Documentary follows 8 high school students as they canoe, raft, and bike from Mount Marcy to New York City, highlighting pollution concerns
By Phil Brown
Take eight high-school students–some with little outdoor experience–on an expedition over Mount Marcy and down the Hudson River to New York City, and you’re bound to have a movie-worthy adventure. That is the subject of “The Voice of the Hudson,” a documentary by John Barnhardt, an Emmy-winning filmmaker.
The 50-minute movie will be shown in the Saranac Lake Central High School auditorium at 7 p.m. Wednesday. Admission is free (click here to RSVP).
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The Source to Sea journey was the brainchild of Joe Dadey, the executive director of Hamlets to Huts in Saranac Lake, and Greg Morrissey, the founder of Mountain Goat Movement, a guide service in New Jersey.
In all, some 20 people made the 375-mile trek over two weeks in the summer of 2023. Others in the expedition included adult leaders, guides and a four-person film crew.
The students traveled under their own steam, hiking over Mount Marcy; canoeing, rafting and kayaking much of the Hudson; and biking on the Empire State Trail.
Exposing the students to the outdoors and testing their mettle were not the only goals of the expedition. Along the way they took water samples that labs would test for pollution.
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Tim Keyes, a data analyst, acted as the group’s science coordinator. He described the water sampling as citizen science, not the sort of rigorous research that appears in peer-reviewed journals. Nevertheless, the students did find something significant: microplastics in Lake Tear of the Clouds, the little pond on the slopes of Mount Marcy. Lake Tear is the highest source of the Hudson.
Microplastics are minuscule fragments of plastic that exist seemingly everywhere on the planet (and in our bodies). In the Adirondacks, they had been found in Lake Champlain and the Saranac and St. Regis rivers. The Source to Sea expedition dashed the hope that Lake Tear’s remoteness protected it from this insidious and invisible form of pollution.
“That finding was surprising, but maybe not so much now as we learn more about the presence of microplastics in the environment,” Dadey said.
It seems safe to assume that microplastics can found anywhere in the Adirondacks. All of the water samples taken by the students along their journey contained microplastics.
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Microplastics are shed into the environment from innumerable sources, including car tires as you drive to the trailhead and the fleece jacket you wear on a hike. The labs did not ascertain the type of microplastics found in Lake Tear or the Hudson, though such testing is possible. Dadey said he may order such tests as part of a future expedition.
MORE TO EXPLORE: Read a first-hand account of the trip
Two of the students lived in the Adirondacks: Sage Whidden of Saranac Lake and Cole Sears of North Creek. Both are now freshmen in college. Four of the students came from the New York City region. Two were from California.
All of the students were boys. Dadey explained that the leaders wanted to avoid “guy/girl dynamics.” He is thinking about putting together a trip for girls in the future.
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The students enjoyed spectacular scenery, including the High Peaks, the Hudson Gorge and the Manhattan skyline, but they had to earn those views. Indeed, they must have wondered what they got themselves into on the very first day of the trip. Starting at Adirondak Loj early in the morning, they hiked over Mount Marcy, the state’s highest peak, and descended to Lake Tear. Given the filming and water sampling, progress was slow. After an 18-mile hike, the students arrived at their campsite at 3 a.m. On Day 2, despite a shortage of sleep, they canoed more than 11 miles on the Hudson and then biked another five miles to Newcomb.
There were other hard days, such as when strong headwinds forced them to pull off the river near Stillwater in Saratoga County. The next day they biked 70 miles in 90-degree heat. Over the next three days they biked all the way to New Jersey, crossing the Hudson on the George Washington Bridge in Manhattan. On the final day they paddled kayaks to Jersey City, where they were reunited with family and friends.
“It was really, really tough, but it was a lot of fun,” Dadey said of the expedition. He praised Barnhardt and his crew for capturing the essence of the experience in the documentary. “It highlights the grit and perseverance of these young men.”
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