Behold.

Ecce is Latin for "Behold". We are here in Barryville, New York for the weekend and the name of the bed & breakfast we are staying at has truly lived up to its name. We arrived last night at about 8pm & it was too dark to see much of anything. On the drive through the mountains, we kept saying to each other, "Wow, this must be incredibly beautiful!" We had no idea.

It was a double-edged sword, but I woke up this morning (last night?) at about 4am with a spitting headache. I couldn't go back to sleep and did various things, from pacing around our room to walking out onto the balcony and looking at the stars, despite the 25 degree temperature. This being said, I woke Mike up in time to see the incredible sunrise and fog over the Delaware River, 300 feet below.

Ecce is a 5 bedroom house that was purchased by Alan & Kurt about 2 years ago. They have another home nearby (as well as an apartment in the city), and after spending over a year remodeling, opened this house as a bed & breakfast. Alan helped close Arthur Anderson and soon after moved out here full time, while Kurt commutes from the city and stays on weekends. They are a lovely couple, extremely hospitable, and genuinely kind.

Every time we go outside the view takes our breath away. The sunset this evening was beautiful. Kurt is an incredible chef and made everyone (all 4 couples staying here this weekend) appetizers this afternoon before we all left for dinner, serving them in the "sun" room just off of the front porch. Mike & I spent quite a while talking to Steve and Anthony, a very nice couple from Brooklyn. Anthony works at Us Weekly as an editor and Steve is a theater director. I feel like I had a very boring life after our conversation with them. :) It was a little awkward being thrown into a forced social situation, but we were quickly at ease with our new friends. The whole bed & breakfast thing is definitely new to us, but I think we are sold.

Today was a little chilly (about 45 degrees), but crisp and bright. No complaints here. We absolutely love it here.

Rest and Be Thankful.

We took a long drive this afternoon, hugging the Delaware River for most of the drive. We are right in the corner of New York, New Jersey & Philadelphia, along the Catskill & Pocono mountain ranges. I think we stopped about 15 times to take pictures.

We can't get the pictures off of Mike's camera until we are home & have his cord, but let it be known that he was quite the photographer today. I'm sure that we'll have more beautiful pictures to post soon. I liked this picture I took of him.

We can hear the rapids from the river from the house. The air is fresh and clean. The sun shining into our room in the morning was unbelievably.

Somewhere along our drive we saw a field of cows. I love black and white cows for whatever reason, and insisted that we stop and take pictures. All dozen or so cows stopped and turned their heads towards me. I talked to them for a few minutes and we were on our way. Mike asked me if they were milking cows, but I assumed that they weren't due to the lack of visible udders. Hopefully they weren't for dinner. :/