New owner, old easement at former Adirondack Scout camp

 4,200 acres in Long Lake sells for $3.5 million. What Cedarlands property sale means for public access

By Mike Lynch

For the first time in decades, the former Cedarlands Scouting Reservation in Long Lake is going into the summer with new ownership. 

The Upper Mohawk Council, Inc. sold the property to Long Lake LLC Cedarlands Properties in September 2023 for $3.5 million. The LLC, with a Manhattan address, is owned by Dino Cusumano, according to the Long Lake assessor’s office. He couldn’t be reached for comment. 

The roughly 4,200-acre property had been on the market since 2015, several years after the Scouts shut down the summer camp at the facility for financial reasons.

The property is known by backcountry users because it is part of the 4,890-acre Cedarlands Conservation Easement Tract. The easement allows for limited public access. Much of the property is closed to the public from June 24 to Aug. 23 and the area known as the “basecamp” is private. 

The easement tract is home to two bodies of water: the 400-acre clear-water McRorie Lake (or Rock Lake) and the 60-acre Mud Pond. It is also home to several mountains. 

Public access is through a parking lot off Kickerville Road, which has a trailhead for a hike into the property. It also has a  0.3-mile carry that leads to Mud Pond. 

It appears the new owner installed a gate on a road into the tract on a road near the parking lot. The state Department of Environmental Conservation says the gate is on private property. People are allowed to walk around the gate to access trails that are part of the easement. The gate stops people from illegally driving onto private property. 

Dan Snyder, a scoutmaster for 30 years in Madison County, said he took children to the Cedarlands property for about two decades until it closed operations in 2011. 

“It was a great camp,” he said. “You had 5,000 acres all to yourself right in the middle of the Adirondack Park.” 

He called the accommodations “very rustic.” The Scouts used old cabins on the property, including one as a trading post. But they slept in tents. 

The camp staff lived in an old farmhouse and ate meals in a big barn. There was no dining hall and all that was left of the main lodge was a fireplace, Snyder  said. 

“It was a pretty rugged place,” he said. “It was the way folks preferred it.”

Rob Frenette, owner of Raquette River Outfitters in Tupper Lake, said he visits the property occasionally.

“The times we go there we don’t see anybody,” he said. “So I don’t think it gets a lot of use.” 

Wealthy real estate broker Thomas Walker bought the property and thousands of surrounding acres in the late 1800s. He built his main camp on McRorie Lake, where it remained for about a century before burning in 1980. 

The Scouts of Oneida County eventually bought the property for just $10 in 1962, according to an article by Hallie Bond, the town of Long Lake historian.