09/06
NRO was almost over. The on and off Friday rain led to a Saturday that was bright and sunny except for the canopied camp site. A lot of people went to Surprise, some people went to other nearby caves, and I stayed under the canopy collecting money from late registrants. The numerous Saturday entertainment events came one after another, and at some point I realized I didn�t need to do anything else that night. So I peeled out my contacts and crawled in my bag. And now Tom Cavanaugh was waking me up through my tent.
"It�s 8:30. All the crepes are gone."
My watch broke during OTR, and I hadn�t replaced it. I knew it was after sunrise, but not how long after sunrise. I was 50 feet from the tents, and didn�t hear the clamor of the grotto grills, so I thought it was 7:30. Breakfast started at 8:00. And apparently was doing fine without me standing around.
There was a feeling of relief all through the morning. NRO was done. It was a big hit. The grotto had a huge amount of money, the NRO itself did just fine, and now everyone was pulling up stakes and driving home.
I wanted to cave. Someplace new. So I drove up to Sam�s Point Preserve. I was positive that I wouldn�t be the only caver here. Sure enough, I recognized Peter Youngbaer�s Vermont plates and bat sticker in the parking lot. So there was at least one familiar face in here.
The preserve is Nature Conservancy land now, but used to be a show cave. Some of the only dwarf pine forests in the world are here, as well as one of the biggest single collections of land this close to New York City.
The ice caves I visited aren�t the ones marked on the map published here, but just south of the mapped trails, a short hike from the parking lot. This used to be commercialized, so the trail was wide enough for a car. Huge erosion scars showed that even an ATV would have problems here now. Small blue cylinders were jabbed in this area, with protected pine sapings. In a couple decades, the trees could reclaim this pavement.
I found Peter as he was leaving the ice caves. He waited for me to take a quick run through. It�s a self-led trail through several crevice and talus caves, one strung out after another. (The ice had melted by mid-September, unfortunately.) At three points it gets dark enough to need a light source. At all three spots, installed motion detectors set off lights. It�s a great idea. Other low-maintenance show caves should think of it.
Peter and I compared our drives home. He had several hours more than me to do, but both of us were here, and were curious to see how the high-water level would affect the falls. So we headed northeast along the trail to Verkeerderkill Falls.
We passed a shirtless guy on the narrow, soggy trail. Then we passed a shirt. We tried finding the guy to see if he lost it, but he was gone. It�s a Coors Light t-shirt, extra large, and look for it at the next NRO auction.
The falls were, in Peter�s words, kicking. Huge quaitities of water rushed over a gradiated cliff, splashing on several spots during its 150-foot fall. The whole valley we were looking over was carved from this waterfall. We each took gulps of the mountain stream. People pay for this stuff in bottles.
Peter was going to turn around, but why do that when there�s new trail ahead? We continued on to High Point.
"That looks like an apple tree," Peter said after an hour walking near the cliff. It was off the trail by fifty feet. He bushwhacked over there, me following. "What sort of tree is this?"
We saw some small berries hanging from upper branches. None were on branches within reach, but a few were on the ground. We picked up a few. They were tiny, purple and egg-shaped. Peter ate one. He didn�t immediately die, so I ate one. The seed at the center took up almost all the room of this mint-sized fruit, but the fruit itself was so sweet it made the effort worth it. This was my first huckleberry. They�re very hard to cultivate, so they don�t make it to supermarkets.
High Point used to be home to a watch tower, but it was taken down. Some moorings are still there, along with a couple that had brought a baby stroller all the way up the path. The stroller could make it this whole way because the last leg our our hike was a road made in the colonial days for carriage traffic. It was washed out around High Point, but below that it was wide and even and gravel-paved.
Off of this road is the easternmost end of the trail leading to the Ellenville ice caves, the ones marked on the map. I took the trail fifty feet before it completely disappeared. It must be more apparent from the Ellenville side, where parking is free and it doesn�t take five hours of hiking to reach.
As we passed by Lake Maratanza, Peter cut to our left. Peter�s nose for interesting stuff paid off again, because here was a dry brick shaft dropping six feet below the water�s surface. At the bottom of the shaft was a stone-hewed tunnel that had a big echo and was half-filled with water. We tried to figure out what this was. An overflow valve? Escape tunnel?
We bushwhacked back to the trail, and Peter began thinking about where that tunnel led. A lot of water passed through it, so it had to come out someplace relatively low to the high-built trail. Soon we came to a patch of ferns down to out left. Peter jumped down into them. Twenty feet away was a completely hidden cave entrance. At this point Peter, environmentalist, calm-headed regional politician and recent vegetarian convert, threw his arm in the air and yelled "F&*%ing A!"
New caves and hiden caves. I�m glad I woke up today.