Harriman Park in Winter: The Nickel Mine
February 10, 2010
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood…
Harriman Park is most every downstate hiker’s favorite place for solitude and keeping in shape. I like winter best for hiking because there is no vegetation to block the views, fewer people out, no snakes, and – if there is enough snow for snowshoeing – I can walk just about anywhere because the snow covers rocks and fallen logs.
The path that diverges to the left in the photo above is a remnant of the Rockhouse Mtn trail, unmarked and rarely used (not a footprint on it). The path to the right is the Beech trail, a popular route for hikers that follows a 200-year old farm road. It’s not at all disturbing that most everyone takes the road more travelled; on the contrary, I find it gratifying that there are so many of these choices to be made in Harriman Park.
On this early February day my destination was the Nickel Mine, one of many mines in the Ramapo Mountains. With some effort it can be reached from the north in spring, summer and fall on an unmarked and very wet old bottom road, then by climbing up the old mine road – but not in winter because the access road for cars, Tiorati Brook Road, is closed for the season. So I approached the mine from the south, bushwhacking 2½ miles from the Beech trail, picking my way along the edge of a swamp, crossing a long-abandoned mill sluice, edging uphill, and then hiking along ancient paths to the trailless ridge of Grape Swamp Mtn and then to the open mine. This route is not just less travelled but completely unknown to the casual hiker on the Beech trail.
Nickel ore was indeed mined from the Nickel Mine, which was operated for 10 years (1875-1884) by the Rockland Nickel Company, though the rock looks like it contains iron.
One can walk into the pit, protected from the blustery north wind. There were no tracks here, of course, except for those of the animals that make Harriman their home, especially deer, rabbits, foxes and voles.
After a quick lunch in the mine, I returned by a different route, partly on the Beech trail, so I could pass the Civil War era Jones family cemetery. This part of Harriman Park was settled by farmers, who eked out a subsistence from the rocky soil. Running through the dense woods are countless long stone walls, no longer marking fields or pastures, but evidence of both the toil of the farmers and the return to nature of the cleared land.
While the return to nature appears complete, some exotic plants that were planted by the farm families near their homesteads have taken over sections of the understory, especially prickly stands of barberry. Here on the Jones farm stood, until a few years ago, a majestic (and non-native) Norway spruce, a landmark that every hiker looked for. Its trunk snapped in a storm. Just behind the spruce’s broken trunk hides the entrance to a root cellar, facing east to catch the light of the rising sun.
Like the Hudson Valley itself, Harriman Park is rich in history, anthropology and geology. And it cries out to the hiker to take a path less travelled.
Photos by Jerry White of The Staging Prince. This article, like many posted here, highlights recreational activities for Hudson Valley residents. We invite you to sign up for our free monthly newsletter for Hudson Valley homeowners.
Castle of the Month: Bannerman’s Castle
February 6, 2010
Bannerman’s Castle
Sitting on a small island called Pollepel in the Hudson River between Cold Spring and Beacon, across from Storm King Mountain, are the impressive ruins of a castle, one of the very few ever built in the US.
The complex of buildings was constructed as an arsenal between 1900, when the island was purchased by military surplus dealer Frank Bannerman, and 1918, when Bannerman died. Bannerman had purchased most of the Army surplus materiel from the Spanish-American War, including tons of ammunition, and he needed a safe place to store it. In the eastern facade of its imposing superstructure (the Tower), Bannerman cast the legend: Bannerman’s Island Arsenal. A smaller castle was built on the western shore of the island as a residence.
In 1920, 200 tons of munitions exploded in one of the large buildings, causing significant damage to the complex. The island was essentially abandoned after 1950 with the sinking in a storm of the ferryboat Pollepel that had served the island. The island and its buildings were bought by New York State in 1967, and tours were conducted in 1968. The following year the roof and floors of the castle were destroyed in a fire, and no further visits were permitted until they were resumed recently by The Bannerman Castle Trust.
During Christmas week of 2009, a large section of the north and east Tower walls collapsed, and the Trust is seeking donations to stabilize the structure before it is totally lost.
A kayak is the ideal way to approach the castle over stonework obstacles in the shallows of the island. But the castle poses serious risks to visitors: the island boasts generous growths of poison ivy, and the structure itself is demonstrably insecure. Nevertheless, Bannerman’s has been a popular destination for kayakers. The European-type castle is fascinating, and, with due care (and some luck), the island can be a good spot to break for lunch.
Photo by Jerry White of The Staging Prince.
Sell Your Castle in Weeks not Months
The Story of Benmarl Vineyards
January 30, 2010
This continues our series highlighting activities for residents of New York’s rich and fascinating Hudson Valley, along with a measure of its history.
The Hudson River from Benmarl Vineyards
In the last 30 years we have become a country of wine consumers and are drinking increasing amounts of wine grown in our own native soils. This acceptance of our own wines has come about through the efforts of a few American winelovers who were determined to demonstrate that fine winemaking, both as an art and as a business was well within the capability of our nation’s climate, soils, and talents. Many stories can be told of the difficulties and rewards experienced by these dedicated people.
One such story concerns the Miller family, which began appropriately on a vineyard in the Hudson River valley, perhaps the oldest wine district in the United States. Wine has been made from the grapes of this region since the 17th century when the French Huguenots grew vines and made wine in nearby New Paltz.
Among the young farmers attracted to this burgeoning industry in the early 1800’s Andrew Jackson Caywood bought and planted a handsome piece of land high above the river in a Hudson region grape-growing community dating from 1772. When it incorporated as the Village of Marlborough in 1788, a cluster of grapes carved in its seal commemorated its major crop. Mr. Caywood became an outstanding viticulturist and leading authority in the development of new grape varieties.
When the Miller family, led by well-known artist-illustrator Mark Miller, bought the Caywood property in 1957 and re-named it Benmarl (meaning slate hill), it had outlived all its early contemporaries to become America’s oldest professional vineyard. The Millers rebuilt its steep terraces, replanting them with excellent European wine grapes, hybrid and vinifera, carrying on Caywood’s private experimentation at a time when New York’s wine industry was at a low ebb and long before New York State officially began experimental wine study.
To help them support their work, in the early 1970’s the Millers created the Societe des Vignerons, inviting friends interested in perpetuating the Valley’s viticultural traditions to become “vicarious vignerons” by taking on the annual support of two or more of Benmarl’s experimental grapevines and receiving in return their produce in the form of wine.
The Societe caught the imagination of serious wine lovers, and its work in the vineyard inspired many regional farmers to plant better wine vines. In just a few years the Societe saw its crusade to bring about a renaissance of our country’s first vineyard region evolve into a veritable fountain of astonishingly fine wine enhanced by a regional character which sets it apart from any others in the world. Benmarl’s Societe grew from a few friends to many hundreds all over the United States.
Benmarl’s wines were well received. In fact, there was perhaps no other American vineyard, during those early years, which received more attention from those who write about, think about, and enjoy good wine than this tiny vineyard in the Hudson Valley. Benmarl wines were featured at prominent New York restaurants, including Windows on the World, the Four Seasons and the Quilted Giraffe.
TIME Magazine, in a full-color feature, described Benmarl and its Eastern farm winery counterparts as “a new breed of winemakers, whose wines of fine quality and elegance are shaking California’s throne.” New York Times wine columnist Frank Prial became interested in Benmarl and its Societe when it sought his help in publicizing the need for legislative reform to encourage farm wineries in New York, and he described its wines as “remarkable examples of what dedication can produce.” Author and wine authority Alexis Lichine wrote in his Encyclopedia of Wines and Spirits that “Benmarl promises to be among the finest vineyards in the nation”.
New York Governor Hugh Carey (a member of Benmarl’s Societe) signed the Farm Winery Act in 1976, permitting New York’s grape farmers to produce and sell wines directly to the public. As Mark Miller’s reward for helping to put the New York fine wine industry on the map, Benmarl was awarded NY State Farm Winery license #1. Benmarl was the inspiration, and Mark Miller the acknowledged parent, of the farm winery industry with its new wineries in New York State and throughout America.
Benmarl was gratified to have one of its wines voted the “Best US Red Wine” by the judges at the prestigious 2000 Atlanta Wine Summit International Competition.
The Miller family sold Benmarl to another wineloving family, the Spaccarellis, in 2006. They are replanting the old vineyards to make them more productive, renovating and restoring the old winery buildings, expanding the line of Benmarl’s fine wines, and winning more gold medals. You might wish to spend an afternoon at their Marlboro winery, now called Benmarl Winery at Slate Hill, 5 miles north of Newburgh in southern Ulster County, to taste for yourself what are certainly among the finest wines that New York offers. You won’t be disappointed with either the wines or the views over the river from “America’s Oldest Vineyard”. For directions, see their website, www.benmarl.com. Photos by Arlene Gould.
Hudson Valley’s Puddingstone Mountain
December 25, 2009
Different geologically from nearby mountain areas of the Hudson Highlands is Schunemunk, the puddingstone mountain.
At 1664 feet, the peak of Schunemunk is Orange County’s highest point. Located in Woodbury, Cornwall and Blooming Grove, the mountain provides a welcome respite from the pressures of suburbia. The northern part is a state park on land assembled by Star Expansion Industries, the Ogden Foundation, and the Storm King Art Center, purchased in 1996 by the Open Space Institute, and then acquired by New York State in 2004.
It’s a wonderful hiking destination. A very strenuous initial climb of 1500 feet rewards the hiker with miles of ridge walking with panoramic views. The mountain has 25 miles of hiking trails through varied woodland, with scrub pitch pines growing along a pair of ridges separated by a small valley. On the eastern ridge are the Megaliths, a group of huge blocks that have split off from the underlying rock, a good picnic spot.
Under your feet is the Devonian quartz-pebble conglomerate “puddingstone”, large nuggets of white quartz and pink sandstone embedded in a reddish matrix, formed from sedimentary deposits of rock and sand washed down the slopes of the ancient coastal Taconian mountains (whose nearby vestiges are the Ramapos) when they were “real mountains”, rising perhaps 20,000 feet above the ancient Silurian sea.
To get to Schunemunk, head north on Route 32 past Woodbury Common. After 7 miles (in the hamlet of Mountainville), take a left onto Pleasant Hill Road, then left on Taylor Road. After crossing the Thruway, you will see the trailhead parking area on the right. Three trails start just across the road. See a Trail Conference map for a loop hike of 9-10 miles (www.NYNJTC.org).
The Hudson Valley offers a multitude of outdoor activities to its residents. Photos by Jerry White of The Staging Prince.
Popolopen Paddle
November 15, 2009
The Hudson Valley provides many benefits to its residents, not the least of which is proximity to recreational hiking in Harriman Park , the Hudson Highlands and the Catskills, and sea kayaking on the Hudson River, seen in the banner image above at the Bear Mountain Bridge.
Recently I launched my kayak into an inlet of the river at Annsville Creek, just north of Peekskill. The kayak launch site, off Route 6, was built by New York State and sports a well-equipped kayak shop run by Atlantic Kayak Tours.
Paddle under the MetroNorth railroad bridge and you’re in Peekskill Bay, with Indian Point to the south, and Jones Point and Dunderburg Mountain across the river to the west. Paddling upriver that day was easy, riding the incoming tidal current and benefitting from a light breeze from the south. This is an attractive section of the river, where it runs through the Highlands.
Passing Iona Island National Estuarine Sanctuary, I remembered the first time I saw this part of the river – decades ago from a New York Central train. In fact it was the highlight of the train ride because this section was used to anchor a huge fleet of mothballed World War II naval and merchant ships, many of which had once carried troops from the Piermont Pier to Europe. Now, the overlooks on Route 6 are often filled with hawk and eagle watchers.
Coming up to the soaring structure of the Bear Mountain Bridge over the narrows between Bear Mountain and Anthony’s Nose, I peered around the bend to see if I could see West Point upriver (too far). There was a lot of boat traffic: sightseeing boats, motorboats, a few sailboats, and an occasional barge heading downriver. I crossed the channel to the west shore and paddled under the low railroad trestle into the quiet water of Popolopen Creek, leaving the churning river behind.
The Popolopen splits the promontory sites of Fort Clinton on its south bank and Fort Montgomery on its north, built in 1776-77. The Americans stretched a chain across the river from Fort Montgomery to Anthony’s Nose to block British ships from sailing upriver from Manhattan. In October 1777 the British landed 2100 troops at Stony Point to the south, marched them over 1000-foot Dunderberg Mountain on what is now the “1777 Trail”, and attacked the two forts’ 700 defenders from the rear, capturing the forts in one of the fiercest battles of the Revolution and dismantling the chain. Among the attackers of the forts were a company of “Loyal Americans” from the Hudson Valley. Thus, New Yorkers fought New Yorkers, and hundreds – mostly the outnumbered defenders — were killed or captured.
The Popolopen flows out to the river after cascading for 2 miles through a steep rocky gorge. Discovered a few years ago as a Class V whitewater kayaking run, the Popolopen is particularly unpredictable and dangerous.
After enjoying lunch in my boat at the base of the cascade (to avoid poison ivy lining the banks), I paddled back into the Hudson. Heading south, I did my best to overcome both the current and what was now a very stiff wind blowing upriver. Adding excitement was a significant chop resulting from the wind blowing across Haverstraw Bay to the south. While on this day it took twice as long as usual for the 4-mile return to Annsville Creek, it is always an interesting paddle. For those with a second car, the 11-mile paddle from Annsville to Cold Spring, past West Point and the Constitution Marsh, is also recommended.