The Appalachian National Scenic Trail, generally known as the Appalachian Trail or simply the A.T., is a marked hiking trail in the Eastern United States extending between Springer Mountain in Georgia and Mount Katahdin in Maine. The trail is about 2,200 miles (3,500 km) long, though the exact length changes over time as parts are rerouted or modified. The Appalachian Trail Conservancy describes the Appalachian Trail as the longest hiking-only trail in the world. More than 2 million people are said to take a hike on part of the trail at least once each year.
Harriman is a village in Orange County, New York, United States. It is in the southeast part of the town of Monroe, with a small part in the town of Woodbury. The population was 2,424 at the 2010 census. It is part of the Poughkeepsie–Newburgh–Middletown, NY Metropolitan Statistical Area as well as the larger New York–Newark–Bridgeport, NY-NJ-CT-PA Combined Statistical Area.
Edward Henry Harriman was an American railroad executive.
The Ramapo Mountains are a forested chain of the Appalachian Mountains in northeastern New Jersey and southeastern New York, in the United States. They range in height from 900 to 1,200 ft in New Jersey, and 900 to 1,400 ft in New York.
Bear Mountain State Park is a 5,205-acre (21.06 km2) state park located on the west bank of the Hudson River in Rockland and Orange counties, New York. The park offers biking, hiking, boating, picnicking, swimming, cross-country skiing, cross-country running, sledding and ice skating. It also includes several facilities such as the Perkins Memorial Tower, the Trailside Museum and Zoo, the Bear Mountain Inn, a merry-go-round, pool, and a skating rink. It also hosts the Bear Mountain Circle, where the historic Palisades Interstate Parkway and Bear Mountain Bridge meet. It is managed by the Palisades Interstate Park Commission, which is overseen by the State of New York.
Mary Williamson Averell Harriman was an American philanthropist and the wife of railroad executive E. H. Harriman. Born in New York to a successful family, Averell married Harriman in 1879. Averell's father introduced Harriman to the railroad business. After Harriman's death, his wife was left with between $70 and $100 million. She became dedicated to philanthropy, donating the land that became Harriman State Park and largely funding the development of the controversial Eugenics Record Office. Averell had several children; her son, W. Averell Harriman became governor of New York and her daughter Mary Harriman Rumsey founded the Junior League.
At 47,527 acres (192.33 km2), Harriman State Park is the second largest state park in New York State. Located in Rockland and Orange counties 30 miles (48 km) north of New York City, it is a haven for hikers with over 200 miles (320 km) of hiking trails. The park is also known for its 31 lakes, multiple streams, public camping area, and great vistas. The park's hiking trails are currently maintained by volunteers from the New York - New Jersey Trail Conference.
Palisades Interstate Park and its governing body, the Palisades Interstate Park Commission, was formed under an interstate compact in 1900 by governors Theodore Roosevelt of New York and Foster M. Voorhees of New Jersey in response to the destruction of the Palisades by quarry operators in the late 19th century. The Palisades are the cliffs on the west bank of the Hudson River across from and continuing north of Manhattan Island. The commission consists of ten commissioners, five appointed by each governor, who serve staggered five-year terms.
Raymond Hezekiah Torrey was the author of weekly columns, Outings and The Long Brown Path in the New York Evening Post in the 1920s and 1930s. The column played a major role in the development of the 2,100-mile (3,400 km) Appalachian Trail, the Long Path and the popularity of hiking generally. He was a founding member of the New York–New Jersey Trail Conference and one of the authors of the first edition of the New York Walk Book. He had extensive scientific knowledge, writing about everything from the short-billed marsh wren to marine fossils and lichens; he could identify over 700 plants. He was secretary of the Association for the Preservation of the Adirondacks, and also secretary of the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society.
Arden is a hamlet around the town line of the Orange County towns of Tuxedo and Monroe in the "boot" of New York state west of the Hudson River. It is roughly coterminous with the 10910 ZIP Code.
The Long Path is a 357-mile (575 km) long-distance hiking trail beginning at the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee, New Jersey and ending at Altamont, New York, in the Albany area. While not yet a continuous trail, relying on road walks in some areas, it nevertheless takes in many of the popular hiking attractions west of the Hudson River, such as the New Jersey Palisades, Harriman State Park, the Shawangunk Ridge and the Catskill Mountains. It offers hikers a diversity of environments to pass through, from suburbia and sea-level salt marshes along the Hudson to wilderness and boreal forest on Catskill summits 4,000 feet (1,220 m) in elevation.
Taconic State Park is located in Columbia and Dutchess County, New York abutting Massachusetts and Connecticut within the Taconic Mountains. The state park is located off New York State Route 344 south of Interstate 90 and 110 miles (180 km) north of New York City. It features camping, hiking, bicycling, hunting, cross county skiing and other recreational opportunities.
Bear Mountain is one of the best-known peaks of New York's Hudson Highlands. Located partially in Orange County in the town of Highlands and partially in Rockland County in the town of Stony Point, it lends its name to the nearby Bear Mountain Bridge and Bear Mountain State Park that contains it.
The Appalachian National Scenic Trail spans fourteen U.S. states during its roughly 2,200 miles (3,500 km)-long journey: Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. The southern end is at Springer Mountain, Georgia, and it follows the ridgeline of the Appalachian Mountains, crossing many of its highest peaks and running almost continuously through wilderness before reaching the northern end at Mount Katahdin, Maine.
Tomkins Cove is a hamlet in the Town of Stony Point, Rockland County, New York, United States located north of Stony Point; east of Harriman State Park; south of Doodletown and west of the Hudson River. It is located north-northwest of New York City. The population is approximately 1,739 and the ZIP Code is 10986. The community is served by the 786 exchange in area code 845.
The Silurian Tuscarora Formation — also known as Tuscarora Sandstone or Tuscarora Quartzite — is a mapped bedrock unit in Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia, and Virginia, USA.
The Blue Disc Trail is a marked trail in Harriman State Park, New York, United States. The trail is 2.8 miles (4.5 km) long, connecting Johnsontown Road to the Ramapo-Dunderberg and Victory Trails. The blaze of the trail is a white blaze with a blue dot on it. The trail climbs two mountains, Almost Perpendicular and Pound Mountain, and passes two major rock formations, Elbow Brush and Claudius Smith Rock. The trail dates back to the 1920s with the Tuxedo Trail and 1932 as the Red Disc Trail by Paul H. Schubert. The trail was official in 1943, when Alexander Jassup replaced the red markers with blue discs.
Arden Valley Road is a scenic road located in Southfields, New York, in the United States, that travels through Harriman State Park and is owned by the Palisades Interstate Park Commission. At 5.2 miles (8.4 km) long, it begins at New York State Route 17 (NY 17) in Southfields and ends at Seven Lakes Drive in Harriman State Park. Arden Valley Road also serves a trout stocking area for the Ramapo River. The road is located entirely in Orange County and is home to the Elk's Pen Trailhead in Harriman State Park. In 1921, plans arose by the commission to construct the road, which was completed the same year and stretched along the borderline with the Harriman estate. Major William A. Welch ordered 75 elk from Yellowstone National Park to be placed in a wired cage between Arden and Southfields in 1919. The elk eventually disappeared from the pen by 1942, and the area became the current Elk's Pen trailhead for trails within Harriman State Park.
The Kittatinny Valley is a section of the Great Appalachian Valley in Sussex and Warren counties in northwestern New Jersey that is bounded on the west by Kittatinny Mountain, and in the east by the Highlands region. The valley is roughly 39 miles (63 km) long, with an average breadth of 10 miles (16 km) through the center of Sussex and Warren Counties.
The New York – New Jersey Highlands is a geological formation composed primarily of Precambrian igneous and metamorphic rock running from the Delaware River near Musconetcong Mountain, northeast through the Skylands Region of New Jersey along the Bearfort Ridge and the Ramapo Mountains, Sterling Forest, Harriman and Bear Mountain State Parks in New York, to the Hudson River at Storm King Mountain. The northern region is also known as the Hudson Highlands and the southern as the New Jersey Highlands. A broader definition would extend the region west to Reading, Pennsylvania, and east to the Housatonic River in Connecticut, encompassing the Reading Prong.
