Kaaterskill High Peak - 3655 ft.

Sunday September 26th (Day 12)

Because of it's prominent view from the Hudson Valley, Kaaterskill High Peak was once believed to be the highest mountain in the Catskills. At 3655 ft., however it is actually only 22nd. Since there is no maintained trail to the summit, I chose to join in with another group hike. It also gave the guys a chance to see some of the eclectic group of people who climb these mountains.

The group leader for this one was Romanian and not quite as attentive to the weaker hikers in the group as the leader from last week. Unfortunately, right from the start I had a feeling of deja vu because there was one individual in the group who probably didn't need to be climbing mountains. She fell behind early on even though the trail towards the summit was just a moderate grade. The initial trail eventually meets up with a snowmobile trail that literally circles the summit on a flat ridge. The final push to the summit is a steep climb with several rock scrambles. Since I didn't want a repeat of last week's group hike and the drama of getting an injured member back down off the mountain, I asked the guys to help make sure that "Betsy" made it up and down safely. From that point on, the team work of four cops made that happen and we have forever coined the phrase "Betsying" a person or their equipment.

Plane crash on the side of the mountain. The official cause of the crash... "failure to maintain altitude" (isn't that the primary cause of every crash?)

Adam 3 at the summit.

A stone cairn, just in case you might miss the turn.

West Kill Mountain - 3880 ft.

Having had guests in for the last couple of days, I have fallen behind on posts. We've stayed very active doing a long trail hike on Saturday and an even longer group hike on Sunday, collecting two more summits in the meantime...

We staged one vehicle in the DEC parking area where the Devil's Path begins along Spruceton Rd. and took the other one several miles further down to the dead end. The hike started on the Diamond Notch Trail that I took to the summit of Southwest Hunter the other day. That gave us a chance to stop by Diamond Notch Falls for some pictures before we joined up with the Devil's Path and started the long steep climb up West Kill. Just prior to reaching the top, "Buck's Ridge Lookout" afforded some great views of the Black Dome Range and all the other northern peaks.

West Kill Mountain is one of the few summits in the Catskill's that actually has a sign marking the top. After a quick stop for pictures, we continued on the Devil's Path to the second climb of the day. At 3420 ft., St. Anne's Peak isn't high enough to qualify as one of Catskill 35's, but it stood in our way of reaching the end of the trail. After a short, steep climb to the top of this smaller mountain, we started a long, rocky, bone jarring descent into the Mink Hollow Valley. After about eight miles all together, we arrived at the welcome sight of my truck waiting in the parking lot.

Kaaterskill Falls and the Hudson River

On Friday, I was joined by my son Dave and two of his friends from work. I didn't want to scare them off right away so instead of jumping right onto the trail and up some big mountain, we opted for the scenic, but short trail to Kaaterskill Falls. The weather has been dry here in New York so there was much less water coming over the Falls than I have seen in the past. I did hear one of them comment, "I gotta tell you, I was breathing hard coming up that trail." It was only a half mile long. Wait until we do a six miler tomorrow. Only one mountain, but it should be interesting.

From there we drove into Kingston and took the Rip Van Winkle boat cruise down the Hudson. Since it was an unseasonably warm day in the high 80's and I specifically chose Fall to make this trip, it was a day better suited for being on a boat than sweating up the back side of a mountain anyway.

... and you get to see a couple of Light Houses and decent views along the way.

Southwest Hunter Mountain (3740 feet)

Southwest Hunter is the most recently added summit to the 3500 club. It was originally thought to be a sub-peak of Hunter Mountain, but since it fit the criteria of a separation of at least a half mile between summits and at least a 250' drop at the Col, it qualifies as a peak in its own right. It does not have a maintained trail to the summit, but the Devil's Path leads up out of Diamond Notch to an unmarked trail indicated by the stone cairn pictured below. It was not as steep of a trail like I have experienced the last couple of days, but once you entered the woods and started up hill, it went on "seemingly forever." A narrow and rocky trail that made footing incredibly difficult.

The summit canister is in the picture to the right..

The rock cairn that points to the summit..


Geiger Point is the only good view once you reach this rock ledge.

And Sarge could not resist jumping into the incredibly clear, but really cold mountain stream at the bottom of Diamond Notch Falls. Altogether about a six mile hike, but kind of bone jarring on the way down. Number 11 in eight days, 14 all together. Dave and two other Raleigh Police officers come in to join me tomorrow. Sarge was back with me on the trail today, but it will be nice to see some humans tomorrow...

Sugarloaf Mountain (3800 Ft.)

I overheard a couple of people that were on the group hike the other day who convinced me that Sugarloaf was one of the toughest summits no matter which side you came up from and since the guide book calls it 'suicide mountain", I decided to leave Sarge back at the cabin (and he was not too happy about that) and do it on my own. I chose to start at the same trail head as I did for Plateau yesterday. It is an unmarked, unmaintained old trail, but a much shorter start to the summit. From that point it was only 1.75 miles to the top. Unfortunately... uhh... yeah... straight up. Tough walk for an old man, but once again I made it.

The one nice thing is... at the summits, I actually get phone service, so I make all the calls that I can and take care of what little business a retired dude has to do. (like talk to my beautiful, lovely wife...)

Can I come home yet, please?

Sometimes you
have t0 g0 through the mountain....











The signs at the trail head at the top of the "old" Mink Hollow Trail.

One way goes right to Plateau, which was yesterday, today to the left up Sugarloaf. All on the "Devil's Path" which is appropriately named. Trust me on that one...

Plateau Mountain (3840 Ft)

I actually planned this hike as an "easy" one after a day off.

Oh... how stupid I was. It was a relatively short hike to the summit. About 2.04 miles. (Plateau, is a long two mile flat summit) but I thought that I was coming in from the short side. Unfortunately, it was less distance, but an extremely steep sloop. Sarge pooped out at about 3700 feet. I had to lift him five times for rock scambles. Just a tough mountain and I had to take a twenty minute nap at the top just to get ready to come back down. As hard as it was to come up, the down worried me about Sarge, like I said, I don't want him tumbling down 2000 feet.

We made it through, the beer was very cold in Hunter. Trust me... when you climb one of these big ones, the beer is the best you have ever had...

I get stronger every day...

R & R Day off the Trail

As we used to say on the Appalachian Trail, Monday was a "zero" day. No mountains climbed, no miles covered, but we did manage to get to the other side of "The River" and see some of my favorite sites. Sarge doesn't like to pose, and won't sit still long, but I can show off pictures at Walkway over the Hudson...

Roosevelt's...

Vanderbilt's

And the Esopus Light House as seen from Mill's Mansion

A good day. I got to drink beer in a number of my old favorite places along the way and had dinner with my Mom. Day off done, back to climbing...

Friday and Balsam Cap Mountains

This is one of those times that you may want to back up to the previous post and
read it first or this one will make less sense. As I have noted before,
this blog posts the most recent comments first and I have set up the background
to these mountains in the previous one...

The group for this hike was so big that it was split into two smaller groups. Mine had 16 people in it and the plan was to hit Friday Mountain first as it is the more difficult of the two. The make up of the group was about 50%/50% men and women raging in ages from 22 to 61. You hike at the speed of the lowest common denominator. I should have known what kind of day that it was going to be when one of my group tripped and fell over a log in the first hundred yards.

Sarge and I have been "power hiking" for the last four days, not because I was trying to but only to determine my own pace and strengths. Now with a group, we would climb for a short time, they wait for a while for the rest to catch up. By staying up front, I was able to listen to others who had already done mountains that I haven't and learn some the best ways to complete them.

It was a steep, steady climb all the way up the side of Friday which included two hands over feet 50 foot scrambles up through sheer rock crevasses. I was amazed that a couple members of the group made it through there. As we started our last push for the summit, the same individual that fell 100 yards into the trip, fell again only this time something "cracked." It was her wrist, which was better than an ankle, but at 3500 feet and her having a panic attack about didn't make it easy. She caused herself to go into shock, passed out for a while, then threw up several times. We made her as comfortable as possible on the closest thing we had to a level spot and wrapped her in a "space blanket" while we tried to make some decisions.

Now this story could go on for a long time so I'll try to give it the Reader's Digest version from here. Both groups met back up. The two guides and one lady from our group stayed with her, while the rest of his pushed on for the summit which only about 20 minutes away. On my first trail-less hike I ended up leading the group up to that one. (top picture) We returned to the injured woman, who was doing somewhat better. The guides had contacted NYS Parks Service Rangers and the local fire department and were waiting for them to make a decision on how to move her. No matter what, it was going to take at least two hours for them to get there. The rest of us made the decision to continue on (still guide less) to the top of Balsam Cap. Following a "herd path" (unmarked, unmaintained, but somewhat discernible path made by previous hikers and animals) we made our over the relatively short distance between the two mountain passing a lookout where I took the above inset picture of the Ashokan Reservoir in the distance.

We all signed in at the summit canister and had a short lived celebration for still being able to complete both mountains before we headed back knowing that there was a good possibility of not making it out before dark.

Back at the accident sight we found a note from the guides saying that with their help, they were walking the lady down the mountain slowly to meet Rangers, the Fire Department and a local land owner who where coming up the mountain on ATV's. We started back down the mountain (once again guide-less) retracing our steps using mine and another hiker's GPS's. The emergency folks were able meet up at with the guides and injured lady at about 2700 feet after having used chain saws to clear several large trees blocking their path. She was safely transported out to a waiting ambulance.

We met back up with the guides who led up out the rest of the way (still an hour and a half down steep, lose, rocky terrain) reaching the road just before dust. What was supposed to be a six hour climb turned into an 11 hour ordeal. One of the other hikers commented at the bottom that we all looked like the characters from the first episode of "Lost" after the plane crash.

Day Five - Friday and Balsam Cap Mountains. (3604 and 3623 feet respectively) Today was a day for a couple of firsts. My first attempts at trail-less summits and first group hike. All the trail-less summits have cannisters like the one on the left. (My first on on top of Friday) Inside is a small memo pad (just like the ones all police officers carry in their shirt pocket) on which you just record your name and the date. No comments, bitches or gripes. Twenty three aspiring members to the club showed up for this hike because the summits have the reputation for being two of the more difficult ones to reach. Group hiking is a double edged sword, because on one side, you have an experienced group leader to show you the way up and back, but unfortunately you have to hike at the group's pace and level of abilities. I'll explain that a little more next...

Today I did (we did, Sarge does much more than me) 6.3 miles of what I hope are the toughest mountains, and certainly the highest mountains of the trip. These two summits, Thomas Cole and Black Dome are numbers three and four for elevation for the whole trip. They where both "ass kickers." The only saving grace was that the Col between Thomas Cole and Black Dome didn't drop that much. The decent from Black Dome was one of those really steep ones that required me to lift Sarge down because it was so tough that if his footing wasn't right he could tumble down several thousand feet. We both made it out safe (but sore) and you can't beat the last part of the trip out next to the Batavia Kill stream. Absolutely one of the most beautiful reasons you hike in the Catskill Mountains. I didn't post a picture of myself at the top of Black Dome Mountain because if you can see my face at the top of Thomas Cole, I'm not really happy. The summit picture of Black Dome is Sarge sitting on the rock. When you feel like you want to die, take a picture of your dog...

I've done six tough mountains in four days... Not bad

'

By the way, if I haven't introduced you to Sarge, he is my hiking companion. He's an 8 year old Springer Spaniel and a total mountain dog. No matter how many miles I do he most likely doubles it because being a bird dog, he moves left to right trying to flush pheasant, quail, and turkeys, not because he knows what he's doing, just because he knows that he has to do it...

Still Day 3 - Graham Mountain is one of the few that is still in private hands. The trail is easy to follow, but it is unmaintained. On a misty day, the close growth encroaching on an unmaintained train gets you wet. Since the trail is private, you have to get permission to hike to the summit. Since I have always had a problem with authority, I didn't ask. My wife, my mother and both of my sons understand that part of me. It's really an easy trail until the last half mile.

The summit is not attractive because there is a ruin of an old relay tower for a public television station. It is one of the least favorite summits for the 3500 club. I was just glad to have it done and out of the way. Altogether, about 8 miles, more back tracking than I would like, but a good two summit hike. Tomorrow only 6.3 miles, but two very fomidible summits. I appreciate my mother picking me up on the other side.

Day 3 - Today may be the only gift that I'll be given on this trip, because the parking area at the trailhead was already at 2700 feet. Much less climbing. Since there is a fire tower at the top of Balsam Lake Mountain, there was a fire road to the top of it. Since even old roads have to follow the path of least resistance it was an easier hike. Unfortunately, there was no need to waste energy climbing the tower, even though the views are supposed to be spectacular, a cold misty rain and dense fog would have kept me from seeing anything. This mountain was 3720 feet, my highest so far for this trip until I ventured off the beaten path for Graham Mountain...

Day 2

Balsam Mountain - Not one of the tallest at 3600 feet but very steep near the top. Just enough to cause me to think "what in the hell have I gotten myself into?" At least it was only about 6 miles altogether and I was off the mountain by 1:30 pm. Just in time because the sun went away and it rained hard for the rest of the day.

In order to get to the middle of "no where" you have to go through some where. Unfortunately that some where was New Jersey and a two hour back up in traffic. Although I was later getting in than anticipated, I still managed to make it to the top of Panther Mountain and get this whole event started off.

Day 1

In order to get to the middle of "no where" you unforturnately have to go some where. That somewhere happens to have been New Jersey. It took forever to get through that traffic, but I did finally get in. It's a 10 hour drive which I did overnight, but I couldn't let lack of sleep get in the way. I had to start right away, because as I would find out later, time and weather work against you.

With all the planning that has gone into this trip, the one thing that you can't fully prepare for is leaving your best friend for a little while. The best part of this whole trip will be that after a week of climbing mountains by myself, Sandy will join me for a couple of the toughest, and actually the highest mountains of the trip. We've been to 14,000 feet together in the Rockies, this should be a breeze.....

Just as a bit of a reminder, this blog is written in real time and the most recent posts are displayed first, if you want to start from the begining, you may have to scroll down to the bottom.

If you only have a limited amount of time to accomplish a goal, some amount of planning is necessary. Our dining room found a display stand as a new piece of furniture along with multiple maps, trail books, calenders, legal pads with notes and a couple of coffee stains.

With the retirement part out of the way, I get to plan the trip. 25 and a half years with the Raleigh Police Department, preceded by four years with the New York State Department of Corrections. (A totally unappreciated field of endeavor) The best way to "disconnect" from that way of life is to try to climb as many mountains as possible in the shortest amount of time. (or drink a lot of beer)

Raleigh Police...

Six years of uniform patrol, eight years of full time SWAT, a short time back on the line as a Sergeant and then back to SWAT as a Team Leader. These next two years were absolutely the best. Truly the best and brightest people that anyone could ever be associated with. Then, a short stint in Drugs & Vice leading to a long period through good and some not necessarily good times as a Detective Sergeant.

In the early days, I would never have seen myself as a Detective, being the more aggresive, (but always professional) type, but I actually learned more about police work in my last couple of years than I ever would have thought and there is nothing wrong with getting smarter. It turned out to be a great place to retire from, giving me a great transition into...