nietzschescat
New member
We started on the Roaring Brook Trail and at the junction took the Mink Hollow Trail. There was a post at the trail junction, but the signs were missing. The trail was either ankle deep mud or wet leaves on wet rocks or running water.
After about an hour, we realized that we left our lunch/snacks in the van and had only our emergency food: 4 cliff bars and a box of honey sticks. We had plenty of water so we decided to keep going.
The trail comes to a nice rock ledge with a view point after about 1 1/2 hours. So we stopped there and took some pictures of the fog and when we decided to start walking again we had a hard time finding the trail because at that exact spot it's kind of a sharp switch back. We ended up realizing what the trail was doing, but got turned around and took the trail we had just come up on because the trail UP the mountain was heading down hill. It took awhile to realize our mistake since with all the wet leaves on wet rocks it was hard to take your eyes off your feet for too long. Eventually, we got ourselves turned around the right way and continued up the mountain.
There were quite a few trees blown down across the trail. We saw a little toad (pretty cool for November). The bridge over the Roaring Kill was missing it's handrails, so that was a little scary since it was wet.
The approach to the summit of Sugarloaf on the Devils Path involves a lot of scrambling up rocks, holding onto roots, etc. We were covered in mud by the end of the day. I was almost wishing for ice because we would have had at least some traction with crampons. The woods were just beautiful today with huge rocks and fog and spooky old beech trees.
It was a little less slippery on top of the mountain. There seemed to be more sand and sandstone and less mud, although at one point it was just water running down the trail.
We had no expansive views all day because of the fog, but it really made the day interesting.
The summit was like a nice walk in the woods and then the descent iwas more scrambling and sliding down rocks. Finally, we came to the junction with the Pecoy Notch Trail. We saw another toad, a large one this time. For some reason, the blue trail markers were very hard to spot today and with the trail covered with leaves it was a little slow going.
We arrived at the beaver dam and took some pictures.....again very nice with all the fog. We stopped just briefly at Dibble's Quarry and sat on the blue stone chairs and put the batteries in our head lamps. By now we are soaking wet and covered with mud to our knees, but it was so warm out all day that we never needed a jacket. All the snow was totally gone by the way.
The next bridge was more frightening than the first. It's rails were barely attached and the piles of rocks supporting the bridge were kind of off kilter and the logs making up the walkway were kind of starting to rot. We saw a bunch of turkeys there and also scared up what we think was a grouse.
We were happy to have our head lamps since it did get dark before we were out of the woods. We devoured our smoked salmon, dried pineapples and snack mix back at the van and stopped at the Stewarts in Tannersville for some coffee.
I love the Catskills.
After about an hour, we realized that we left our lunch/snacks in the van and had only our emergency food: 4 cliff bars and a box of honey sticks. We had plenty of water so we decided to keep going.
The trail comes to a nice rock ledge with a view point after about 1 1/2 hours. So we stopped there and took some pictures of the fog and when we decided to start walking again we had a hard time finding the trail because at that exact spot it's kind of a sharp switch back. We ended up realizing what the trail was doing, but got turned around and took the trail we had just come up on because the trail UP the mountain was heading down hill. It took awhile to realize our mistake since with all the wet leaves on wet rocks it was hard to take your eyes off your feet for too long. Eventually, we got ourselves turned around the right way and continued up the mountain.
There were quite a few trees blown down across the trail. We saw a little toad (pretty cool for November). The bridge over the Roaring Kill was missing it's handrails, so that was a little scary since it was wet.
The approach to the summit of Sugarloaf on the Devils Path involves a lot of scrambling up rocks, holding onto roots, etc. We were covered in mud by the end of the day. I was almost wishing for ice because we would have had at least some traction with crampons. The woods were just beautiful today with huge rocks and fog and spooky old beech trees.
It was a little less slippery on top of the mountain. There seemed to be more sand and sandstone and less mud, although at one point it was just water running down the trail.
We had no expansive views all day because of the fog, but it really made the day interesting.
The summit was like a nice walk in the woods and then the descent iwas more scrambling and sliding down rocks. Finally, we came to the junction with the Pecoy Notch Trail. We saw another toad, a large one this time. For some reason, the blue trail markers were very hard to spot today and with the trail covered with leaves it was a little slow going.
We arrived at the beaver dam and took some pictures.....again very nice with all the fog. We stopped just briefly at Dibble's Quarry and sat on the blue stone chairs and put the batteries in our head lamps. By now we are soaking wet and covered with mud to our knees, but it was so warm out all day that we never needed a jacket. All the snow was totally gone by the way.
The next bridge was more frightening than the first. It's rails were barely attached and the piles of rocks supporting the bridge were kind of off kilter and the logs making up the walkway were kind of starting to rot. We saw a bunch of turkeys there and also scared up what we think was a grouse.
We were happy to have our head lamps since it did get dark before we were out of the woods. We devoured our smoked salmon, dried pineapples and snack mix back at the van and stopped at the Stewarts in Tannersville for some coffee.
I love the Catskills.
