250 miles NE of New York City; 150 miles E of Niagara Falls; 90 miles SE of Rochester.
Two towns just south of the Finger Lakes proper give a taste of something different in this region known for its unique bodies of water and pastoral charms. Corning is a town of just 12,000 people, but in the Finger Lakes, as the headquarters of the Fortune 500 company Corning Inc., it's a big deal. Quite literally, it's the town that Corning built; the company, the original makers of Corningware, Pyrex, and now high-tech materials like fiber optics, has employed as many as half the town's population. Corning was once known as "crystal city" for its concentration of glassworks, and today glass is at the center of the town's attractions, at the world-renowned Corning Museum of Glass.
Elmira, a largely blue-collar town and southern gateway to the Finger Lakes, may not qualify as a stop on many itineraries, but it does offer a handful of nice surprises. The town, home to Elmira College, is known in select circles as the "soaring capital of the United States," a reference to its place in aviation history, and it also makes much of its association with the legendary writer and humorist Mark Twain, who wrote many of his most famous works while summering in Elmira. Fans of architecture will also delight in the surprising concentration of Victorian homes; Elmira is said to have more than any other area per capita in North America.
