Long Path
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| Long Path | |
|---|---|
 Long Path mileage sign in Palisades Interstate Park |
|
| Length | 347.25mi; 559km |
| Trailheads | Fort Lee, New Jersey Indian Ladder State Park, New York |
| Use | Hiking |
| Highest Point | Slide Mountain |
| Lowest Point | Sparkill Creek |
| Trail Difficulty | Moderate to Strenuous |
| Season | Spring to Fall |
| Sights | New Jersey Palisades, Harriman State Park, Shawangunk Ridge, Catskill Mountains |
| Hazards | Severe weather Poison ivy |
The Long Path is a 347.35-mile (559 km) long-distance hiking trail running from George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee, New Jersey to Altamont, New York, in the Albany area. While not yet a continuous trail, relying on road walks in some areas, it nevertheless takes in many of the popular hiking attractions west of the Hudson River, such as the New Jersey Palisades, Harriman State Park, the Shawangunk Ridge and the Catskill Mountains. It offers hikers an incredible diversity of environments to pass through, from suburbia and sea-level salt marshes along the Hudson to wilderness and boreal forest on Catskill summits 4,000 feet (1219 m) in elevation.
When originally conceived in the 1930s, it was to be the antithesis of a hiking trail, with neither a designated route nor blazes, simply a list of points of interest hikers could find their own routes to. However, increasing development after World War II in Orange and Rockland counties made that less workable, and it was revived in the 1960s as a standard trail. Future plans call for it to be extended through the Adirondacks to the Canadian border.
Contents |
[edit] History
[edit] Conception
Vincent Joseph Schaefer, a scientist who worked in Schenectady, New York for General Electric, began to imagine a "hiker's route" from New York City to the Adirondacks shortly after helping to found the Mohawk Valley Hiking Club in 1929. He was very clear on one thing: that it not be marked as a trail.
"Schaefer envisioned resourceful hikers making use of what they found along the way," say historians Guy and Laura Waterman — whether hikers' trails, back roads, abandoned wood roads, tow paths, creek beds, game trails, plus occasional bushwhacks where that appeared to offer the most interesting route." They quote him describing the Long Path as:
...[A] route that a person having good "woods" sense could use to move across a region using compass and "topo" map, and that in a meandering way would lead such persons to most of the interesting scenic vistas, rock formations, choice or unique vegetation, historical sites and similar items that a certain type of outdoors person enjoys
He wrote to an official at Harriman that:
There would be no cutting or blazing, for this trail would be a truly wild walk that wouldn't erode the land or scar the solitude ... and each found site would be an adventure in orienteering.
[edit] Implementation
He named his idea the Long Path after Walt Whitman's line about "the long brown path that leads wherever I choose" from his poem Song of the Open Road. Since that was also where Raymond H. Torrey, the New York Post's influential hiking columnist, had gotten the name for his column, it was a smart public relations choice. Torrey, who had done much to get the Appalachian Trail built, both physically and in print, in the New York metropolitan area the previous decade, announced the idea in a column in 1933. Another strong advocate in the early days was a transplanted Coloradan, W.W. Cady, who came to be identified with the LP almost as much as Schaefer himself.
He and Torrey, who devoted a series of columns to it the next year, scouted a route from the city to the Catskills, while Schaefer and his brother did the same for the "trail"'s northern half, envisioning an end at Whiteface Mountain in the Adirondack High Peaks.
To Schaefer, once this route was scouted, it was finished, per his concept ... "(it) exist(s) as soon as the route had been field explored and then marked on a topo map, and so had become available to the person who appreciates such things." However, very few of these people could be counted among the hiking community of the day, to whom a trail was something to follow, and they had difficulty grasping the concept that the trail was open. Few, if any, people tried to hike it, and as Schaefer and Cady became involved in the war effort and drifted away from the hiking community afterwards, the idea of the Long Path as originally conceived quickly became part of history.
[edit] Resurrection
In 1960, Robert Jessen of the Ramapo Ramblers hiking club, and another city-based hiker, Michael Warren, revived the idea. Since Rockland and Orange counties had become more developed even then, they abandoned the original concept of a unmarked route and pushed instead a conventional trail, although it had to make use of road routes. Over the next two decades they were successful in establishing a continuous trail from the bridge to the southern Catskills, helped by a major relocation of the trail up Peekamoose Mountain and its continuation over Peekamoose's neighbor, hitherto trailless Table Mountain, crossing the East Branch of the Neversink River and enabling a link with the existing Catskill trail system.
The Catskill route was finally completed in 1987 when a trail was built connecting the snowmobile loop around Kaaterskill High Peak to Palenville. A further missing link, from the Sam's Point Preserve in the Shawangunks to VerKeederkill falls, was cut a decade later.
[edit] Expansion
As the lower trail neared completion to the northern boundary of Catskill Park at Route 23 in Windham in 1985, H. Neil Zimmerman of the New York - New Jersey Trail Conference renewed interest in the Adirondack connection. The Long Path North Committee was formed, and after some negotiations with area landowners eight miles (12.8 km) of trail were opened in 1990. By the middle of the decade, it would extend 75 miles (120 km) north of its former terminus, to the Indian Ladder in John Boyd Thacher State Park. In the early 2000s, five more miles (8 km) were opened and blazed to Route 146, and informal road blazes existed from there to the Mohawk and the Adirondack Park Blue Line.
[edit] The Long Path today
Perhaps reflecting its origins as a trail that wasn't really a trail, the Long Path in the early 21st century is a work in progress, continually evolving even in those places where it has long been a presence. Relocations continue to be made and new sections opened.
The central Catskills have seen the greatest activity. In 1999, trail crews completed work on a section starting at the Willow Trail near the summit of Mount Tremper near Phoenicia, descending down into the neighboring valley and then over "Edgewood Mountain" into Silver Hollow Notch, where it follows an old road down to Route 214. This section eliminated a lengthy road walk to Willow, albeit at the price of a two-mile road walk into Stony Clove Notch. However, this added Plateau Mountain to the trail route, and pending future approval from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and an amendment to the Unit Management Plan for the Indian Head Wilderness Area, a new section will be built to follow a ridge from Silver Hollow Notch to the Devil's Path on Plateau and eliminate that road walk.
To the south of Phoenicia, work is also continuing on a planned section to run from the Burroughs Range Trail near Wittenberg Mountain over adjacent peaks to Route 28 that would eliminate the road walk out of Woodland Valley State Campground. Hikers would still have to walk along the highway into Phoenicia and then back out to pick up the trail unless they wished to ford Esopus Creek.
Not long afterwards, the state purchased the former Lundy estate in the vicinity of Kerhonkson, 4,930 acres (19.7 km²) straddling the Catskill Park Blue Line near the southern tip of the park. The new property is to become a state forest outside the park and a new Wild Forest within it. It will also allow for the relocation of the Long Path off roads to follow the Ver Nooy Kill past some beautiful waterfalls.
In late 2001, the Catskill Center for Conservation and Development allowed the construction of a new trail across its Platte Clove Preserve. It was added to the Long Path, and allowed for a rerouting of the route along existing trails to take in Indian Head Mountain and its stunning views of the Hudson Valley, as well as eliminating a road walk that previously existed.
All these changes have combined or will to make the 94 miles (150 km) of Long Path in the Catskill Park almost entirely off-road.
In the Shawangunks, new agreements with landowners and/or changes in ownership have also made eliminations of road walks possible.
Further south, in heavily suburbanized Rockland County, where some road walks are now mostly unavoidable, the county's Planning Board has made the Long Path route an area of special attention and one of its spines for open space preservation efforts, trying to convince its local counterparts to protect the corridor.
North of the Catskills, the Long Path North Committee continues its efforts to bypass road walks and route the trail into more wooded areas, particularly the small state forests in Schoharie County. The main problem the trail faces there, ironically, is underuse ... some sections just north of the Catskill Park, particularly the magnificent climb up Huntersfield Mountain and its associated range, are getting overgrown and only the blazes remain to indicate the trail. Increasing public awareness of the trail and promoting use of various sections continues to be a concern.
Lastly, the southern end of the trail was moved to an information kiosk and parking area on the other side of the I-95 overpass at the bridge approach.
[edit] The Orange County problem
From the earliest days of the Long Path one of the most difficult issues has been how to get the trail across northern Orange County as a foot path. Between Schunemunk Mountain and the Shawangunks lies the broad valley of the Wallkill River and the many lowlands within, then and now heavily farmed.
While under Schaefer's original concept it might have sufficed to use the odd field road and hedgerow as shortcuts between dusty country roads, as a blazed trail it is a headache for two reasons:
First, private landowners who were willing at first to allow a trail to be cut across their property have in many cases revoked that permission or changed their mind about giving it in the first place due to increased civil liability concerns on the part of themselves and their insurance companies. While some changes in New York law have been made to accommodate those concerns, most take a wait-and-see attitude.
Second is the paucity of large tracts of open space, public or private, in that area that could be used. Today there are more options than there used to be, but for now the only major park of any kind that the trail takes advantage of in that region is Highland Lakes State Park, for which the Palisades Interstate Park Commission has never gotten around to developing or even planning, and thus the trail's approaches at either side of the park are poorly maintained and neglected. (To add to the confusion, blazes from earlier road walks can still be followed on roads south of Maybrook and in the village of Montgomery).
There are some encouraging future options. The creation of Stewart State Forest as a result of the late 1990s privatization of Stewart International Airport made another large tract of open land in the area available that had previously been closed to the trail; however that awaits the ultimate resolution of what is done with land still owned by the state Department of Transportation along Drury Lane pending the construction of the planned new exit along I-84. Another new relocation possibility has emerged using abandoned railbeds and other off-road routes in the Washingtonville area.
Despite this, the trail in northwestern Orange County, from Highland Lakes to the Shawangunks, still follows paved roads exclusively for 16.2 miles (26 km) and even the guidebook suggests that it might be a pleasant route for bicycling.
[edit] The Shawangunk Ridge Trail
One way of solving the Orange County problem, avoiding it entirely, came out the joint efforts of the New York - New Jersey Trail Conference and the National Park Service. In 1989, they conducted a feasibility study on the idea of abandoning northern Orange County altogether and simply having the trail follow the Appalachian Trail from the junction in Harriman to High Point State Park in northwestern New Jersey, where a new trail would then be constructed to link up with the current LP along the ridge near Wurtsboro. The result was the Shawangunk Ridge Trail, a 28.5-mile (49 km) connector which drew on a possible AT relocation that had first been considered in 1965, before the National Scenic Trails Act made it possible to protect the existing route.
It actually hugs the base of the ridge in some areas due to land-access issues, and has some road walks, but these are slowly being eliminated. The low-lying route in Sullivan County actually is something of a blessing, as it allows hikers to take in the magnificent Basha Kill Wildlife Management Area.
The AT-SRT detour is the route currently recommended by the Trail Conference for anyone considering a thru-hike of the LP, due to its better capacity for that purpose and fewer road walks, despite the additional 22 miles (35 km) it adds to the trip.
[edit] Management
The Long Path is currently under the purview of the Trail Conference, which divides it geographically into three sections:
- The Long Path South Committee for the areas south of the Catskills
- the existing Catskill Trails Committee for the Catskills
- and The Long Path North Committee.
As the areas under the jurisdiction of the latter are somewhat beyond the Trail Conference's usual reach in the Greater New York area, the Long Path North Committee functions somewhat independently. In the future, when the trail begins to extend into the Adirondacks, it is likely that the Adirondack Mountain Club or some other group based in the region will have management responsibilities for those sections.
[edit] Marking
Throughout most of its length, whether on or off the road, the LP is indicated by a 2-by-4-inch (5 by 10 cm) aqua blaze. In some areas where blazes have not been repainted in some time older, light blue blazes may be found, but the distinctive "parakeet" aqua (sometimes referred to, incorrectly, in some guidebooks as teal) indicates the Long Path, and only the Long Path.
In the Catskills and the state forests on the Shawangunk Ridge, the trail uses official NYSDEC markers — blue in the Shawangunks, and whatever color is used for the particular trail in the Catskills the LP follows. Markers with the LP logo (see above), either in aqua or blue (if older) can sometimes be found on signage at junctions where the LP changes trails.
The mile-long trail through the Catskill Center's Platte Clove Preserve follows green diamond-shaped metal markers with the Center's logo on it.
Finally, the section in Thacher State Park follows aqua plastic markers with the LP logo.
The Shawangunk Ridge Trail uses either the aqua blazes or blue NYSDEC markers, depending on whether it is on public or private land.
[edit] End-to-end
When it began to be established as a marked trail, the Long Path was not built with an eye toward being "thru-hiked" in one continuous trip, as it was more a backbone for creating hiking opportunities in areas which did not yet have them and thus ideal for day trips or short overnights. The Trail Conference did give out rockers for those who completed a tally sheet of trips made on different dates. The trail, even with the AT/Shawangunk Ridge detour available, did not easily lend itself for those from out of the region who would need access to maildrops and places to sleep in the areas where camping would not be permitted.
After several dozen hikers had earned these, it was perhaps inevitable that someone would be the Earl Shaffer of the Long Path, and on May 30, 1998, Mary Ann Nissley of Chalfont, Pennsylvania, a woman with experience hiking many long-distance trails, completed the first Long Path thru-hike in 25 days. Several others have followed since. To date all LP thru-hikers have gone from the GWB to the Mohawk; there is no reason not to try the journey southbound, but no one has yet.
The current Long Path guidebook now has information on nearby post offices, motels and other things useful for those contemplating a thru-hike.
On May 24, 2005, trail runner David O’Neill, the founder of Charity Runners Inc., finished the first thru-run of the Long Path, as a benefit for the Trail Conference. He had started on the first of the month; his time of 24 days is the current record for fastest journey up the Long Path (This included five days where he rested and allowed injuries to heal, and one day he did as a normal hike).
On May 13, 2006, O'Neill repeated the benefit thru-run and became the first to complete a thru-run of the Long Path using the AT-SRT detour. He started on the first of the month and completed the 369 mile journey in 12 days, 5 hours, and 17 minutes.
[edit] Route
[edit] Fort Lee to Harriman State Park
Currently, from its new beginning just slightly south of the old one, the LP goes over the bridge approach and then a pedestrian bridge over a ramp from the bridge to Palisades Interstate Parkway. After that, it enters the park along the cliff edges that it will remain in for the next 12.7 miles (20.4 km) to the state line, running through the woods next to Palisades Parkway at times and even passing through some of its rest stops and parking areas.
Once past the stone monument at the state line, it briefly dips back into New Jersey, then moves closer to Route 9W near Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, then heading for Tallman Mountain State Park, where it climbs the eponymous feature, then descends to the trail's lowest elevation, a mere 5 feet (1.6 m) above sea level as it crosses Sparkill Creek on a wooden bridge.
Climbing and crossing 9W again, it passes through the low hills in and near two county parks as it climbs up toward Blauvelt State Park, then drops into Nyack, where it crosses the New York State Thruway for the first time. After passing through Mountainview County Nature Park, it follows 9W for a mile or so, then leaves it for Hook Mountain State Park and its dramatic views over the Hudson's Haverstraw Bay. It then drops down to the small Haverstraw Beach State Park and follows a road out of it into High Tor State Park, where the bare summit of the tor, the highest peak of the Palisades at 832 feet (253.5 m) affords the best views of this section of the Hudson Valley.
After High Tor, it stays on the ridge of South Mountain County Park as it curves away from the river, toward a crossing of Palisades Parkway, US 202 and NY 45 in Mount Ivy. Again, the trail follows along in the woods along the parkway's right-of-way until it can enter Cheesecote Town Park. After that, it's a short road walk that finally allows the trail to enter Harriman State Park.
[edit] Harriman to the Shawangunks
The trail meanders through this southern part of the park, briefly joining with the cross-park Suffern-Bear Mountain Trail, passing St.-John's-in-the-Wilderness Church, and finally reaching Seven Lakes Drive at Lake Skannatati. North of there, it briefly joins the Dunning Trail and wanders among the ruins of an abandoned iron mine and joins the Arden-Surebridge Trail at the junction colloquially called Times Square. Leaving it to run alongside Dismal Swamp, it crosses the Appalachian Trail not long afterwards, then continues north towards the Lake Cohasset Shelter where camping is permitted. It then runs along the crest of Stockbridge Mountain, passing the Stockbridge and Stockbridge Cave Shelters, and afterwards works its way down to US 6 by way of a fire road.
It follows an access road into a parking area, then climbs up Long Mountain to a memorial in honor of and at a favorite view of Raymond H. Torrey, who did much to make the trail possible. Then it heads westward, skirting at times the boundary of the United States Military Academy (West Point) property, crossing NY 293 and following it and later Route 6 closely in neighboring woods until it can finally leave Harriman Park behind and drop down to local roads in the Central Valley area, cross the Thruway again to NY 32 and Schunemunk Mountain.
On Schunemunk, it ascends some subsidiary knobs with sweeping views of the whole area, and eschews the summit for a drop down and then up again to the peak's western ridge, where it passes through some unique, rocky pitch pine stands, and drops off it to local roads and an abandoned Erie railbed, which bring it to NY 94. After passing through and around Washingtonville on a combination of roads and railbeds, it follows local back roads past Campbell Hall, over the Wallkill River and under I-84 to Highland Lakes State Park.
After following old roads, horse trails and passing the two lakes that give the park its name, it emerges and once again follows local roads through Bullville, into Sullivan County and finally back into the woods where it meets the Shawangunk Ridge Trail.
[edit] Shawangunks and southern Catskills
The trail stays in the ridgecrest, mostly, as it works its way into Ulster County and briefly follows NY 52 as it descends towards Ellenville, then climbs up to Cragsmoor and the ridge crest again, following local streets to Sam's Point Preserve.
After following some of the old dirt roads from the days when the nearby ice caves were a tourist attraction, the trail follows a recently cut route through the dwarf pine forest to VerKeerderkill Falls. This section has been identified as their favorite by many who have hiked much or all of the Long Path, as the shortness of the trees gives a feeling of being above treeline and allows for constant views of the ridge ahead and behind, Mid-Hudson valley to one side and the Catskills to the other. The falls themselves are also a unique sight. The trail is currently closed between VerKeerderkill Falls and Mud Pond, and a detour via High Point is necessary. However, this land in this area has recently (March 14, 2006) been added to the Minnewaska State Park Preserve and this section will presumably be re-opened.
The forest returns to normal as the trail then makes its way toward Minnewaska State Park Preserve and its many rocky scrambles, cliffs and lakes. Awosting Falls is a highlight of this section.
From there the trail slowly begins to dip off the ridge, finally joining US 44 and NY 55 to cross Rondout Creek and US 209 at Kerhonkson. Currently, it follows little-traveled local roads from there to the Catskill Park Blue Line.
Shortly after entering the Catskills, it reaches VerNooy Kill Falls, another popular day trip. It then climbs over Bangle Hill in the Sundown Wild Forest and descends steeply to a state campground at Bull Run.
One of the most challenging sections of the Long Path is ahead as it meets its first two Catskill High Peaks, climbing more than 2,600 feet (792 m) in 4 miles (6.4 km) to the summit of Peekamoose Mountain, then cresting neighboring Table after a brief dip.
From there it drops down to cross the East Branch of the Neversink River and then back up again slightly to a junction with the Phoenicia-East Branch Trail and the east end of the Finger Lakes Trail. It follows the Phoenicia-East Branch Trail up to a col to the east of Wildcat Mountain, then up the beautiful Curtis-Ormsbee Trail to the summit ridge of Slide Mountain, where the Burroughs Range Trail takes it a short distance to the highest peak in the Catskills and the highest point on the LP, approximately 4,180 feet (1,277 m) above sea level.
It makes a rough descent over Cornell and Wittenberg down to Woodland Valley State Campground, then follows the road out to Phoenicia.
[edit] Central and northern Catskills
Crossing NY 28 and going through Phoenicia, an oasis of civilization amid the mountains, the Long Path follows a road east out of town to the trailhead for Mount Tremper, where it follows the old road up to the fire tower, which offers splendid views of the entire region. Continuing on down to Warners Creek and then up Edgewood Mountain, where views north have been cut, it drops down again via Silver Hollow Notch to follow NY 214 to Stony Clove Notch and the Devil's Path, perhaps the most challenging and rewarding trail in the Catskills, over Plateau, Sugarloaf, Twin and Indian Head mountains down to the Platte Clove Preserve, then a brief road walk to the Kaaterskill High Peak snowmobile trail. On the north side of that peak, the Long Path descends more than 2,000 feet via a zigzag route past several waterfalls to Palenville, crosses NY 23A then goes back up the other side of Kaaterskill Clove via the Old Overlook Road to the Escarpment Trail, the site of the legendary Catskill Mountain House, North-South Lake State Campground, and finally up to North Mountain with its inspiring views back over the Escarpment and the lakes.
Eventually the trail tops out on 3,420-foot (1,042.4 m) Stoppel Point near an old wrecked plane, then drops down into Dutcher Notch and then back up to a ridge culminating in a steep ascent up Blackhead Mountain and its 3,940-foot (1,201 m) summit, then down again to Acra Point, Burnt Knob and finally Windham High Peak, the northernmost of the Catskill High Peaks. Descending leisurely to NY 23, it leaves the Catskill Park but not the Catskills, as it immediately goes over several ranges of 3,000-foot (914 m) peaks to Huntersfield Mountain, where NYSDEC has cut some stupendous views near the summit.
[edit] The Long Path North
From Huntersfield the trail makes its way via a combination of roads, woodlots and field edges to Schoharie Reservoir and then enters the county of the same name. First stop is Mine Kill State Park and its waterfall, then the trail crosses through the woods to Lansing Manor at the Blenheim-Gilboa Power Project. It dips down into the Schoharie Creek valley and crosses to Eminance and Patria state forests on the other side, then up NY 30 to Vroman's Nose, a popular local hike.
Afterwards, it crosses the village of Middleburgh and follows NY 145 briefly to climb the Middleburgh cliffs, then makes its way across Cotton Hill and Cannady state forests to Albany County, where it takes in the Partridge Run Wildlife Management Area, Cole Hill State Forest and the 270-degree view of both the Catskills and Adirondacks from Roemer's High Point along the Helderberg Escarpment, which it follows north to Thacher Park, the Indian Ladder and finally its current end at NY 146.
[edit] References
- The Long Path Guide, fifth edition, New York-New Jersey Trail Conference, Mahwah, NJ, 2002 (revised 2005)
- Waterman, Guy and Laura, Forest and Crag: A History of Hiking, Trail Blazing and Adventure in the Northeast Mountains, Appalachian Mountain Club, Boston, Mass., 1989.
[edit] External links
- New York-New Jersey Trail Conference Long Path page
- Long Path North Hiking Club
- LPN page on Mary Ann Nissley's thru-hike.
- CNN story on Long Path at Trail Conference site
- End-to-End tally sheet (for trail circa 1997)
- Charity Runners account of David O'Neill's thru-run
- Harriman Hikers
