When I moved to Western New York for the summer, I hoped I’d be able to take my camper out a few times. Though it hasn’t been as frequent as I would have liked, I did get to go on a quick overnight this weekend to Letchworth State Park, which is about an hour and a half from Buffalo and an hour south of Rochester.
Letchworth State Park is a pretty spectacular place. It was voted by USA Today as the number one state park in the U.S. in 2015. It boasts three huge waterfalls in a deep gorge that the Genesee River flows through. They bill themselves as the “Grand Canyon of the East” which is probably a BIT of a stretch (I grew up in Arizona and spent parts of every summer at the REAL Grand Canyon, so I’m a bit of a snob when it comes to comparisons!)
All in all though, it was fabulous. I was only there for 24 hours, but got a great night of sleep (albeit a bit hot, it was an unseasonable 80+ degrees when I went to bed at 10pm, but an overnight rainstorm cooled things down).
The campsite was pricey (by my standards…). I paid $28 for a less than ideal site with noisy neighbors in a State Park, but I didn’t have reservations, and had to pay extra for being out-of-state. Oh well. The bathrooms were clean, I had a nice place to sleep for the night and because my camper is amazing, it took me less than five minutes to pack up in the morning.
In the morning, I explored the park. A short drive took me to a number of scenic overlooks of the gorge. I hiked to lower falls. It was an easy half mile or so each way, and the view was pretty spectacular, being below the rim of the massive gorge.
I also saw middle falls, which is incredibly spectacular, but less fascinating to me because I was viewing it from above and couldn’t take in the magnitude quite as much.
Having visited Niagara Falls in the past, even though the falls in Letchworth aren’t as big, they are much more beautiful in my book. I’d say it’s the lack of casinos and tourist traps that make a state park more appealing to me
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I’m so glad I had the opportunity to visit Letchworth during my summer adventure in Western New York. I’m still in the planning stages, but am heading to the Adirondacks, Vermont and Acadia National Park in Maine in August before I head home to Charlotte.
Teardrops & Ales 