Canandaigua

The name is older than the city by a long way. It comes from the Seneca name for the village that stood on this spot, written down over the years as Kanandarque, Ganondagan, Ga-nun-da-gwa and, in modern transcription, tganǫdæ:gwęh, and it means the chosen spot, or at the chosen town. The Treaty of Canandaigua between the United States and the Six Nations of the Iroquois was signed here on November 11, 1794. The settlement split from the surrounding town to become the Village of Canandaigua in 1815 and a city in 1913, and it's the county seat of Ontario County, 10,576 people at the 2020 census.

The lake is the reason for everything. Canandaigua Lake is 15.5 miles long and a mile and a half wide, 10,750 acres of water with 35.9 miles of shoreline. It's the westernmost of the major Finger Lakes and the fourth largest, and it is the only source of drinking water for both the city and the town, so what comes out of the tap is lake. The city itself is small, 4.8 square miles at the north end of the water, about 24 miles southeast of Rochester, with the Town of Canandaigua wrapped around it on every side.

Down at the water, Kershaw Beach sits at the north end of the lake on Lakeshore Drive, and Canandaigua Lake State Marine Park has the boat ramps. Sonnenberg Gardens and Mansion is a Victorian mansion with 50 acres of gardens, kept as a state historic park inside the city limits. North Main Street is a historic district in its own right, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and so is the Canandaigua Historic District, which is the paperwork way of saying the old town is still here.

The Canandaigua crewneck in Boathouse Blue makes sense on a lake with 35.9 miles of shoreline. The Chosen Spot crewneck in Concrete is for people who know what the name means and quite like that you have to ask. Both come in Light Ice, which is the right call for a July afternoon at Kershaw Beach.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org