A detour. We were supposed to go camping in the White Mountains this weekend, but the whole Northeast decided to host a torrential downpour, so we took a chance by heading west instead. It worked out for a little while at least!
We opted for Twin Mountain and Pecoy Notch Trail. This whole trip was super last minute with minimal planning – I actually had to look up most of these trails after the fact for this blog post. My Strava maps say that we hiked 4.8 miles the first day and 4.5 the second, so I have no idea how much meandering we did.
But the weather held out for at least most of the first day! Working backwards from my maps, we parked at the Prediger Road Trailhead and took an unnamed trail up to the Jimmy Dolan Notch Overlook.
Hiking through the White Mountains as often as we do, sometimes I forget how different hiking can look elsewhere, even so close to home. It’s a subtle difference – the way that the foliage grows, the way the rocks and boulders have landed. Maybe it was just the area that we were in, but the trail seemed to undulate in a way that I’m not used to; lots of short up and downs along the way.
We made our way from Jimmy Dolan over the Twin Mountain South Summit and then on to Twin Mountain overlook. By the time we summitted Twin, the mosquitos had gotten quite aggressive and it was getting late, so we descended into Pecoy Notch and made camp near the first water source we could find.
I can’t emphasize enough how bad the mosquitos were. We tried hanging out by the fire for as long as we could, had some dinner, but retreated into our tents early to flee the onslaught.
Thankfully our mosquito situation was much better in the morning – remedied by a steady drizzle that stayed with us the rest of the day. Honestly, it was a relief – I think we all rather the rain.
It was a slight shame that we stopped exploring as early as we did, because it turns out, we were only about a mile and a half away from Dibbles Quarry (another thing I had to look up after the fact – it’s amazing that Googling “granite slabs Catskills NY” works).
The whole place looks like the set of a fairytale or fantasy novel. Giant granite thrones are strewn about, built out of piles of rocks, like regal cairns. Apparently, after the quarry was shut down in the 1800s, this area slowly evolved into the mystical place it is today, built piecemeal by anonymous hikers passing through.
We popped out onto a road shortly thereafter and walked it back to the car in the rain.
Thank you Miss Lucy’s kitchen for the delicious post-camp brunch!
