Skip to content

Tirell Pond

Tirell Pond

The Adirondack forest looks different when you're not hiking a blazed trail, when the trees crowd in on all sides, when nothing is worn before your footsteps, when your destination is out of sight and will remain so until the final moment. By the time we emerge from forest and climb the last hundred meters to the rocky peak we're soaked, but it's worth it: the view of Blue Mountain Lake and the nested ridges of Adirondack forest trailing off over the horizon is lovely – and for me, unprecedented. I look at Dave, who has gotten an idea, and following his gaze I get my compass out of my bag's top pocket. It's a straight shot down to nearby Tirell Pond (and then the trail), but there's no trail leading there. We're going to hike the old way, using our backwoods skills, our intuition, and by dipping into our reservoir of luck.

Tirell Pond

Late summer, Ithaca, New York, and it's sweltering. I've been studying a new language for months, but classes are done now and it's time for a break. My buddy and partner in crime Dave uggests the Adirondack Mountains. Great idea! I'd gone to Cornell to study Natural Resource Management but chosen Environmental Engineering instead, and though I've spent lots of time in the Fingerlakes area, the Adirondacks are new to me. Fortunately, they're Dave's stomping grounds.

We've got just shy of a week, so we pick out a section of the Northville-Lake Placid Trail. I've got the maps and plan out the route; Dave's got family not far away from the entrance to the park, and we've both got the equipment, the stamina, and the will. We're college kids after all, and we've got more time than money. Bags go in the car, and we're off. It's an afternoon drive to Rome, where we spend the night with his folks. His lovely Italian mom immediately starts feeding us - plates of lasagna and then sausages. "If you're going to spend the next week living off the land boys, you'd better stock up." We eat like it's our last meal, but with food like that, it's not hard to stuff your face. The next morning we're off before dawn.

We've made one miscalculation: we'd planned to stay mostly away from crowds and spend the hike in splendid wilderness isolation, but our trail has brought us past Blue Mountain Lake, where a small foothpath feeds a steady stream of daytrippers up to the peak of Blue Mountain. Instead of unspoiled natural solitude, we find ourselves on a bit of a boot-trodden superhighway. Our packs look huge next to those of the day-trippers, and our road outward is so much longer we're reserving our energy. Quickening our pace, we join the ranks up Blue Mountain's western slope through thinning hardwoods and spruce and the cool, late-summer air washed clean by a morning shower. By the time we emerge from forest and climb the last hundred meters to the rocky peak we're soaked, but it's worth it: the view of Blue Mountain Lake and the nested ridges of Adirondack forest trailing off over the horizon is lovely – and for me, unprecedented.

There's a catch. Do we want to join the ranks going back down the hill, too? I look at Dave, who has gotten an idea, and following his gaze I get my compass out of my bag's top pocket. It's a straight shot down to nearby Tirell Pond (and then the trail), but there's no trail leading there. We're going to hike the old way, using our backwoods skills, our intuition, and by dipping into our reservoir of luck.

The Adirondack forest looks different when you're not hiking a blazed trail, when the trees crowd in on all sides, when nothing is worn before your footsteps, when your destination is out of sight and will remain so until the final moment. Blue Mountain's east side was thick with untrodden forest we wound our way through, striding downward, always downward, through hardwoods, moss, across unnamed streams, and down small rock faces. Halfway through the wilderness, we stumbled across a mystery: an old sleeping bag, thoroughly mauled and shredded. We joked about teams of organized bears who had carried a camper halfway up the hill where they could eat him in peace, but we quickened our step.

At day's end we reached Tirell Pond, a remote and lovely lens of water shimmering in the afternoon heat. Blue below, blue above, and trees on all sides. We stuck our bruised toes into the sand at water's edge, counted our blessings, and gathered strength for the rest of the hike.

To this day, I remember that hike and that pond in detail, and its remote beauty, quiet calm, and tranquility remain in my mind, the flavor and the soul of the Adirondacks. But it took me twenty-one years to return to this neck of the woods (sixteen to return to the 'Daks).

Trackbacks

No Trackbacks

Comments

Display comments as Linear | Threaded

No comments

The author does not allow comments to this entry