Burroughs Range

“The Goal: Whittenberg, Cornell, Slide

The Reality: Whittenberg, Home, The Royal Tennenbaums on DVD

Here's the story....
The good Corp' and I had planned on doing the Burrough's Range this weekend, instead of joining the gang for the Devil's Path, because we were getting a late start Friday night out of the city. Well, as it turns out, we got a VERY late start out of the city!!

After listening to the Corp’ bang on his drums at the Elbow Room (you should have seen the way he juggled his sticks! – hehehehe) we finally got on the road at midnight. Ugh. Nothing too eventful happened on the way up with the exception of seeing quite a few deer along the side of the road. We pulled into Woodlawn Valley Campground at – yikes!- 4am. We quickly threw the tent down and passed out to the sound of the nearby Esopus swishing by (seems the two of us have a knack for throwing our tent down in the dark near waters edge – remember Loyalsock?!).

Got on the trail, going up Whittenberg, at noon. I was impressed by the lightness of my pack after having spent the winter vowing to cut pack weight with the warmer weather. I was also happy to note that the hike was much easier then my first-ever backpacking trip – on the same path – just under a year ago.

It was a beautiful day. Blue sky, bright sun, dozens of different bird calls filling the air (my favourite sounded like a mix between a glass flute and a Tibetan throat singer), dozens of mini springtime waterfalls cascading near the trail, new leaves in the process of unfurling, and many flowers (dogwood, ….one I can’t remember the name of right now).

Half way up the mountain we spotted a large shadow of a bird flying overhead. It flew so low that it could have landed on our heads. I think it was a Turkey Vulture…..hehe…out to grab a couple of turkeys – gobble…..

I saw a few different types of interesting poop. One was a small bundle of fur and berries; the other was all around the base of a large tree (according to the Tree people….it indicated Owls). Poop is cool. Hahahaha!

¾’s of the way up the mountain, I realized that I had forgotten something very important for the rest of the weekend. After debating, we decided to finish the trip by going to the top of Whittenberg – having my dehydrated spaghetti (complete with ground beef) – and then going home (damn!).

Had a lovely time at the top – the food was awesome – the view? – eh….. J/K! The view was great – I looked over to the Devil’s Path and wondered how the gang was doing.

We were joined by a little porcupine who ambled across the mountain edge – and then very kindly posed several times for each of us.

After spending a long time at the top – we regretfully started back down to the car. Had some excitement when the Corp’ almost stepped on another porcupine hanging out by the trail’s edge. Scared the crap out of all of us! More little fella ran up a tree – which was nice because we got to study him for awhile.

After that it was all downhill – spent an hour or so hiking in the dark – which sucked because of all the loose rocks – but was also nice because of the billion, zillion stars!

Got back to the car at 10:30pm – headed home – slept until 2pm on Sunday and watched a movie. All in all, not a bad welcome back to BP’ing trip!

But….I do miss the group trips and can’t wait for Papalooza!!!


Pictures to come...”

“oh yeah...the flies sucked!”

“okay - so don't read my report :(

sniff sniff :(


wahhhhhhhhh!!!!!”

“Nice report TT!

Inquiring minds want to know:

What did you forget that turned your weekend trip into a day hike?

Isn't it the mosquitos that suck?”

“I forgot my other question:

Isn't the Burroughs Range a firing range where people try to shoot champagne glasses off the top of each others' heads?”

“thats why i clicked on this thread too pedxing. nice beat reference, we'll see how it goes...”

“Gret line about the poop! I like it too.

...and now on poop talk, the stuff we find in it after cutting it in half. But now a word from our sponsors.”

“Cool report! Now where are the damn pics?!”

“My Pics

Wassup, Artex!
This was a really cool trip, despite having to cut it short. The only part that really stunk about that is we carried our full packs all the way to the top of Wittenberg- Definitely the most over prepared day hike I've ever been on. Actually, it was great exercise, I'd consider wearing a full pack on another dayhike just for that. I had a great time.”

“Awesome! Hey, Corp - the pictures turned out really well - can't wait to get mine developed - should be up by tomm. night!”

“excellent! I'm a big fan of poop also...and tracking and any other signs of life I see along the trail. :o)”

“Nice trip report Twinks! I'm glad you two had a great time despite the change in plans. So give us the "poop" on what you forgot?

Cool pics Corp! What's with the porcs in the daytime? We had daytime close encounters as well over on the Devil. Cool little buggers, aren't they?”