won’t notify either of us that they did so. Whichever address you send to, please mention BarbeCon and/or NJSFS in the subject line so I don’t blindly delete your email as spam.

TO WAWAYANDA STATE PARK -- HEWITT, NJ: FROM SOUTHBOUND NJ ROUTE 23: (SUSSEX COUNTY) In NEWFOUNDLAND, NJ, follow signs through jughandle for Route 23 northbound. See next paragraph. FROM NORTHBOUND NJ ROUTE.23: (MOST OF NEW JERSEY) At 2ND. RIGHT after the DAIRY QUEEN, turn onto UNION VALLEY RD. (Cty. Rte.513). Continue to WEST MILFORD, NJ. Just before the SHOP RITE, turn left to stay on UNION VALLEY RD. Just after the WEST MILFORD FLORIST, bear left at the fork onto WHITE RD. At the end, turn left onto WARWICK TPKE. The park is on the left about 2 miles past UPPER GREENWOOD LAKE, NJ. FROM NJ/NY ROUTE 94: (SUSSEX & ORANGE COUNTIES) Just west of the Shop Rite plaza (west of WARWICK, NY and east of the state line) turn SOUTH onto MOE RD. This road borders the right side of the parking lot as seen from ROUTE 94. The park is about 3 miles up on the right, past the Drive-In Theater and just past the state line. FROM NJ/NY ROUTE 17: (BERGEN & ROCKLAND COUNTIES) Immediately south of the village of SLOATSBURG, NY, take the ramp onto the road that passes over Rte.17. This is STERLING MINE RD. (Cty.Rte.72) in Rockland County. It becomes EAGLE VALLEY RD. (still Cty.Rte.72) in Orange county then SLOATSBURG RD. into Passaic county.). Continue past Ringwood State Park and Skyland Manor. Just past the Little League Field, then turn right onto MARGARET KING AVE. At the Tee, turn right onto GREENWOOD LAKE TPKE. (Cty.Rte.511). bear right when the road forks. (Greenwood Lake Sporting Goods is inside the fork.) In BROWNS, NJ (a.k.a. HEWITT, NJ), {it varies from map to map} the road changes into UNION VALLEY RD. (Cty.Rte.513). After the A&P on the left, bear straight onto WARWICK TPKE. There is a convenience store inside this fork. The park is on the left about 2 miles past UPPER GREENWOOD LAKE, NJ.

ONCE IN THE PARK: Proceed past the ranger station and tollbooth. (Your copy of the appropriate camping permit should get you in free, and should get you in to park at the campsite when the beach lot is closed.) TO THE CAMPSITE: Proceed on main road until you get to a culvert. Immediately after the culvert, turn left at "Group Camp Sites" sign. Continue until you see another culvert on the left and a big stone building on the right. Go over the culvert and then bear right. The campsite is #1, the 3rd. of 3. (See "It's a Jungle Out There" for walking directions from here to the picnic grove.) TO THE PICNIC AREA & BEACH: Instead of turning left after the culvert, continue on the main road until you see a large parking lot on the left. The picnic site is up the hill above this lot (to your left as you face the lake).

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WHAT TO DO WITH YOUR TENT: Purchase & Preparation: If you don't already have your tent, consider getting one sized for a party a couple of people bigger than yours. An under-filled tent is far less prone to become wet from condensed breath. (It's a volume to surface area ratio thing, of course.) Besides, wouldn't a bit of extra space be welcome. It's nice to be able to stretch out in one's sleep without getting wet from touching the walls and to dress in an upright position. The salescritter will likely try to sell you seam sealant and a groundsheet with the tent. Unless you already own these items, it's a good idea to buy them. Any tent is likely to leak through its seams given half a chance. It is also useful to have a genuinely waterproof layer between yourself and the soggy ground. Unless you bought an expensive tent, the pegs that came with it are probably worthless. The Nylon™ peg and Aluminum skewer types found at camping stores are both OK for grassy areas like those at Wawayanda. Also useful are a mallet for pounding the pegs in and an extractor for getting them out. Read the tent and sealant directions before proceeding. Set up the tent a few times on a nice day before the campout so you can pitch it quickly if you arrive in a storm or after dark. (Do you really want to push your luck with an unfamiliar tent in a cool, drizzly twilight? How about in a thunderstorm?) The last time you put the tent up, you should do so atop the groundsheet. Cut the groundsheet so that the tent overlaps it by an inch on every side. It's time now to apply the sealant to all the seams on the tent and on the rain fly (if there is one). Let it all dry thoroughly before repacking it. Site Selection: When you get to the campsite, pick a spot and decide on the tent's orientation. Don't pitch it in a low spot unless you're willing to wake up in a puddle. Don't point the flap into the prevailing wind or uphill (if you must pitch on a slope) as these are the directions from which water is most likely to invade the tent- and the flap is likely to act as a giant scoop in either case. Any protruding piece of ground cloth will likewise act as a funnel. Don't pick too steep or bumpy a patch of ground- you'll be sleeping on it. If you must pitch on a slope, sleeping head-up seems to be the best bet. Many people complain of headaches and/or sinus trouble after sleeping head-down. If you try to sleep across the slope, you'll probably wind up rolling down it. Pitching & Final Checks: Put the groundsheet down in the position and orientation you want the tent to occupy and set the tent upon it. (You did practice, didn't you?) Make sure that the groundsheet doesn't extend out past the edge of the tent floor at any point. Check that the rain fly doesn't touch the tent wall anywhere and that nothing inside the tent (including yourselves in your sleeping bags) touches it either. Even on rainless nights, the tent walls will probably get wet from breath condensation. There is still no such thing as a waterproof tent. Keep items that can be harmed by a little water off the floor. Even if the manufacturer says that the tent is freestanding, stake it down. It's bad form to roll your tent into the campfire in your sleep or to have it blow into the woods in a windstorm.

OBLIGATORY WARNINGS:

Camping is reasonably safe unless you go looking for trouble. Here's how to avoid a few of the more easily found kinds . . . Don't bring flaming objects like grills or gas lanterns into or near your tent. There's still no such thing as a fireproof tent. Even a flame-retardant tent will burn given sufficient provocation. Mind the sun. Keep your skin covered with a good sun block, or long clothing and a wide-brimmed hat. A good pair of ultraviolet blocking sunglasses will help preserve your eyes. Don't try to improvise a grill from old refrigerator shelves. Their plating often contains heavy metals, including Cadmium. Cooking heat releases these into your food in toxic quantities. The populations of small mammals in the park will likely be moderate because of the past couple of winters have been closer to average than the previous several unusually warm ones. Some few of the critters you encounter may be rabid. Rabid animals don't necessarily foam at the mouth or act "mad". Assume that any furry critters you meet have rabies— don't handle, corner, feed or harass them. In recent years, the campsite has been visited, at all hours of the day or night during the past few BarbeCons, by Black Bears seeking free meals. There was a bear hunt in New Jersey a couple of years back and Wawayanda Park was one of the major hunting grounds, so the bear population will likely be down from previous years. As bears go, the survivors are relatively laid-back and generally don't go looking for trouble, but you shouldn't ask for any by feeding them, playing with cubs, or keeping food and/or garbage lying around the campsite unattended. Keep all food either locked in your vehicle or slung high in a tree, not in or near your tent. All trash must go into the trashcans down by the road across the stream from the campsites. If a bear gets too close for comfort, make a loud noise- i.e. use a whistle, bang on a pot lid, rattle your key chain or just shout at the top of your lungs- and back away slowly. Remember, you are in the bear's home. By the way, the above rabies warning also applies to bears. Don't forget Lyme disease or the deer ticks that spread it. Because of the presence of hosts (see above), there is a bumper crop of deer ticks this year. Avoid long grass, wear long trousers tucked into your socks, or, at least, apply a good coating of a high "DEET" insect repellent to all exposed skin. Last, but not least, we’ve had a new entry in the reasons-you-might-want-to-soak-in-DEET contest for the past few years. It’s called West-Nile-like Encephalitis, a virus carried by mosquitoes from the birds that are its primary host. It has a low mortality rate among the elderly and the immunosuppressed, and may be anywhere from asymptomatic to flu-like in others.

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