Anything You Want:
The West Central Region of the Adirondacks, the focus of ADK’s newest guidebook, just may be the most diverse part of the park.

By Norm Landis

The Adirondacks’ West Central Region has much to offer. There are short trails, long trails, trails right out of campgrounds if you want to car-camp, or remote trails where you might not see anyone and where your cell phone won’t work. There are lean-tos and campsites galore.

There are remarkable flora and fauna, inviting waterfronts, views from mountaintops, big cliffs, big trees and some natural wonders. You can do loop hikes or through hikes. There is history.

You can learn more about it in ADK’s fourth edition of the West Central Region Guide to Adirondack Trails. This latest arrival, Volume 5 in ADK’s latest series of guidebook updates, is scheduled for release in fall 2006.

The region offers numerous short hikes, some mere tenths of a mile. Cathedral Pines is very short (all of 210 yards), right off Route 28. If you go you may want to take a few friends to hold hands around some trees, which are big enough that you may need two or three to reach around them (or more if some are children). Hikes to a lot of ponds (Helldiver, Icehouse) in the Moose River Plains are also short, and Rock Dam is only a little longer.


While the Northville-Placid (NP) Trail is famous – ADK has a trail guide for it and many have hiked it – hikers who want to see a LOT of backcountry could hike nearly as far, without backtracking, on West Central Region trails, with little road walking. Trails in one Wilderness Area between two Wild Forest areas provide the potential to put together a fantasy “PN (Panther-Nobleboro) trail”-- 100-plus miles of wilderness could be covered, crossing one state highway, a couple of rivers and only brief sections of back roads.

Several trails are handy to campgrounds – in fact, the trails go right through.

  • At Nick’s Lake near Old Forge, a trail around the lake goes across the beachfront and through the campground.
  • At Eighth Lake Campground, the Uncas Trail goes through the campground, crossing a canoe route, with trailhead parking for one of the approaches to Black Bear Mountain at the back.
  • If you get the right campsite at DEC’s Brown Tract Pond Campground, you can be on the trail to Shallow Lake or Sucker Brook Bay in just a few steps.
  • The Lake Durant Campground provides direct access to Stephens Pond and Cascade Pond.
  • Although you would have to go miles on a dirt road to get there, campsites sprinkled throughout the MRPWF offer easy access to a number of day hikes – enough so you could spend a week.

You won’t get a cell phone signal through most of the MRPWF, Cedar Lakes or West Canada Lakes areas. Another remote segment where chances are quite good you’ll find solitude is the Constable Pond-West Mt. trail in the Pigeon Lake Wilderness, especially from Pigeon Lake to the top of the mountain. There are also some ponds off the east end of Big Moose Lake accessible only by boat.

While some MRPWF trails are nice round-trip before-dinner hikes, Sly Pond, one of the highest bodies of water in the Adirondacks at 2,872 feet elevation, is quite remote.
Horn Lake is a long drive and a long hike, especially if you take lunch breaks at Balsam and Stink Lakes along the way.

At Ferd’s Bog, also among the short trails although it’s uphill coming out, visitors can stare straight down into the jaws of a pitcher plant eating its meal of bug meat. Pitcher plants can also be found on the Shallow Lake trail. Another spot is Indian Lake via water. Instead of heading down the lake, turn your canoe or kayak left and head for the shallow end.

Ferd’s Bog is also a good place to see boreal birds (if you don’t feel like looking it up, “boreal” means “northern”). There are loons to lull you to sleep at many lakes – Gull, Cascade, Queer, Moss, Indian.

A pair of furry creatures snarling at each other one night near the Queer Lake lean-to may have been fisher. Some have seen moose tracks, appropriately, in the Moose River Plains Wild Forest and in the Ha-de-ron-dah Wilderness. Chipmunks sometimes make mad dashes past lean-to fireplaces, aiming for scraps of food at places like Woodhull Lake.

The West Central Region doesn’t have a lot of mountains, which is nice because when you get a view you can see for miles. Hikers years ago visiting the Bald/Rondaxe Mountain fire tower (since restored) were told to look over the top point of the dead tree to see Algonquin and then to look at the little triangle beyond it – Mount Marcy. From the Blue Mountain fire tower, climbers can look down at the sandy beach at Tirrell Pond on the east or back over a string of lakes to the west.

West Mountain offers views over Raquette Lake; easy-to-reach Castle Rock overlooks Blue Mountain Lake. With less hiking than up the mountains, Keegan’s Trail (formerly listed as Ledge Mt. Overlook, when there was no marked trail) overlooks West Canada Creek.

Woodhull Mountain also offers some views, and that’s one spot where bicyclists get a head start on hikers. The former railroad bed, which carries the trail in from McKeever, allows bicyclists to pedal something like 6/7 of the way before locking up their rides and hiking up the mountain. Bicyclists also use the Uncas Trail on both sides of Route 28 near Eighth Lake Campground and, taking a foot trail a short distance over to another road, could go all the way to Sagamore Lake.

While some of the region’s attractions may be similar to sights elsewhere, others are more unique.

  • The natural rock dam at the confluence of the Red and Moose Rivers stops them both until they pile up enough to get over or through small openings.
  • The flume at Gleasmans Falls is under three miles in on trail 2.
  • Impressive cliffs can also be viewed along the north side of Lower Mitchell Pond, which is the second and westerly part of a pair. Another set of cliffs is on the south section of the V-shaped Chain Ponds Trail in the Pigeon Lake Wilderness.

There is both wilderness hermit and fine-living history in the West Central Region. Hikers well into the wilderness can stop at hermit “French Louie’s” fireplace on the east end of West Lake in the West Canada Lakes Wilderness. Right off Route 28, visitors can check out one of the Adirondack Great Camps at Sagamore (go to www.sagamore.org for tour information) or, out on the trail nearby, catch a glimpse across Mohegan Lake at another. There are old hotel sites and former lumber camp sites at an array of locations, including the north side of Big Otter Lake, and near Woodhull Lake.

Then there are old railroad beds from KcKeever toward Woodhull Mt., for logging, and the former Raquette Lake Railroad, with an historic marker, crossed on the Vista Trail. The resurrected Adirondack Scenic Rail Road (www.adirondackrr.com) offers train trips in the Thendara area, including one-way train rides--you and your bicycle can be let off to get back under your own power.

When all is said and done, if you aren’t sure what kind of outing you want, look at the West Central Region. You’ll find them all.