| Popolopen | |
|---|---|
The memorial atop Popolopen Torne in 2006, facing northwest, with Cranberry Brook and the military reservation below. |
|
| Elevation | 942 ft (287 m) |
| Location | |
| Location | Highlands, Orange County, New York, USA |
| Range | Hudson Highlands |
| Topo map | New York New Jersey Trail Conference #119 |
| Climbing | |
| Easiest route | Hike |
Popolopen is the name of several related landmarks mainly within the Hudson Highlands of Orange County, New York. These include a mountain, Popolopen Torne—or simply "The Torne"[1][2] and a short and steep-sided nearby valley officially called Hell Hole, but often Popolopen Gorge. Popolopen Creek runs through this valley and Popolopen Bridge spans its mouth at the Hudson River and is crossed by Route 9W. Popolopen Lake lies at the headwaters of its namesake creek. Despite local usage, the United States Board on Geographical Names recognizes only the lake, creek and bridge as bearing the name "Popolopen." [1]
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Popolopen Torne (officially called merely "The Torne") is a small mountain with a relatively sharp and bald peak, part of the Hudson Highlands, with a summit 942 feet (287.12 meters) above sea level.[1] The blue-blazed, horseshoe-shaped Timp Torne trail makes a loop from Mine Torne Road to the summit and back again. Its short and steep ascent for hikers affords 360° views of the Hudson River, West Point, Bear Mountain, and Harriman State Park. U.S. Route 6 passes through the valley formed between Popolopen Torne and Bear Mountain just before it reaches the Bear Mountain Bridge.
A cairn stands at the summit as a memorial to members of the U.S. Armed Forces. Hikers can carry rocks with them from the base of the mountain to the top and add them to the pile, and rocks are often painted with unit insignia and other messages. A homemade sign detailing its creation and meaning was originally attached to the monument, later replaced by an engraved marble plaque.
Lake Popolopen is a lake northwest of the mountain, on the West Point Military Reservation near New York State Route 293. Camp Buckner and Camp Natural Bridge are located at Popolopen, and the lake is a common site for training and recreation. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, cadets from West Point would leave the reservation each August for a three-day war game dubbed "the Battle of Popolopen".[3] The lake was also the site of a summer camp and was used exhaustively to supply water for nearby mining operations. During World War II, after the land was purchased for exclusive military use, the remains of the summer retreat became Camp Popolopen, a POW camp for German prisoners.[4] After the war, the name was changed to Camp Buckner.
The lake comprises the largest body of water at West Point, and is used for aquatic training such as scuba diving and amphibious assault.[5]
Lake Popolopen is the setting for the murder mystery Dress Gray by Lucian Truscott IV, grandson of U.S. Army General Lucian Truscott, Jr.[6]
Popolopen Creek—also called Popolopen Brook[5]—is a stream, fed mainly by Lake Popolopen, Stillwell Lake, and Weyant's Pond, eventually draining into the Hudson River. It runs mainly through West Point and ends in a gorge between Bear Mountain and Popolopen Torne, officially called Hell Hole and popularly known, somewhat interchangeably, as Popolopen Gorge.
Local usage applies "Hell Hole" to a series of small plunge pools within this gorge, although the usage contradicts the U.S. Geological Survey maps and other widely used sources.[7][8][9][10][11]
In a paper published in 1950, the geologist K.E. Lowe wrote that the gorge known as Hell Hole is the result of a fault within a regional intrusion of crystalline rock called Storm King granite. Yet he added: "Despite painstaking investigation, the writer found only one outcrop revealing direct evidence of faulting. A badly weathered, unhealed zone of crushed Storm King granite is exposed in the south wall of upper Hell Hole. Its continuation is unfortunately lost under debris from the construction of [highway] US 6 which mantles most of the Bear Mountain side of the valley." [2]
For most of its length through the gorge, the creek is narrow and extremely rocky, with fast moving rapids and several waterfalls. It can only be reached on foot and is not generally navigable by boat.
The red-blazed Popolopen Gorge Trail runs along the south side of the creek to a foot bridge just south of Popolopen Torne. Here, it joins the blue-blazed Timp-Torne, 1777 West and 1779 Trails. These run along the north side of the creek from Hell Hole to the bridge, with the Timp-Torne detouring over the summit of Popolopen Torne. They cross the footbridge and join the Popolopen Gorge Trail to detour around West Point property, and the combined trails turn southwest and follow the valley of Queensboro Brook. On October 6, 2002, New York Governor George Pataki dedicated a long suspension foot bridge which spans the creek a short distance further downstream.[12] The foot bridge connects the Twin Forts Trail to its intersection with the Appalachian Trail on the western side of the Bear Mountain Bridge.[11]
Some few advanced kayakers are said to have run through this gorge at flood stage, but the rather dangerous and doubtful nature of this enterprise has helped make such descents quite unusual.
On 8 June 2008, a man was arrested for parachuting into the creek from the 9W overpass, called Popolopen Bridge. He was charged with disorderly conduct, unauthorized use of an aircraft (the parachute), and unauthorized swimming. His two assistants were also charged with unauthorized swimming for pulling him out of the water.[13]
A girl of sixteen suffered a head injury when she fell from a cliff over Hell Hole on 20 July 2008 and died three days later.[14] She had been with a swimming party although swimming in the creek is forbidden by park authorities.[15]
During the American Revolution, the mouth of Popolopen Creek was spanned by a pontoon bridge [3]. Much later, the road north from Hessian Lake to Fort Montgomery once crossed the lower part of the gorge by an iron bridge. The steep descents into the gorge and sharp turns onto this bridge made it dangerous for auto traffic, and the road (then Route 3, renumbered U.S. Route 9W in 1930) was rerouted over a high steel viaduct further downstream, near the site of Fort Montgomery, in 1916. Another bridge was built immediately adjacent in 1936.[16]
Called Popolopen Bridge, the 1936 structure is of the deck truss design, more than 600 feet long, 48 feet wide, and rises about 150 feet above the mouth of Popolopen Creek. As of 2000, its average daily traffic was about 18,000 vehicles. Although rehabilitation was performed in 1992, additional work aimed at repairs was completed in 2007. [4] [5].
The 1916 bridge was demolished in the 1950s, although its high stone abutments remain.[17]
Iron mining and smelting once took place along the upper reaches of Popolopen Creek. The Forest of Dean Mine produced iron ore from the Revolutionary era into the twentieth century, operating a narrow gauge railroad along the creek as far as the eastern slopes of Popolopen Torne. The mine site is now submerged under Stillwell Lake. Queensboro Furnace, located just above the outlet of Queensboro Brook into the creek, smelted iron during the late eighteenth century. The remains of the furnace have been preserved but are located on the grounds of the West Point Military Reservation.
A grist mill was built in 1799 by Eugene Lucet, just above the later site of the Route 9W crossing.[17] A dam was built upstream in 1901, just above the old Hell Hole bridge, to improve the water supply to the mill. The dam is still intact today, and water pools behind it when the creek flow exceeds that of the outlet near the bottom. This intermittent body of water is marked Roe Pond on some maps although at least one other pond in the area has that name. The mill was later converted to a hydroelectric plant, and was demolished in the 1950s.[17]
An aqueduct was built on the north side of the gorge in 1906 to bring water from Queensboro Brook and Popolopen Creek to West Point.[18] Another was built on the south side in 1929–30 to supply Bear Mountain State Park with water from Queensboro Lake.[19] Repairs to the latter were to result in the closing of the combined Popolopen Gorge–1777 West–1779–Timp-Torne Trails from the fall of 2008 to spring 2009.[20]