Independence hike into the Catskills!

Yes!! We declared independence from the weather monsters and decided to hike up the highest peak in the Catskills, Slide Mountain. Oh and yes, we did it on July 4! :) It was a lovely, clear morning with just a hint of nip in the air, unusual for July certainly, and some cummulo-nimbus clouds looking down at us nastily. But, we threw caution to the winds, rolled down the top of our car and headed three hours away from the (rather empty) city into the Catskills area and the town of Big Indian.

We have been in the area before; last year when we were camping in Sullivan County, we had attempted this hike by another route but could not summit due to lack of time and fast-approaching dusk. Well, actually, we had not really planned the trip and the sign post at the start was a bit misleading. Anyway, we made a promise to ourselves, then, to come back and tame the mountain!

So, after a bit of researching, we decided to hike up the mountain via the Curtis-Omsbree (CO) trail. As a background, there are three ways to hike up - Pheonecia East Branch (P-EB), Curtis-Omsbree (blue marked) and the Burroughs Range (red marked) trails but only the Burroughs trails goes all the way to the summit. The CO trail took us through all three.

The trail head is conveniently located at one end of the parking area for slide mountain. We started on the yellow blazed P-EB trail, skipping across a tiny brook, up a rather steep rocky climb and continued on a reasonably gradient climb for 0.7 miles. At this point, you can either continue on the yellow trail to the summit or proceed another 0.8 miles to the junction with the blue blazed CO trail, which, we did.

The junction is hard to miss. There is a stone marker erected in memory of William Curtis and Allan Omsbree, who had laid the trail out and unfortunately died in a snow storm while hiking in New Hampshire. Continuing up the blue blazed trail we passed through rocky outcrops, more heart pumping climbs, some sunny fern patches and a great lookout point.

The look out point is at 3500 ft altitude, approximately half way up the way to the summit, and offers a spectacular view (the photo at the start) of the Catskills ranges. Continuing along the blue trail, we came to a fork, where we turned right onto the red blazed Burroughs range trail. A short distance later we summitted. OK, this one is a tricky summit. There is well actually no view from here. Just a small concrete block marking the highest point. There is spot just before the summit which does have good views of the East.

But, a bit further over on the other side of the red trail, there is a rocky outcrop; the perfect location for a pit stop to enjoy the breeze (rather chilly it was actually) and our homemade chicken salad sandwiches (oh! and laughing cow cheese! I can eat just the cheese as a snack!!).

After a leisurely lunch, we discovered that John Burroughs (after whom the trail is named) had rested many a time at the same exact spot and drew inspiration for many of his essays. This fact was subtly pointed out to us by a large plaque on the underside of the rock (just in case, you didn't know the history going in).

Incidentally, the Burroughs Range trail traverses three peaks - Cornell, Whittenberg and Slide Mountains, a total of 14 miles round trip. We had thought of hiking this trail but being cognizant of the fact that there are only 14+ hours of daylight and the place was about three hours from the city, we decided to stay with the shorter one.

After resting for about 45 minutes, we descended via the red Burroughs Range trail almost all the way. For the last 0.7 miles we took the yellow trail again down to the parking area. The red trail is more rocky and definitely wasn't as much fun as the blue one. We also realized that this was the trail that we had climbed up last year. Anyway, I would definitely recommend going up via the yellow or blue trails.

The total trail length was 6.2 miles which we completed in 4 hours including the 45 minute lunch stop, a few minutes at a couple of outlooks and a few more in photo-taking. The trail was well-marked and I would classify it as a cusp between easy and moderate (The descent definitely made the ascent look tougher, but hey, that's already behind you! :-)).

So, all in all a great day out in nature! And not a drop from up above! Pays to take risks sometimes :)