Laying siege to the tower
By Phil Brown
A classic route near Chapel Pond combines technical ice climbing with alpine-style mountaineering
Snow Sports
All Stories
Ski trips on the new state lands
The former Finch, Pruyn tracts offer many options for cross- country tours with spectacular views. By Tony Goodwin Over the past five years, the unprecedented addition of sixty-five thousand acres of former Finch, Pruyn lands to the Forest Preserve has opened up many new recreational opportunities. To date, the most publicized opportunities have been for…
Chapel Pond Canyon
By Phil Brown
By Phil Brown More than thirty years ago, Don Mellor was in a plane flying over the High Peaks region, taking photos for his rock-climbing guidebook, when he spotted a large streambed in Chapel Pond Canyon. He returned the next winter with Steve Wisenand, one of his students at Northwood School in Lake Placid. The…
Whetstone Gulf State Park
Skiers head to Tug Hill in search of snow and enjoy breathtaking views while touring around the rim of Whetstone Gorge. By Phil Brown This winter showed us, once again, that the snow in the Adirondacks is unreliable. A backcountry skier needs to have a backup plan. Mine is to go west. To Tug Hill.…
Moose Pond
Novice skiers can enjoy breathtaking scenery at a wild pond north of Saranac Lake. By Phil Brown My daughter Martha used to love going down hills on cross-country skis. If she fell, she’d herringbone back up the trail and try again. That was before she took up indoor track in winter, before she enrolled in college, and before she went off to…
Coney, Adams and Treadway
Coney, Adams, and Treadway reward snowshoers with spectacular views for only moderate effort. By Spencer Morrissey Snowshoeing in the Adirondacks has a long history. Originally a means of travel, it is now a popular recreational pastime. The French called snowshoes raquettes because the paddle-shaped contraptions of earlier times resembled rackets. They were used by hunters and…
Poor Man’s Downhill
Wilmington trail offers plenty of excitement for skiers who don’t like to earn their turns. By Phil Brown Any backcountry skier who has slogged seven and a half miles up Mount Marcy realizes that the old saying “What goes up must come down” has got it backwards. It should be “What comes down must go up.” Yet that’s not always true.…
Upper Hudson Ski Loop
DEC creates a trail for skiers that loops through former Finch, Pruyn timberlands near the Goodnow and Hudson rivers. By Phil Brown Since the state purchased the Essex Chain Lakes a few years ago, I had been meaning to try out the ski touring in that region. My initial idea was to ski on old…
Fish Creek Ski Tour
In a time of low snow, skiers find ideal conditions on frozen ponds in the Fish Creek area. By Phil Brown The winter started out promising with a good snowfall in December, but later in the month rains washed away most of the snowpack. We received a bit of light, fluffy powder the week after…
Chouinard’s Gully
The Adirondack Park’s frozen cliffs offer some of the best ice climbing in the country. By Phil Brown The Adirondack Park has thousands of rock-climbing routes, many of them stellar, but it will never rival such climbing destinations as Yosemite Valley in California, New River Gorge in West Virginia, or the Shawangunks in downstate New…