![]() Now: where the Devil is it?Īfter about fifteen minutes of fruitlessly casting about, Kevin cheats and turns on the GPS in “orienteering compass” mode. The pair arrive on the flat summit within a few hundred feet of the canister. Rather than trying to find it again, he exercises a general rule of mountain navigation: the summit is up., and simply heads upward through the brush. Kevin misguesses the direction that the path takes around it (choosing the left side, that offers a line more nearly in the direction of the summit), and sees no sign of the path on the other side. Kevin and Alberto climb the well-defined herd path, which leads into the crown of a fallen tree. ![]() The grade is now abandoned for about a century, but offers level hiking to a point just north of Southwest Hunter Mountain (Leavitt's Peak).Īt this point, a pair of cairns mark the turnoff to Southwest. Before long, as the trail veers eastward, a small cairn appears on the right, marking the start of a rail grade over which horse-drawn cars operated for the Fenwick Lumber company. At this elevation, there are still a few late blackberries, and the two enjoy a small snack on them. Over the next hour or two, the pair ascend to the 3500 foot level, and arrive at Geiger Point atop the West Kill headwall, with its views of West Kill Mountain and Southwest Hunter.Īfter another pause for compulsive photography, the pair continue up the Devil's Path, which is now running nearly level along the 3500-foot contour. Auld Nick must have been sleeping on the job that day. This section of the Devil's Path is quite benign, particularly by comparison with what it has further east. Kevin is surprised by how gradual the climb turns out to be: there are none of the rock scrambles typical of Catskill trails. The two get on the trail a little before 0900, and make good time up the relatively easy Diamond Notch trail to the lovely little fall that is variously styled Diamond Notch Falls, West Kill Falls, and Buttermilk Falls (the last is puzzling why do so many different falls in the Catskills bear that name?)Īfter the briefest pause for photography, the two turn left on the more rugged Devil's Path, and start the long climb up the north wall of the West Kill valley. Kevin and Alberto park at the trailhead for the Spruceton Horse Trail and roadwalk over to the Diamond Notch trailhead. They decide to skip Rusk this time, and go counter-clockwise, so as to get Southwest Hunter (Leavitt's Peak), the more difficult of the two peaks, out of the way first. This time, Alberto from work is his hiking partner. With Catherine packed off to school, Kevin decides to try and finish the hike that got interrupted on July 20.
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