The Adirondack Trip
John Brown's Tract hiking trail
On May 6, 2000 a group of six guys set out on a hiking/ camping trip in
to the Adirondacks with soon to be married guy, Ryan Mehl. The six of
us (Graham Mehl, Scott Seymour, Sean Pollu, Matthew Clark, Ryan Hinrichs,
Ian Rhile, and ??) wanted to take him on a memorable trip. This
memorable trip took us to John Brown's Tract hiking trail circuit
in the Adirondacks of the state of New York. The John Brown's Tract
full circuit is 9.6 miles long and hiking time is approximately 8
hours. The circuit is a long level loop generally following the
valleys between long ridge hills. The hike takes you past several
lakes in the ha-der-on-dah wilderness, each desirable as a camping
or fishing destination. The route is designed to five you a feel
for the wilderness that greeted the first settlers. The surrounding
forest were burned in one of the worst of the 1903 forest fires,
ignited by a spark from a wood fire locomotive on the rail line
near by. The trailhead starts at NY highway Route 28. 0.6 miles
in you come to fork, turning to the right begins your journey.
Only a few glacial erratic lies beneath the forest of enormous beach,
birch, and maple trees. Continuing down another 0.9 miles is another
intersection; turning to the right brings you past Bare Mountain.
After 1.7 miles you reach Middle Settlement Lake. You can see swamps
openings beside middle Branch Creek. You know when you near the lake
when suddenly in the midst of the unbroken forest, one of the
Adirondacks' great big boulders appear. It is a part of the facing
cliff that has split away. There is a short trail that takes you
out to the big lake. The lake is surrounded by swamp. Shoreline
is made muddier by the flooding of recent beaver work. Maple trees
block the view. 0.9 miles further down the trail brings you to
Cedar Pond. At this point there is 1.3 mile trail that take you to
Middle Branch Lake. This trail starts up a series of short ledges
and goes over a height-of-land and down into swales and then cuts
down more steeply and crosses a stream. At this point there is an
intersection. To the right heads to a DEC truck trail that circles
back to Thendara trail. The left fork goes to a shelter. The
shelter overlooks a pretty lake that is visited by looms, which
may swim by quite close. The lake's shores are lined with Labrador
Tea. Other features are dense spruce bog, bunchberry, creeping
white winterberry, and beech fern. A short hike back from the
trail to the shelter of 1.7 miles takes you past Grass Pond.
Another 1.1 miles take you back to the beginning of the trail
circuit at NY highway Route 28.