Today I decided that I was going to hike up Rounds Mountain, in the Town of Stephentown, NY. I found a short-cut to get there, and it only took me about 25min. I turned onto Round Mountain Road and started up, looking for a trail leading off at some point from the road. A few minutes up I pass a 2-sided, opened gate, and I wonder if this is a private road. Well, the trail never materializes and I end up scraping my car over about 20 2' wide by 1-2' deep trenches that were obviously installed to discourage vehicular traffic, spinning the tires on loose dirt and wondering if my car is going to die. But I figure there can't be much more to go, and I can't really turn around either, so I keep going and voila, I'm at the top!

The view wasn't bad, but it was pretty hazy, so it wasn't spectacular either. I could mainly see Northwest into the New York side. It seems that the summit is a local hangout spot for ATVers and others, as there were many tracks, some beer bottle caps, a destroyed tent, and some trash around.

So, I was at a dead end, it seemed that the trail on the map didn't exist, but was in fact the road I had just driven up. But then I saw a trail marker for the Taconic Crest Traill! It seems that although the TCT is not on the topo map I used, it actually crosses right over the top of Rounds Mtn., coming up and going down the East side of the mountain.

I decided to follow the trail south (~SSE), and it turned out to be a nice hike. The terrain roiled up and down, and often I found myself walking gradually down hillsides. There were many large patches of ferns, and a variety of deciduous trees, especially birch, beech, maple. After about a mile or more of hiking I ran across a small trailhead (or box) containing maps of the TCT. This was quite exciting as until then I hadn't run across one single complete, somewhat detailed map of the TCT. The trail then merged into a road (that looked even less conditioned than the road up), Madden Rd., the signpost declared in bright orange. Following this down about 3/10 of a mile it became paved and with houses around it, and so I decided to head back. I figure the round trip was about 3 mi.

From looking at maps, and from this experience, it seems that there are many beautiful hikes waiting in the Taconic Mountains, and in particular on or heading towards the Taconic Crest Trail.