Just returned home from a getaway weekend to upstate NY. We stayed at a nice old inn at Ballston Spa. It was a package deal with a couples mineral bath and massage (my first). The young wife really liked the massage, but for me it was a big case of meh. Not unpleasant, but not as good as I had been led to believe it would be; I didn't really feel anymore relaxed than normal.
The weather was exceptional this weekend. Yesterday, after the massage, we drove into Saratoga Springs and ate lunch al fresco on the porch of the Van Dam hotel. It was amazing to see how upscale Broadway has become since I lived across the street 30 years ago (when I was in Navy nuclear power training in Ballston Spa).
This morning, we toured the battlefield at Saratoga and then drove over to Bennington, where we ate lunch before driving home. It was a pleasant surprise to be wandering about in a T-shirt in mid November.
Love Saratoga Springs!!!
Can't remember the address, but in 1966-67, when I was a district manager for 24 stores in upstate ny, vermont and northern ma, my office was on Broadway. The location was inside a second story castle-like round turret that hung over the sidewalk. It had windows on all sides, and was probably about 12 feet in diameter. Was living in Greenfield Ma at the time, so was at the office just once or twice a week... on the road the rest of the time. Always wondered if the office was still there.
Saratoga Springs was a lot less commercial then, I think. We eventually moved to Elnora, which became Clifton Park while we were there. Our free time was always spent in places like the harness track, the springs, the pool, the battlefield and later at SPAC, where we went for the grand opening. DW brought our four boys to the pool two or three times a week.
Saratoga was the gateway to my beloved Adirondaks where, with my scout troop, we climbed, canoed, camped and explored almost every weekend and a full week in the summers between 1970 and 1979.
(Chain of Lakes Old Forge to Tupper)
Oh yeah... and always, always when we went the actual springs... drank the medicinal waters, and brought home a bottle. Favorites were Hathorn Spring #3 and the Hayes Well Spring....
Sheesh... doesn't take much to trigger the memories. (Oh... and BTW, always managed to return home by way of the Skidmore Campus, for the view).
He tried them on while half awake during a night-time kidney break. 
if that is at all possible. 
