I have exactly one day to explore the Adirondacks, and hopefully take some great photos. What’s worth seeing?
I’m moving this from GQ to MPSIMS forum…
Mountains, beautiful lakes, and lots of wild country. There are only a few roads going through the Adirondack Park; great tracts of it are wilderness.
A quick explanation about the Park – it’s a designated area covering parts of about fourteen counties, delimited by the “Blue Line” (you may hear that term). Within that line is a mixture of public and private land, including quite a few large villages (~10,000 people). Private land on the main roads tends to be quite developed, largely but not exclusively catering to tourists. The public land inside the Blue Line is the State Forest Preserve, which has to be kept "forever wild" by a stipulation of the State Constitution. So don’t be at all surprised to see lengths of tourist-trap strip development apparently inside the park – they’ll alternate with wide-open forest-lined stretches of highway (which are in the majority).
Your best bet for interesting stuff will be in the High Peaks area, roughly centered on Lake Placid in the northeast end of the park. If you’re driving a reliable car not given to overheating and with good engine for the weight it’s hauling, do take the drive up NY Route 421, the Whiteface Mountain Highway. You’re driving up the side of one of the taller mountains in the state – there’s a parking lot at the top of the road, with an elevator nearly to the summit and the potential for hiking to the top. If you were overnighting there, I love the climb on Mount Ampersand – a beautiful hiking trail that slowly ascends the mountain, no “mountain climbing” equipment needed except comfortable walking/hiking shoes/boots until you get 30 feet from the summit (which is a granite outcrop). And the view from either mountain is absolutely fabulous. If you’re a Civil War buff, John Brown’s Farm is in North Elba. Lake Placid has a lot of Olympics attractions – they’ve hosted the Winter Olympics three times. Saranac Lake is just a nice resort village.
Further south on the east side of the park are Lake George and several smaller communities on little lakes. Lake George is a seasonal tourist town par excellence, fun but not precisely what the Park is all about.
Up to this point, nearly everything is within a 20-mile drive of Interstate 87, which passes through the easternmost edge of the park.
I’ve never been to the Adirondack Museum in Blue Mountain Lake, but I’m given to understand it’s quite well done. The drive through the middle of the park, east of the High Peaks, from Tupper Lake down to Indian Lake and Blue Mountain Lake, is probably one of the better ways to get a feel for the real Adirondacks.
The Fulton Chain of Lakes, down State Route 28 in the southwest part of the park, are excellent fishing and pretty when you can see them, but it’s pretty much seasonal-residential cottage and catering-to-fishermen recreational tourism, not the day-visitor stuff. Thendara is a pretty cool little community on that road – and the basis for the name of the capital city in Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Darkover stories (she came up with the initial idea for the first story while riding on a train through the area, and the name “took” in her imagination).
Much as I personally love the Western Adirondacks, over near my home town, they are not anything interesting. If you should happen to be taking NY-3 into or out of the Park at the western end, notice as you pass through the Village of Harrisville – the industrial park, the water tower, some older houses that have been rehabilitated, are all the product of grants which my ex-boss and I got that village.
Sigh. I’ve only been to the adirondacks to snowmobile and how I miss it. I couldn’t imagine it any other way than snow covered.
Go to the top of Whiteface Mountain and enjoy the view.
Visit the General Store in Old Forge.
Thanks guys, especially Poly. I’ll see how much I can cram into one day!