Wittenberg and Cornell Mountains
On Thursday we went hiking the Burrough's Range Trail in the Catskill Mountains, also know as the Wittenberg-Cornell-Slide Trail. We started at the East end in Woodland Valley and climbed both Wittenberg and Cornell Mountains, a round trip of about 8.6 mi, and to a total height of 3860 ft. (Cornell Mt.).
The first 2.5 miles were fairly routine, though the trail started out steeply, and there were some nice cliffs covered with moss and giving views of the valleys below. Climbing up the main slope of Wittenberg we started to run into ice and snow on the trail; this did make it difficult at times (hiking up Cornell we had to go around a rocky pass because the ice made it too treacherous to climb), though not so much as to suggest it wasn't worth hiking - on the contrary it was quite a beautiful climb. In the upper elevations there were many balsam firs and many of these became dwarf-sized nearing the top, as is usually the case on top of mountains.
Between Wittenberg and Cornell was about a 1 mi. long stretch that was also covered with balsam firs, and red pine, and which narrowed into a wide knife blade in one section - one could see the hillsides slope sharply down on either side, and the valleys below, as if one were on the edge of a knife.
The view from Wittenberg was superb, and the Ashokan Reservoir (which supplies water to New York City) was dead center; the Western half had the color of chocolate milk, or possibly pink kool aid (depending on who you asked), which seemed to be from soil runoff from the surrounding mountains. The soil itself had a reddish-brown color and the Esopus Creek, which we crossed several times, was of a similar hue. The view from Cornell was not as great, as there was no real clear spot for a good view, but from the Western slope towards Slide Mountain there was a nice view of the wind-blown firs and the nearby mountains, including Slide.
All-in-all I think this has been the best hike we have gone on this year (except for the fact that I injured my knee near the top and had to hobble down 5 mi. of mountain) and we intend to go back, using the "2 car method" to hike the entire Wittenberg-Cornell-Slide trail from West to East, about 12.4 mi. I believe; the scenery should be even nicer when the growing season is in full swing.
Jesse on 04.24.05 @ 08:01 PM EST [link]