Adirondacks
by
Joel Slaby
The Adirondack Mountains (ADK) are a mountain range in upstate New York and I’d argue the best hiking on the East coast. Home to 46 high peaks, summiting one of them quickly starts a drive to summit all of them, earning a legendary title “46er.”
These are the requirements for a high peak:
- At least 4000ft elevation
- Either 300ft of prominence or 0.75 mi between peaks
My friend, Dean, introduced me to the peaks during the Summer of 2019 and since then, I’ve returned a few times hoping to one day conquer the rest. I’ve summitted 9/46 so far:
- Marcy
- Skylight
- Wright
- Algonquin
- Iroquois
- Colvin
- Blake
- Nippletop
- Dial
The trips were quite a while ago, so I’m not including a detailed trip report, but there are the pictures we took and I’ve estimted the trails.
Trip 1
14-15 Aug 2019
We made this trip right before the fall semester started. We dropped our backpacking packs at a lean-to about 3 miles in to maximize how many peaks we could day hike. The trails were relatively steep and extremely rocky, making for an awesome blood pumping hike. Weather was perfect the whole time.
Summitted: Marcy, Skylight, Wright, Algonquin, Iroquois
View from Mt. Marcy
View from Skylight Peak
View from Wright Peak
On the way up to Algonquin Peak
Algonquin Peak looking at Iroquois Peak
View from Iroquois Peak
En route to Avalanche Lake
Avalanche Lake
All Trails Map
Trip2
26-28 June 2020
Dean and I’s schedule aligned in the middle of Summer 2020, so naturally we had to hit the ADK.
Summitted: Colvin, Blake, Nippletop, Dial
Summiting Dial Mountain
View from Dial
Indian Head Creek
All Trails Map
Trip 3
4 July 2020
Made a short day trip up to ADK. The group wasn’t feeling a long hike so we didn’t summit anything, but still had a great time on the rocks.
