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So Much Work to Be Done

Barbara McMartin
Opinion
Ferris Lake Wild Forest, Giant Mountain Wilderness, Hammond Pond Wild Forest, High Peaks Wilderness, Hoffman Notch Wilderness, Hudson Gorge Wilderness, Hurricane Mountain Wilderness, Jay Mountain Wilderness, North Country National Scenic Trail, Pharaoh Lake Wilderness, Shaker Mountain Wild Forest, Siamese Ponds Wilderness, Silver Lake Wilderness, West Canada Lake Wilderness, Wilcox Lake Wild Forest

Part 4 of 4 I believe that it is important to know the history of Adirondack trails in order to participate in the public process of creating plans for the units of the park. So, I have written this to give perspective to those who will do the planning.

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An Advocate for Trails

Barbara McMartin
Opinion
Black River Wild Forest, Ferris Lake Wild Forest, History, Independence River Wild Forest, North Country National Scenic Trail, Northville-Placid Trail, Siamese Ponds Wilderness, Silver Lake Wilderness, Wilcox Lake Wild Forest

Part 3 of 4 Here this account takes on a new perspective, because I view what happened during the past quarter century as one who was actively involved. In the early 70s I completed my graduate work, started hiking again, and became an advocate for trails. As an advocate for dispersing hikers throughout the Park, I was frustrated from the start in ways I never expected.

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Trails in the Mountain Pleasure Grounds

Barbara McMartin
Knowledge
Ferris Lake Wild Forest, Five Ponds Wilderness, Giant Mountain Wilderness, High Peaks Wilderness, History, Hoffman Notch Wilderness, Jessup River Wild Forest, Lake George Wild Forest, Northville-Placid Trail, Shaker Mountain Wild Forest

Part 2 of 4 The Laws of 1895 authorized the state to lay out paths in the newly created Adirondack Park. There is little evidence that anything was done at that time. In 1909 Governor Hughes advocated trails and roads to give greater access to the “mountain pleasure grounds.” As it turned out, recreational trail building by the state began a few years later, not because of Hughes’ plans, but in a rather circuitous way.

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Join AWA for Second Wilderness Webinar

Adirondack Wilderness Advocates
Events

Join us for our second Wilderness Webinar, beginning at 7:00 pm on Wednesday, September 1, 2021. Long-time AWA member and board member Ari Epstein will walk through the proof-of-concept Visitor Use Management Tool he has been developing, which could someday be implemented at popular trailheads to support adaptive management in the Adirondack Park.

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A Short History of Adirondack Trail Building

Barbara McMartin
Knowledge
Five Ponds Wilderness, Ha-de-ron-dah Wilderness, Hammond Pond Wild Forest, High Peaks Wilderness, History, Moose River Plains Wild Forest, Pharaoh Lake Wilderness, Pigeon Lake Wilderness, Sentinel Range Wilderness, Siamese Ponds Wilderness, Silver Lake Wilderness

Part 1 of 4 Hindsight is wonderful! With what we know about the Adirondacks today and what we know about building trails, we could devise the most wonderful trail network, one that would protect the fragile slopes of the High Peaks, take hikers to mountaintops all around the Park, and ameliorate problems of overuse and under-use.

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A Message to the Adirondack Wilderness Community

Tyra Olstad
Enjoyment, Opinion
Boreas Ponds, High Peaks Wilderness

When I moved to Upstate New York in 2013, acquaintances kept telling me about the Adirondacks, how magical they are, with their steep-sided mountains and layers of forest, mirror-calm lakes and clear-flowing creeks; bears, moose, loons. Having lived most of my adult life in the West and coming to New York from interior Alaska, I was skeptical, but hopeful. Could there really be such a large protected area in the Eastern U.S.?

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Cotton Lake: The Wilderness No One Knows

Bill Ingersoll
Opinion, Protection
Black River Wild Forest, Cotton Lake Wilderness (Proposed)

The preferred method for preserving the “Cotton Lake Wilderness” as a state-recognized wilderness is to remove the quotation marks – for the APA board to take definitive action and reclassify the land per the procedures set in place by the SLMP. Doing so would elevate Cotton Lake to equal status with the nearby West Canada Lake and Ha-de-ron-dah areas.

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The Company I Keep

Bill Ingersoll
Enjoyment
West Canada Lake Wilderness

As he ate the moose slowly moved toward shore, unperturbed by his mucky environment, his ears occasionally flicking away a nuisance fly. From what I could make out through the camera’s viewfinder his bulbous nose spent much time in the water. Then he would lift his head up, displaying his broad rack like hands splayed in supplication. They looked ponderous, an evolutionary over-indulgence, even if I already knew that evolution had produced much larger racks on other cervids lost to extinction.

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