Saturday, May 23, 2009

Black Mountain 2009

This past Friday I went up Black Mountain on the East side of Lake George from Black Mountain Point. This is a favorite trail of mine as it is a nice little trainer for the High Peaks and it has some real nice views of Lake George. Also, since this trail is for the most part accessed via the lake, it is usually quiet. I was not disappointed. In fact the trail showed very little signs of recent travel. The trail is clear with only a couple of small obstacles. However, as pleasant as the woods were, they were well populated with black flies, that got out of hand a couple of times. One nice part of the day was that I had the summit all to myself, which is a first in recent years. Even the black flies left me alone up there. This trail and a lot on the east side of Lake George do not get a lot of use and are great places to get away. I usually see less people of these trails than I do on the high peaks trails in the Adirondacks.

I want to mention a couple of things about our boat trip up to Black Mountain Point. We saw an otter not 30 feet from our boat in Warner Bay. I saw a pair of them last fall in there, but I was surprised to see one during the busy season. They must be getting used to people. The other thing that I want to mention is my feelings as we made the turn at 14 mile island heading into the Narrows and looked into Shelving Rock Bay at the Knapp Estate. Even the houses that are not part of the Knapp Estate, like Tommy Hilfiger’s House fit into the Old Adirondack feel that little corner of the Lake has for me. I really enjoy looking at these new and old homes that take me back to how I imagine the glory days of the Adirondack were. Anyway this area just takes me back I guess.

Oh and I checked on both my letterboxes and they are fine.

2 comments:

Jonathan Volks said...

Black Mountain is a great climb. I've never done it from the lake side before, only the other side. There is a couple of great lean-tos to stay in also at the base of the mountain.

Matt said...

Another nice way to do this area is to hike in from Dacy Clearing to Fishbrook pond. There are other ponds there as you know and most I think have at least one lean-to. Fishbrook has two plus a designated camping site