Sunday, December 21, 2014

Harriman/Bear Mountain Trails Completion

This blog post is the official announcement of my completion of all marked trails within Harriman/Bear Mountain State Parks. For my entire life, I have been hiking these trails. During the last three years, I made an effort to complete every section of every marked trail within these park systems. This is no easy feat, with over hundreds of miles of trails. From 2006 until now I have every single section of every single hiking trail within Harriman/Bear Mountain State Parks. While I have also done much hiking and trails prior to 2006, from 2006 onward I know that I have completed all the trails. In any case of doubt, I made sure to do the trail again to ensure that all parts of the trail were 100% complete.

I only have about 4 hikes remaining for my next goal to have all parts of all the trails of the park systems actually documented within this blog. Due to the winter road closures, I won't be able to complete them until the spring. Once that happens, I'll have every section of every trail in the park system documented within this blog.

My hiking experience includes easy and difficult hikes, as well as short and long distances. It includes all seasons, from summer heat-waves to brutal winter hikes on frozen lakes, and everything in-between. In the blog are hikes during snowstorms, surprise thunderstorms, rattlesnake encounters, tick infestations, and a torn meniscus.

Trails are often rerouted, and I purchased a new 2013 map edition so I can have an outline of the latest trails to the best of my knowledge. Oftentimes I slightly veer off a few feet from the actual trail. My criteria for following a trail is where the main path of the trail is still visible.

Overall it has been an amazing experience, and it's great to have so many trails and scenery within such close proximity. I'd like to give a shout out to all my dedicated hiking partners over the years.
  • Shimmy Rosenberg
  • Yehudah Koblick
  • Morty Neuman
  • Debbie Koegel
  • Eli Koegel
  • Srully Rosenberg
  • Jacob Baldinger (from the early days)

7 comments:

  1. Congrats! All woods roads & unmaintained trails included?

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  2. No. Though I have done most of the woods roads and unmaintained trails.

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  3. This is great -- did you mark them on the map as you went?

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  4. Absolutely! I have a Photoshop file of the north and south maps as the base layer, and after every hike, I highlight my route with the date as a separate layer in the file. I have all layers organized in yearly folders within the file, and have this through 2008.

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  5. Hey, I also went on some with you in the early days! :)

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  6. Yes, I remember those days! That was prior to my blog and prior to me keeping records of all the trails I had hiked. Join me again and I'll get you on that list :)

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  7. Congratulations. This is truly a valuable archive.

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