The only independent, nonprofit news organization solely dedicated to reporting on the Adirondack Park.
By Phil Brown
By PHIL BROWN In 1989 and 1990, the state Department of Environmental Conservation drafted a preliminary list of navigable waterways, taking suggestions from its regional staffs, the Adirondack Mountain Club’s canoe-route subcommittee, and American Whitewater, a nonprofit group devoted to protecting whitewater resources. Since the list was only preliminary, DEC planned to hold public hearings…
By Phil Brown
Mt. Colden’s historic mountaineering route affords a long view of peaks and the past. By Phil Brown We started up the trail a little after 9 a.m., but the real adventure began about noon, after we had hiked to Avalanche Lake and stood gazing up at the Trap Dike, the famous gash in the cliffs…
By Phil Brown
The March/April issue of the Explorer contains an article about skiing the Kilburn Slide outside Lake Placid. I went with Josh Wilson, a backcountry snowboarder, shortly after a big snowfall that prompted an avalanche warning for the region. One purpose of the trip was to test the avalanche conditions on the slide. The greater purpose,…
By Phil Brown
NOTE: THIS IS ANOTHER POST FROM OUR PUBLISHER, TOM WOODMAN. The attorney general issued a news release pertaining to the motion to intervene in the Shingle Shanty case. See our earlier post to download the legal documents. ATTORNEY GENERAL SCHNEIDERMAN SUES TO PROTECT PUBLIC’S RIGHT TO TRAVEL ON ADIRONDACK WATERWAY State Seeks to Stop Property…
By Phil Brown
We just received the Forest Ranger report for January and February from DEC’s Region 5, which includes the eastern two-thirds of the Adirondack Park. Below is the report verbatim. Essex County Town of Keene, Private Land (Adirondack Mountain Reserve Easement) On Sunday January 2, 2011, at approximately 4:28 pm, DEC Dispatch in Ray Brook received…
Lawsuit questions public’s right to paddle through private property. By Fred LeBrun A year and a half after paddling through posted land connecting publicly owned waterways, Adirondack Explorer Editor Phil Brown has been sued for trespass by the private landowners, namely the Brandreth Park Association and the Friends of Thayer Lake. The case could clarify the…
Snowy woods beckon skiers By Phil Brown We were all happy to be on our first backcountry ski trip of the season, but none of us was as excited as Ella. She often bolted ahead of us, eager to see what snowy adventure lay around the bend, and she kept her high spirits throughout our…
By Phil Brown
On Sunday, I skied the Marcy trail from Adirondak Loj with Mike Lynch and Chris Knight, two reporters from the Adirondack Daily Enterprise. We followed snowshoe tracks nearly to Indian Falls and then broke trail as far as the junction with the Hopkins Trail, 1.2 miles from the summit. We turned around there. The 6.2-mile…
By Phil Brown
I shoveled my driveway four times in twenty-four hours, and I am a happy man. If you’re a backcountry skier, you understand. Saranac Lake got more than a foot of snow in this week’s storm—enough, I imagine, to render skiable most of the backcountry trails in the area. Yesterday, my son and some friends skied…
By Phil Brown
The fifteenth annual Adirondack International Mountaineering Festival comes to Keene this weekend. As usual, the Mountaineer and Rock and River have attracted elite climbers to the event and are offering a variety of classes for those who want to learn or polish mountaineering skills. Most of the classes are full, but there are still openings…