Hike #1567; Rosendale to Kingston

Hike #1567: 8/27/23 Rosendale to Kingston with Matt Davis, Russ Nelson, Diane Reider, Brittany Weider, Evan "Joe Millionaire" Van Rossum, Justin Gurbisz, Bill Merchant, and Everen

This hike would be the final one in our Delaware and Hudson series.

Several years ago, Matt Davis proposed that we do a series of hikes that traced the journey taken by a single piece of coal, from mines to market. I loved the idea. It was brilliant. His initial idea was to trace the old Lackawanna Railroad or the Morris Canal, routes that I'd already pretty much exhausted, so I suggested that we do something neither of us had really undertaken, the Delaware and Hudson.

The route was completed in 1829, a combination of canal and a portage railroad. 

The canal stretched from Kingston on the Hudson River west to Honesdale, and then a gravity railroad from there up to Carbondale and more of the Lackawanna River valley. 

We started around Olyphant and climbed one of the planes from a mine area and headed east, following where the loaded track had been, then along the canal east.

The idea was that we would do one hike in the series per month until we finish it, barring any weather related delays, and we would reach Kingston Point within maybe two years or so.

The series was sixteen hikes starting in early 2018, just under six years to get all of them in. I'd hoped, as I hope for all of these big series I work on, that we'd have a big group that would commit to doing it together.

The series started out promising with a large group, and several folks did all of the first ones. 

Unfortunately, people started to drop form the series as we continued on. Dan Trump did the first six of them, but then missed all of them after. Jenny came out most all the time, but she missed ten out of sixteen also, more interspersed.

Diane was next, having only missed 4 of the hikes in the series. It came down to only Matt, Russ, Ewa, and I for the last ones when we got as far as Ellenville, beyond the summit level of the canal.

Unfortunately, Matt missed the bit north from Ellenville. Russ came out for Kerkhonksen to High Falls area, but Ewa didn't. She came back only for the next High Falls one, so she was on all but 3. 

Matt missed north of Ellenville to High Falls, in two hikes, so he did all but two. Russ missed only the five mile stretch on the bit of road walk from High Falls to Rosendale. So, once again, I was the only one to truly do the entire thing start to finish again, but it's alright.

For the last hikes in the series, I decided to milk this for as long as I could. I always throw other little things into the mix when I do these hikes anyway. Along the way, we included some falls up by Simpson PA, we included Prompton State Park twice, Lake Wallenpaupack, Minisink Battlefield, Port Jervis Watershed, Cragsmoor, and more.

The pandemic crap set us behind several months, and I'd decided to add a bunch of stuff onto these final hikes.

First of all, the entire route from Ellenville to Accord was pretty much one with the O&W Railroad's Kingston Branch, and so I felt that, even though I had done most of that where it wasn't on the canal, I should do it again just to fit in with the series, since it is an entire branch. I added parts of the right of way that were not one with the canal onto two hikes.

Then, on the next bit, I figured we would use the Wallkill Valley Rail Trail heading south. This bit is the next section of the Empire State Trail, and we had done that entire trail from New York City to New Paltz, so I might as well slap that in there to fit that series as well.

Originally, I was going to milk this into one more hike, by incorporating the Wallkill Valley Railroad north of Rosendale, but I decided that it would instead be its own hike.

For this last one in the Delaware and Hudson series, I decided to focus on the canal from Rosendale to Kingston Point, and then we'd hike the old Ulster and Delaware Railroad from there west to Kingston Plaza. I'd already hiked that twice, but I had never done it since it was officially turned into a trail in several sections. 

I chose Kingston Plaza as the meeting and end point, and we would shuttle with as few vehicles as possible to the start point from there.

Our start would be at the Century House Museum on the west side of Rosendale, in an area that was known as Lawrenceville. I planned for this so that Bill Merchant could open the museum for us.

Mr. Merchant has now been running the show with the Delaware and Hudson Canal museum in High Falls for years, and he does an absolutely amazing job.

His talents for retaining the minutia of all of the canal related history is just perfect for someone like me. 

He says he doesn't tire of telling the same story to folks who come by and have no clue how the canals worked, but I suspect it must be cool for him to discuss things like miter gates and drop gates, cut stone and composite stone, or whatever other details that might not mean anything to anyone else. 

He's a true community leader when it comes to history, involved in aspects of this all over. I hit it off with him during our first phone conversation. With him, there is so much to discuss. We could go on for hours about the details of the canal, and that doesn't even scratch the surface of so many other things I'd love to discuss with him. We'd recently found out I was a session musician and was heading into the studio to record some stand-up bass tracks. 

Through these discussions, I found out that he has gotten very involved in the Century House, a place I came to love a little over a decade ago. It is steeped in history of Rosendale Cement, which grew to a world-renowned business for about a century.

Lock 7

I've already gone over the history of this in the past journal, but since this is the last one, we'll reiterate it once more.

Century House was the property of the Snyder family for generations, very much tied to this industry.

When the Erie Canal was being dug upstate, Engineer Canvass White discovered a way of making natural hydraulic cement using the limestone and dolomite. The similar process was found, some believe by engineer James McEntee when the Delaware and Hudson Canal was being built, around 1825.

The Snyder family got involved in the cement mining business, and the Century House was built by Christopher and Deborah Snyder for newlywed Jacob Low Snyder in 1809.

In 1825, Snyder ceded some of his land to John B. Jervis for the Delaware and Hudson Canal to pass through. As a condition to this, Snyder required of the canal company that they construct a slip from the canal from which he could ship his produce to market directly from his property, and a bridge to connect to his mill.

When the area for the slip was being excavated, it was discovered that a large amount of dolomitic limestone of high quality, which could be pulverized and used as cement without additives, was on the property.

Snyder leased the southeast portion of his property to Watson Lawrence, who had already built a cement facility just to the east. That area grew up to become Lawrenceville with this industry.

Popularity grew, to the point where all natural limestone cement became known as Rosendale Cement.

The cement was used on such huge projects as the footings of the Brooklyn Bridge, the Statue of Liberty, Washington Monument, Grand Central Terminal, Croton Aqueduct, Empire State Building foundation, and our nation's capital.

Likely lock house at lock 7

Popularity of the Rosendale style cement declined when the Portland Cement industry took off, starting with the first facility in Coplay PA, which we've hiked through many times. 

Mr. Merchant stated that it might well be possible that Portland Cement was seen more favorably specifically because it could be demolished. Rosendale Cement did not demolish so easily, which is why the first attempt to take down the original Rondout Aqueduct with a wrecking ball failed, and the ball just bounced right off of it (but a generous amount of dynamite took it out).

There were ups and downs in the industry, and the Snyder family continued with it. There was a drop during the Great Depression, but in 1935, it became the Century Cement Manufacturing Company, wholly owned by Andrew J. Snyder II. 

It was discovered that Portland Cement could be made even faster and stronger by mixing with natural cement at an 80:20 ratio. It was particularly well suited to highway construction, and the last major American Rosendale Cement project was the New York Thruway in 1954.

The industry continued to shrink until the only real customers it had were for historic buildings made of the product, who needed more of it for repairs. Snyder finally gave up on the business in 1970 and passed away 5 years later.

The old cement mines had been used to grow mushrooms, as well as to store top secret documents. A museum was intended to take over a portion of the property including the 1809 Snyder Residence, known as Century House, but that folded up.

When the property went up for sale, it was purchased by Dietrich Werner, who really got things going with the Century House Museum. My friends involved in abandonedmines.net had their annual picnic there, and Jillane became a part of that group.

When I met her, she took me to the site for the first time, when I got to meet Dietrich. I ended up attending the abandoned mines group picnics a few years in a row at the Widow Jane Mine, and got to explore the adjacent Lawrence Mine system as well. The last couple of times there, Jillane stayed in the car the entire time, and I went with the group to go through all of the mines.

Sadly, Dietrich Werner passed away a couple of years later, and the site reorganized with different leadership. It was always what Mr Merchant calls a sort of "roadside attraction" more than a museum, but I really like it for what it is.

We arrived at the site and parked off to the right at the right where there are some old cement kilns. These are the private property of a company that stores sensitive documents in some of the old cement mines, but the lot is public.

Before we even got out of the cars, Mr. Merchant was walking over to greet us. 

Our first order of business was to head uphill, past the Century House, and then to the old Widow Jane Mine. I had considered visiting the Lawrence Mine, the really deep one on this trip, but I heard there is more security so we didn't.

Still Widow Jane Mine is really very interesting and is a good representation of what these mines looked like. It is being regularly used as a music and arts venue, and it was being actively set up with stuff while we were in there.

Russ immediately got roped into, or rather volunteered, to help set stuff up, and was doing trips between a van parked outside, and inside the mine.

The mine was known as the Widow Jane mine for one Jane Snyder who's name appears on the old 1870s atlas maps of the area. Usually, a woman's name was not put on the maps back then unless she was a widow, and so I assume it must have been named for her. 

After hanging out in the mine a bit, and listening to an excellent history dissertation from Mr. Merchant, we headed out of the mine and back downhill toward the Century House.

Ev really loved this mine the previous time we were in, but this time he seemed a bit freaked out by it and was anxious to get out.

We headed down to the Century House. Mr. Merchant unlocked, and we looked through the displays. It looked great, much better than previous times I'd seen it. Mr Merchant was trying to make some sense of the displays, because everything was kept so haphazard in the past.

Deitrich was a great guy, but he collected a lot of stuff that was historic, but kind of random for the story of the property. Trying to find a place for everything becomes kind of difficult. There's a lot more work to do in the museum, but it's coming along nicely, and I kind of like the randomness about it for what it is.

After some time here, we headed out from the museum and began descended toward the former canal. Ev had been running amuck, and I needed to get him out of there before he broke something.

As we headed down. Mr. Merchant pointed out old mill and spring sites on the left, and then we paused for a moment to check out the old Delaware and Hudson Canal slip for the Snyder Estate mentioned previously.

The guide book I have by David Barber calls this a basin, and when he published it, he may have thought it was a basin, but now we know it was a narrow slip, just barely wide enough for one boat to come in and get loaded. 

There would have been a wider bridge to carry boats beneath Rt 213 at Lawrenceville at that point.

Just below us to the right side of the road as we headed east was the former canal. It goes through private land, so we couldn't really get on it in this area.

In this area was the former site of Lock 9. Apparently there are remnants of it, but nothing we could see on that land below us.

This bit of the hike repeated what we had done the previous month for just a bit, along the side of Rt 213. This would be the worst bit of the hike, because it was on such a busy road.

We passed by a mine that is being used by an industry on the left, and to the right were some piers where a rail line was used to carry product out of the mines and to over the tops of kilns along the canal.

There are kilns directly below the road, not visible to public, adjacent to Lock 8 below, which is reportedly also in reasonable shape, but I couldn't see it.

We continued a bit down the road, and came to a super narrow spot. Like last month, I had to wait until no cars were coming toward us, and then run pushing Ev in the stroller to get past it. 

We had no real problem, and continued along the road to where Binnewater Road goes to the left. We turned off at that point last time, just before reaching the Rosendale Trestle.

Binnewater means side water, and in old Dutch terms, the prefix "binne" is used for a side stream or body of water. Sometimes narrow sections of streams next to islands are known as Binnekill. 

Just past this point, we came to the former site of Lock 7. The lock is still there, only buried beneath someone's carport, almost directly on top of it.

One might think that this segment of the canal we were hiking might have been in better shape than the rest of it, because it was used for 18 years later than the rest of the canal to serve the area cement industry.

The canal here was opened in 1827 (the entire route opened in 1829), and while everything west of High Falls was abandoned in 1899, east of High Falls remained in operation until 1917.

Lock 7 was interesting in that there was a rather large house next to the lock, which was reportedly not a lock house. The lock tender lived in the next house up the driveway, a handsome structure painted white and yellow.

The closer building to the lock was apparently not willing to sell to the canal, so it remained closer but was not a lock house.

I had a then and now I set up looking toward Lock 7 from the east, and the lock area was overgrown, but the house on the right side of the road opposite the canal lock is the same, so serves as an anchor point.

Just ahead of this point, the canal becomes one with Rt 213. I understand the original road was on the slope to the left, north of the canal, and was quite narrow, and that the road was built over the former canal soon after its abandonment.

Just ahead, we approached the old Rosendale Trestle high above, once one of the tallest railroad bridges in the world.

The first bridge here was built in 1872 for the Wallkill Valley Railroad, which was established in 1866. The line began at Campbell Hall and was completed to Kingston by the mid 1870s.

It fell into ownership of different lines including the New York Central over the years, but decline came in the 1930s. Passenger service ended in 1937.

The line remained open for freight service until 1982 when track removal began.

Local businessman John Rahl purchased the right of way in 1984 with hopes of establishing an excursion line on it. Work began on the decking of the Rosendale Trestle, and it was half open to pedestrians under his private ownership until around 2010. He also was working out a bungee jumping concession on it, but that was met with some opposition.

In an unprecedented move, Ulster County moved against Mr. Rahl with condemnation proceedings, claiming the line was needed for utilities and new access to an adjacent prison property on the south side of the county. 

The land was seized, and the trail developed. The ultimate slap in the face regarding this is the fact that they never ended up using the right of way for the buried utility that they justified taking the property for.

Mr. Rahl has extensive knowledge of railroad law, which is a completely different school of law than any attorneys today practice, and basically no one wants to bother to learn it. Powers that be today just dismiss it as antiquated, and although Mr. Rahl probably does have legal ownership of the line in the books as per railroad franchise law, everyone in a position of power continues to dismiss him along with all of the old laws that are technically still on the books, but no one ever bothers with.

I spoke on the phone a couple of times with Mr. Rahl and had some very interesting conversations with him about Railroad Franchise law, and what exactly he went through. 

It was quite interesting. Although many people don't seem to like him and feel he comes on too strong, I have had very pleasant exchanges with him.

That line now extends as a trail from Kingston down to where the tracks start back up again in Walden, with the excepto of the jail property which is closed because someone used it to escape once.

We continued under the bridge, and I set up several then and now history compilations of both the canal and the bridge using historic postcard photos I picked up on line, or got from Mr. Rahl.

I had two of them angled at the road, one before and one after the canal was abandoned and filled, another on the towpath with the trestle, and then two on the Keator Avenue Bridge just ahead, looking back toward the trestle.

Just after Keater Avenue, the canal turned off to the left away from Rt 213. The prism is very obvious along the road, and then a large block stone wall. When we drove by earlier on the car shuttle, and on my previous visits, I had thought this might be some remnants of a lock, but it was not. This was the north abutment to the original bridge that carried Main Street over the canal entering downtown Rosendale.

I had one photo that I was trying to identify the location of, and then recognized buildings to identify it as having been taken on the bridge. 

Just ahead, we walked to the mouth of a filled in old cement mine to the left side of the canal, and while the others were looking on at that, I noticed the picture location. Ev and I went back and I climbed to the very edge of the abutment to get the now shot, which came out pretty great.

Bill Merchant continued to walk with us, and decided he would go all the way to the other end of Rosendale before turning back. He had an event going on at the Century House at night, so he needed to get ready for that, though he really wanted to continue on and point out significant sites.

The others went ahead, turned out to the Main Street, and then headed left on Hardenberg Lane to Willow Kiln Park, where there was a farmers market going on. This would have been on the north side of the canal. The old canal route went pretty much right through the center of the park and was rather recognizable.

I fell behind taking my photos, so I went into the first parking lot, and then cut to the left behind a house. 

I then followed a mowed path right through the back yards out to Hardenberg. There were no signs saying to stay out, so this was a really nice little bit of the canal I got to stay on.

We walked right through the fair, which had lots of vendors and some food. I didn't get anything there. I just headed directly for the shade up ahead.

There was a trail head in this lot for the Joppenberg Mountain trail system. That is the mountain that is directly to the east of the trestle, which I climbed up in the past, but I do not think there was any formal trail system up there until recently.

I do want to explore that trail in the near future, but I won't be able to until Ev is big enough to get all the way through it. This would not be a stroller hike.

We hung out in the park for a bit and cooled off, and when we were ready to go, headed back over to the former canal route.

I did not know about this section before, but Mr. Merchant showed us that the canal towpath is a trail through the remainder of Rosendale.

it was a beautiful, well kept, mowed stretch directly behind the homes and parallel with a meadow out to Central Avenue. A section of it was still watered and quite nice.

When we got to Central Avenue, it became private land again, so we turned to the left, and then to the right on Josephine Ave. 

There was a small stream that went toward the canal, which has a purge in it. I wondered if there was once a waste weir in that area, but I don't think Bill said there was anything. This might have been a case of where the canal simply ate the stream and used it to suppliment its water.

We soon reached Rts 213 and 32 at the end of town where Mr Merchant headed back to the Century House. The rest of us headed to the right briefly because I wanted to go into the Bottle Depot for some more to drink.

We went in, and I found a bottle of Hard Chard, an extra strong chardonnay by 19 Crimes, which I quite liked. Probably the best chard I've ever had. 

I didn't worry much about having more because I figured I had a bottle of chocolate whiskey in my bag. Sadly, I went looking for it later, and I realized Jillane took it when I wasn't looking. I don't know what happened to it. I doubt she drank it. Maybe it'll turn up.

Russ, Justin, and Brittany went across to the Turkey Hill across the street, and when they came back, we continued on our way.

The trip from here would take us to the east on Creek Locks Road.

As far as road walks go, this one was really not bad. It was not my preference of roads because it was kind of big. It wasn't too busy, but I do prefer narrower. There just was no other option trying to trace the historic route of the canal.

We could at first see that the old canal was still to the left of the road, but it soon crossed to the right. It looked to me like it crossed at Villa Bianco Lane, a private little lane next to an old house. I thought this could almost look like a lock house, but the area is not the right location for Lock 6, which was still a little further ahead.

Sometimes I wonder if the original locations of locks might have been somewhere else, and that there is really nothing left of them. Some of that early stuff probably isn't too well documented.

The road started to ascend to the left a bit, to a point where there was a splendid view both up and down the Rondout Creek. There were inviting rocks along the other side of the creek. 

Somewhere in this area, as we reached the upper part of the hill overlooking the creek, was the former site of Lock 6. We didn't bushwhack down to try to trace the section. A power line occupies the former canal route, and it is badly grown over, but visible for a little while from the road. David Barber's book describes that some masonry may remain of the former lock, but the area warrants further research. Barber did the best he could documenting the area following the descriptions of Manville Walkefield's older study, but Wakefield has mistakes, and so does Barber.

One of the frustrating mistakes in this area is that Wakefield refers to the lock below the road in this area as Webster's Lock. 

Wakefield calls this Webster's Lock, but Barber acknowledges that the next road up, Webster Lock Road, would be the sensible location for a lock of that name. Barber mostly echoed what Wakefield had labeled as the numbers and lock names, but acknowledges when there are discrepancies. This was such a case.

Lock 6 was also known as Rock Lock, which would make sense with the location directly below us, and the character of the Rondout Creek in the vicinity.

I seem to recall Barber's book referring to a Milhan's Lock or something similar. That might have been a name applied to this lock below us, or maybe to the first of the Creek Locks we'd pass ahead. We're not quite sure.

Mr. Merchant will be working something out where an overlay of the historic maps can be placed on modern maps, and we'll know pretty exactly where these structures used to be.

The reports of both Wakefield and Barber differ when it comes to the demise of Lock 6. One states that the lock was destroyed when the Army Corps of Engineers blasted out some of the rocks in the Rondout for flood control. The other claim is that the lock was removed when utilities were put on the canal route. Both incidents were reported to have happened in the 1950s, and Barber gets his information from a local who lived there.

We continued on the road to the very top of the hill, and to the left was a very interesting, personalized property where it seemed that a house was built on top of old cement kiln walls. 

There was a major entrance we could see going to the back of it. To have a house with direct access to the old cement mines would be amazing.

We continued downhill again, and came much closer to the former level of the canal. The lock might have been in this area. To the right, there were two old masony structures in the weeds, directly adjacent to the road. 

I took a photo of something that looks like a sort of lock cut, but probably wasn't from where I was taking it. It does make sense that the masonry ruins I was seeing would have had something to do with the cement industry and hauling via the canal with no rails present.

This area in general was once a small community known as the Lefever Falls. Those falls themselves were blasted away by the Army Corps of Engineers.

The road started heading away from the historic canal route again, and uphill. This is because the NY Thru Way bisects the canal ahead. It seems that Webster Lock Road used to continue through to this area prior to the highway construction.

We headed up and then beneath the Thru Way, and then began to descend a bit more again.

As we made our way downhill, there was a farm on the right, with an antique tractor on display, and a skeleton seated upon it. Just ahead of this, there was a beautiful old stone house on the left. This appeared to be typical Dutch homestead with gabled roof. This might have been one of the historic Van Wagenen family homesteads of the area, but by the time of the 1870s atlas maps, it appears that this was the property of T. S. Tillson.

A guy was operating a machine directly across the street from the house, and I assume he was probably the owner, but I didn't get to talking to him.

I was walking pretty far ahead with Ev and the stroller at this point. We continued ahead and pretty soon reached the intersection with Webster Lock Road. The canal was very obvious here. Although overgrown, the towpath and prism were recognizable, and some water was in it. The towpath could be seen stretching along the dead end road ahead.

Down that road, there are two houses on the right side that could potentially have been the lock house associated with Webster's Lock, which would have been Lock 5. 

The westernmost of the two looks like some of the other past lock houses we've passed, and is closer to what looks to have been a rise in the canal. Some berm material seems to appear along the edges of the road that would have been a remainder of the canal.

Another nearer house on the right looks like an almost identical model for the one that we saw at lock 7 earlier. I wonder if both might have served as lock houses at one time or another. I think both locks 6 and 5 had lifts of 10 feet.

We continued along Creek Locks Road to the east, at this point with the canal directly beside us to the right. After a little bit, we reached another major point of interest, which Bill Merchant told us to watch out for: the only cut stone dry dock on the entire Delaware and Hudson Canal.

Mr. Merchant has documented lots of dry docks on the canal, some of which no one has ever found he says. In fact, they were not even documented in official logbooks on the canal!

I didn't realize what we were looking at at first, because it looked like maybe there ways a stream coming in from the left, and this might have just been something for flow.

Then, I realized that this dry dock, which was where boats could be pulled in and the area drained for work, was immediately adjacent to Lock #4. The regular composite lock was immediately behind the dry dock.

This might have been the lock that was referred to as Milhan's Lock, but I'm not sure. Mr. Merchant may have the answer one day. Otherwise, this was the first of the "Creek Locks". I know that locks 2 and 3 just ahead were known as Creek Locks anyway.

Lock 4 had a lift of 10 feet I believe.

The creek, canal, and road all shifted hard to the left to begin heading north for a bit. We could see the towpath very easily to the right. A lot of it was in very nice shape, but some bits of it had breaks where flooding had purged it out to the creek. It wasn't clear enough to walk, but could easily be cleared and would make an excellent trail through here. Some of the canal prism still held water through these sections.

Soon, we began to enter the little community of Creek Locks, and more than centuries old homes lined the edges of the road. 

This community actually dates back to colonial days, and originally had the Dutch name of Wegendaal. That was changed in 1825 with the development of the canal and construction of the two locks ahead.

To the right, some of the yards were extended directly out ot the Rondout, and these sections of the canal were filled in for liability and creek access. We could still usually see disturbance in the surface where the canal would have been.

After one of the major clearings, there was a really odd white house that could be extremely old, but it had all sorts of crazy additions put onto it. There was a tall main frame, but then each other addition looked to have been made at different times. The main frame was three and a half stories, which says to me that it might have once been a feed mill or barn of sorts that was converted. 

It was atypical of any other building around in height. It had at least five different additions that jutted out from the sides, as if the owners kept having kids and they kept slapping another room off of the side of another room when it happened. I'd love to know the history, but I couldn't find anything on it.

Just ahead of this house, at the intersection with Constable Lane, we approached Lock 3. This upper one of the Creek Locks was in pretty good condition, of composite material with a little bit of the wood that lined the walls still in place. There was an historic marker noting the Creek Locks on the private property, and the lock was clearly marked. I was able to look from the edge of the road into the lock at a couple of places, but the landowners, who live across the street in the well maintained old lock house, keep it signed.

This lock had a lift of 11 feet.

The lower end of it could be seen into quite easily from the road. I noted that the stone work of this lock, although composite, was at least somewhat cut. Some of the locks further west are smaller stones just laid in place, but these had to be shaped a bit more, certainly because of local geology and availability of stone.

Just ahead of Lock 3 was lock 2, a sort of guard lock because below here, the canal and Rondout Creek became one for the next two miles to Eddyville. This lock was also on private property, with the land all around it mowed, and a foot bridge over the center of it. A cut out of a man sitting and fishing was on the edge.

This lock is noted in Barber's book of having a lift of 10 feet, but William McKelvy's book, Coal Boats to Tidewater, notes it as having a lift of 9. 

Unlike lock 3, lock 2 was constructed of fine cut stone, probably because of the potential from damage on the creek here. 

The Rondout is no longer maintained at the level it would have been during canal days, because the slack water of the stream would have reached into the lower end of the lock here. It seems the dam that is downstream now is substantially lower than the original would have been, which is actually atypical of such situations.

The house across the street, where property owners live, also appears to be the former lock house, somewhat altered but definitely a home of antiquity.

I was able to move through the weeds a bit and get a good shot of the lower end of lock 2 before moving on.

We started walking the road uphill, away from the creek and canal towpath which are on private land and certainly grown over, especially if the towpath is no longer right on the water's edge as I assume.

There's an interesting history just ahead, which I was not immediately aware of, on the lands of the Hudson River Cement Company, there was a railroad that crossed just ahead. It looks to me like it followed something called Gates Road to the left. It made its way from apparent cement mines further uphill to the west, and there was a slip for the canal from the creek to allow boats to pull parallel with the railroad.

No obvious remnants were visible, and even going back with google street view, I don't see anything particularly telling of this site.

As we continued to walk the road, we passed the Abreham Van Wagenen homestead along the road, another old Dutch style house that was hard to get a good look at through the trees. It was constructed between 1725 and 1780 according to a sign, which I assume means the oldest part of the building dates to the earlier date, and probably had substantial additions through the latter.

Another old Dutch stone homestead appeared on the right, above the former towpath route as the road moved away. This one had no historic marker about it, but it obviously had great antiquity.

When we reached the intersection with Main Street, on the left, at the corner, was the historic Petrus Van Wagenen homestead, built in 1699. This home was in very nice shape and appears to have been greatly altered in later years with a high-peaked front roof. 

It was getting really hot out, and I think many of us wanted to take a dip, but we didn't get any accesses to the Rondout for a bit. We passed the Creek Locks trailer park, and the road went up and down a bit. There was one nice house in a great clearing that had its own access to the creek, but we saw no sign of a towpath beside it through here.

Ev was getting fussy, and I knew he needed a diaper change again. I couldn't wait to get to a good spot, so I had to do it at the best pull off near a driveway I could find, and then he was pretty happy again.

Just a little ahead of this point, we reached an access point to the Rondout.

There were fishemen and boaters there, but fortunately most of the fishermen were farther to the downstream side, so we were able to take a quick dip in the upstream side. Or at least Brittany and I did. No one else seemed to be feeling so overheated apparently. I just needed to get in.

In the area of the launch, there was really no discernible remnant of the towpath that I could see. It was probably just the drop off to the creek. 

It was a good drop down, worn where we walked down, and a small stream flowed in next to it. I laid in the water at that point, which was far colder than the rest of the Rondout.

We headed back up to the road, and began walking it parallel with the Rondout downstream. I suspect that a part of this road was probably the towpath in years past.

It wasn't all that long before we came to a point of a cove on the Rondout, which must have been a sort of side basin to the canal. It was full of algae and such now, but when the water was higher, it was probably something of a canal parking lot.

Just befor this point, Dewitt Lake Road came in from the left, and the main road we were walking changed names to Canal Street. The road went onto a sort of causeway which was certainly once the towpath, with water on both sides of us.

Just ahead, as a height of land appeared on the right entering Eddyville, the unnumbered Eddyville Guard Lock was on the right in the weeds. I noted the stone work as we went by. This lock had a negligible lift based on the level of the creek at this point, but served to protect the canal from any flood or flow damages in the area. It was where boats would shift from being in the slack water of the Rondout to its own canal again.

The canal ahead was slightly watered still, in a ditch beside the road. We continued ahead on the road from here, and Church Hill Road came in on the right as we entered Eddyville.

There were some establishments along the way here that would have been nice to see open, but everything was pretty much closed. Some of it looked to be Summer concession, but they apparently called it quite super early.

The canal used to be directly to the right of the road, but it was filled in through this area.

Other stuff was closed on Sundays. There was one bar that was open there, but we had quite a ways still to go, so we didn't want to take a lot of time in the area.

We headed straight on Canal Street a bit, and then there was a driveway on the right. I stepped down it, and then to my left I was looking directly in to lock 1. There was still a snubbing post remaining on the inland wall, and what might have been another on the outside wall.

Although we still had slack water to walk along the Rondout, I really felt a sort of closure at this point. The rest of this was just tidal creek. None of it had been "canalized" below here. This lock was made of fine cut stone, and it was in great shape.

We walked up ahead a bit more, but there was a totally opaque wooden fence that blocked any view of the lock from where historic photos were taken. I did the best I could to match an 1888 photo from Barber's book of the location, but it's rather disappointing looking at the obscured fence view today.

We headed back out the way we came in, and then turned to the right on Rt 213, which becomes locally known as Abeel Street. Just as we made the turn from north to east, there was an old tug boat parked on a trailer to the left side of the road. 

This also felt kind of symbolic, because it would have been tugs that might have pulled boats and freight coming in off of the canal and the Rondout to the tidal Hudson River and down to the city.

There were pretty tidal wetland views, and boat launch areas on the right onto the Rondout in this area, which were quite lovely.

As we walked the road, we passed another old kiln to the left, which after posting about it led to some interesting discussion. Apparently, the mouth of the kiln is too small for the cement kiln process, as claimed by several local experts. However, the notion that this might have been for some kind of iron smelting does not seem likely either. Perhaps a regular lime kiln for agricultural or other purposes is my best guess for that. A little further ahead, we passed another line of old cement kilns with much larger openings, so we know they were used for cement.

We continued along Abeel Street, and there were more moorings and boat clubs and such to the right.

The largest one was fenced in, Feeney's Boat yards, as we headed into the first part of Kingston, a neighborhood known as Twaalfskill. We headed into the developed area, and there was an old fire house building to the left adorned with art and such. I remember hiking down Wilbur Avenue with Jillane many years ago to this intersection and exploring a bit of Twaalfskill for the first time. It still looks much the same as it did back then.

We continued ahead, and probably the most iconic building in that area is the historic office building of S & W B Fitch Wholesale Company.

This late 19th century Gothic Revival style building was associated with the shipping of Bluestone, quarried in the foothills of the Catskills just west of Kingston, owned by Ezra Fitch, who started out trying to get into the steam ferry business in the late 1700s, but lacked the financial backing Robert Fulton had.

Eventually, Bluestone built quite an empire in Kingston, with the material quarried on the west side of town. 

All of the sidewalks in New York City and many other places ended up being bluestone until the cement era hit, and luckily for Kingston, it was in the right location for that as well.

When Jillane and I had hiked through here previously, there was a guy working on the Fitch building as we walked by, which had been framed out as an apartment type living quarters inside. We were given the grand tour of the entire inside of the building, which was quite great.

We continued ahead, and there is a single industrial smoke stack rising from the trees on the south side of the Rondout here. 

This was all the visible remains of the Wallkill Valley Portland Cement plant, which was built in 1882, but suffered a devastating fire in 1889.

Rosendale Cement was right across the river, so maybe there was something underhanded at play. Anyway, the Wallkill Valley Portland Cement plant never re-opened, and the ruins have been sitting there ever since. Maybe if it had stuck around a little longer, until the Rosendale industry began to fall, this business might have lasted, even grown, and the look of the Rondout would be far different from what we see today.

Just ahead, we reached the Wilbur Bridge carrying the former West Shore Railroad over the Rondout. This major behemoth of a bridge is visible from quite a distance in either direction.

It was completed in 1905 by the American Bridge Company, 1,228 ft long and 155 ft above tidewater.

Also known as the Rondout Creek Viaduct, it was called Wilbur Bridge because it was adjacent to the Wilbur Bluestone Shipping Docks.

This steel bridge replaced an earlier 1883 iron structure that could not bear weight of heavier locomotives and freight.

One of the original Whipple trusses approach spans from the original was relocated to the Mahopac Branch over the Croton River on the other side of the Hudson, now abandoned.

I was hoping we'd see a train go over it, because Ev would have loved that, but none came by while we were going through.

Berrian Street went to the right down below Abeel Street, and it was way less used. We headed down and walked beneath the Wilbur Bridge, then continued ahead on Abeel Street.

During this whole stretch of walking, Brittany put on her bluetooth speaker and was dancing along while we walked. Russ commented that hiking was strenuous enough as it was, but dancing while hiking was that much tougher and used more energy. Of course, I too was dancing, while pushing Ev in the stroller.

We continued slightly uphill a bit, and then Dock Street went to the right after a small section of abandoned stone buildings in the weeds to the right. 

Dock Steet was blocked off ahead, and to the left where it had access to a ball field park. We turned left onto this closed off road and made our way into the ball fields area where there were trash cans and a playground. This was a good opportunity to give Ev another change, and then let him run amuck on the playground while we took a break.

Ev must have done all of the slides there, and had a good time, but he wasn't into staying there all that long either. We hurried on, and he stayed out of the stroller walking through the grass. 

We skirted the southeast side of the park following near to the Rondout, and came out to Abeel Street for a short time, then turned to the right on West Strand Street. At the waterfront, a walkway began, and Ev could walk free without holding anyone's hand for a bit. He seemed to really love this section.

Lots of boats were moored along this bit, just below the walkway, and there were enormous Carp swimming among the, apparently looking for handouts from public. Someone in the group was saying "Goog lord look at the size of that fish", because apparently they didn't know carp got that huge. 

We walked along the waterfront ahead, and soon the Kingston-Port Ewan Suspension Bridge over the creek came into view.

This bridge was completed in 1921 as the final connection of New York's first west shore highway link. It was designed by the firms of Holton D Robinson and John A Roebling's Sons Company. 

It's considered significantly historic for the type of bridge it is and the time it was created. It definitely has an iconic look about it.

For years, there were talks of tearing the bridge down, but now it looks like it is going to be saved, and a lot of money is being put into saving it.

A public pier descended down into the Rondout, and Justin and Ev went down to look at it. Ev loved looking over the side and watching the fish through this.

There were once tracks in this area where we were just starting to walk. The Ulster and Delaware Railroad had a spur that came out to the Rondout landing, and when the canal closed up, the U&D collected the coal from its western terminus at Oneonta, and brought it down to the barges on the Rondout for transport down the Hudson.

There were tons of historic markers in the stretch ahead, with the first one about floods and freschets in Spring causing havoc on the waterways. 

The next one was on Island Dock. There was a dock and a lot going on on Dock Street, where we had turned from a bit earlier, but there appears to be basically nothing remaining out there today. During World War I, there was a ship building area on the island.

Originally, the island was just a sand bar in the Rondout, but it was built up by Jon Jervis when the Delaware and Hudson Canal was built, to be a transfer station for the anthracite coal shipments coming in.

We continued on the walkway ahead beneath the Rt 9W bridge, past the site of former historic steamboat landings, and then the site of the Rondout-Sleightsburg Ferry, locally known as the "Skillypot". 

The name comes from an old Dutch word for tortoise, because the thing was so slow. 

When the Kingston-Port Ewan Bridge was built, it put the Skillypot out of business, but some locals kept it going by rowing locals across since the bridge was still quite a long way for folks that didn't yet have cars.

Ahead, we reached the Rhinecliff Ferry Landing, and there was an old brick building that has been converted into a restaurant. We talked about eating there, but we could tell that this waterfront dining would probably cost a fortune and probably also take forever based on the numbers of people seated. We still had a way to go, so we decided not to take that up this time.

The walkway ended here, and so we had to head out to the street. The big brick building of Thomas Cornell's steamboat company still stands strong along the Rondout here. Cornell was a big businessman who took advantage of all of the transportation networks in the area. His name appears on everything it seems after he opened his first shipping out of Kingston with a sloop in 1837.

On the street at this point, we came upon the visible spur of the Ulster and Delaware Railroad to the Rondout, with the rails still visible in the pavement.

There were a couple of sets of rails visible in the pavement. I understand that two separate trolley companies operated out of Kingston, but I'm not really familiar with any of the history there.

The West Strand and Ferry Street came together at an angle in this area, and apparently there were more buildings all through here when the place was a booming center of commerce. Today, it is a rather pathetic shadow of its past overall.

I feel pretty certain that a then and now I got of the tracks and the intersection using an historic 1906 photo is pretty close to accurate, but I can't really be sure.

I owe a lot not only to Mr. Merchant for his updated information, and of course to Barber and Wakefield, but also to Chester Hartiwell who takes a lot of time to comment and add to all of my historic compilations and photos, and helps me to understand the swiss cheesed history I have read and tried to interpret. My understanding of this area is much richer thanks to him.

He often uses my photos in other areas and in comments on other forums, but he is so classy, he adds the Metrotrails logo as a watermark on everything of mine he shares, and usually gives me credit for the work by name. I very much appreciate his work and respect for the work of others.

We walked along on the edge of the road, and passed the only remaining 77 Elco boat, tarped all up, which served during World War II. Apparently, it is to be preserved at this location, but I don't know much else about it.

There were tracks off to the right side of the road in a gravel lot, and in grass and such, from more rail spurs of the Ulster and Delaware line. Then, just ahead, we reached the actively used tracks of the former main line to Kingston Point.

A crushed stone trail was put in within the last decade beside the active tracks out to Kingston Point, and so we turned to the right here to follow them to the true confluence of the Rondout and the Delaware.

I was ready to give up and just walk back in to Kingston, as we had made it to tidewater and technically finished all of the D&H Canal, but Russ actually wanted to go out to the point.

Russ had agreed to take his piece of coal that he'd carried with him in his pack on every hike, and chuck it into the Hudson River, thus ending the series. He promised his wife Ewa he would do so when he got there.

I agreed, it would be appropriate to get out there and throw the coal in. I didn't know where mine was in my pack at the time, but I did end up finding it later. I think I'm keeping mine.

The Trolley Museum began in 1955 to preserve the few remaining New York City trolley cars as I understand, and found a home in the Rondout Shops of the former Ulster and Delaware Railroad in 1983 where they have been active ever since, and still run the trolleys from there to Kingston Point and back.

We turned to the right on the tracks, and began walking away from the roads. Empire State Trail follows the road at this bit, but we continued along on the path along the tracks here.

The Ulster and Delaware Railroad started as different smaller companies like these lines do, and ground broke on it in 1868. By 1875, it stretched from Kingston Point all the way to Oneonta, and is felt to be the only railroad to truly pierce and cross the Catskill Mountains. 

The line remained in independent entity until becoming part of the New York Central system in 1932.

Passenger service continued on the line across the Catskills until 1954, and after that time, excursions have operated on it. 

In the Delaware County section, the Delaware and Ulster excursion line operates between Arkville and areas north, and until somewhat recently, operated to the Catskill Divide at Highmount.

The Catskill Mountain Railroad had the section from Phoenicia to Kingston, but in Tropical Storm Irene back in 2011, severe damage came to the right of way.

The Boiceville Bridge over the Esopus Creek washed out completely, and east of Phoenicia, a major washout left tracks hanging into the creek. There were also previous similar damages west of Phoenicia.

Some of this was far fetched to ever repair. Between Phoenicia and Allaben, near Big Indian, the washout damage and remote area will never see rail service again because the right of way is completely gone. We won't even ever see a trail on that bit; a trail would have to go further to the hillside because the track bed is 100% missing.

I have hiked the entire former U&D corridor from Bloomville in Delaware County to Kingston Point. I found this to be an absolutely amazing line, and one of my favorite railroad corridors I've ever walked. It was also one of the toughest to walk.

When I got involved, there was already a heated debate over what was to happen with the right of way. FEMA money was available to replace the Boiceville Bridge, and other damages, to get Catskill Mountain Railroad trains running between Kingston and Phoenicia again.

Sadly, Ulster County refused to release any FEMA funds to the railroad. This struck me as add; they had a lease on the railroad, which was not up yet, and it was like a kitchen getting destroyed in a house and telling the tenants they have to just deal with it. Catskill Mountain Railroad had tons of equipment out in Phoenicia, and now no reasonable means to get it back.

The plan of Ulster County executive Mike Hein was to make the line into a trail. I started asking questions about it. Having just walked the entire line, I knew it intimately, and had a better understanding than almost anyone of the exact status of each bit.

Many were saying they should have rail WITH trail. The section along Ashokan Reservoir had abandoned old road parallel, and it would actually be more scenic than the railroad bed. 

When I asked why they didn't go for that, I was immediately shocked when the Ulster rep removed my comment. I tried putting it back up thinking it was a glitch, and it was removed again. I got a message from them thanking me for my concern, but that Catskill Mountain Railroad had not kept up their end of the deal to maintain the right of way.

I was sent a photo of the right of way and a claim that it was taken in West Hurley. I recognized the photo location, and assured them the West Hurley section was only light weeds and passable for equipment, and that the photo they had sent me was in fact taken much farther west in Big Indian.

I got no further response. I was blocked from their page. I felt angry that this agenda was being pushed based on lies, so I shared what I found.

Snarky and unprofessional online presence from Ulster County volunteers and representatives was unprecedented, and the new section of trail that we were walking on this occasion was a perfect admission that rail WITH trail could work, because the trolley used bit is narrow.

An Ulster representative made a post about my claim, saying this was an example of "rail with trail", and then claiming it was not. The poster claimed "this is not rail with trail, it is a trolley track with a foot path beside it". I posted in response a photo of a dog wearing a blue shirt, and told him it was not so, but rather a puppy in a navy blouse, and I got blocked from another page.

Another group, "Ulster County Trails Advisory Committee", yet another acknowledged as being a government affiliate, made a post stating that if anyone says anything against their trail plan, that they would be blocked. 

I responded to that page that it should technically be illegal for acknowledged government representatives to censor public opinion to push an agenda, because it is an open public forum. Their exact response was "A rule, unless continuously applied, is not a rule". Then, I was blocked from that page.

I as I aligned myself with more enthusiasts, volunteers, and employees, I found myself angrier. Employees and volunteers of Catskill Mountain Railroad were served papers saying they were not allowed to speak critically of any county management. 

I received a threatening message from someone I didn't know, sent it through to some of my new associates fighting for the railroad, and it was confirmed that the guy was a retired railroad employee working for the county on their trail project, and that he had harassed other people as well.

Ryan Lennox spent countless hours clearing track for CMRR using his Kalamazoo, a railway speeder. The self propelled vehicle could make it to almost all of the closed sections that were not washed out, proving that rail traffic could reach these spots with relative ease. He took video of countless stretches, proving that the claims made by Ulster County were false.

In Kingston, in order to screw the railroad, municipal vehicles were placed across the tracks in order to keep trains from coming through, which should have been an illegal impediment to their business.

A rally was planned called Save the Rails, and I was to attend as an expert guest speaker. 

I found a lot of problems with grant money, how much they were planning to get, and the abomination of a highway they were going to build once the rails were gone. The trail would be wider than many of the public roads found in Ulster County.

It was announced that I would be at this event, and just days before, I got a letter from the state saying that my driving privilages had been revoked in New York.

I was shocked. There was no reason this should happen. I looked into it, and it was from Hancock town court, where the two branches of the Delaware separate. 

I had once gotten a ticket there, a simple parking ticket when I stayed at a hotel and parked overnight at the wrong location. I paid the ticken and it was all fine, but this ticket they used to revoke my license was for a date that I was not even in the state.

I contacted the Hancock Town Clerk, and she told me "It looks like the officer who wrote this was on drugs!".

It was proven that the ticket was false, and my state time sheets could prove that I was in work in New Jersey the day the ticket was issued.

This goes to show how deep this craziness goes, and how I was considered a threat to their plan. I honestly got a bit afraid. A friend in New York offered to drive down to Mahwah and pick me up at the state line, then drive me to the Save the Rails rally, but I declined. The last thing I need is to be thrown into prison in New York based on a false claim, because clearly they can do it.

The battle for the railroad was lost, and Catskill Mountain Railroad operates only from Kingston to West Hurley area. A rail biking venture took over and used a section to the east of Phoenicia, and Delaware and Ulster is still doing well on the Delaware County side.

Once Catskill Mountain Railroad was out, the trail was built on the section along Ashokan Reservoir, and a new bridge was built where the Boiceville Trestle used to be. I suspect they were able to use the FEMA money they refused to utilize when CMRR had it.

When I hiked the line, tracks had already been removed from Bloomville down through Grand Gorge, were in place from East Kortright all the way through to Kingston Point save for a short bit on the west side of Phoenicia. Some was washed out, but it was mostly all there.

My second time walking the section through Kingston between the Plaza and the Point, the tracks had just been removed.

The trolley line had that section of track, but as the story goes, someone fell on the property, and there was a major lawsuit. The trolley museum could not afford it, and the city of Kingston offered to take it off of their hands for exactly the amount of money of the settlement.

This I have been told was also very suspect behavior, but I was not involved in any of it to know more.

We continued walking along the tracks out toward Kingston Point. We didn't go all the way out to the end. We just went as far as the open water of the Hudson at the curve.

We had a great view of the Rondout light house, one of only seven remaining Hudson River lighthouses. This one was built in 1915. I'd have liked to go out to it, but its kind of tidal and hard to walk to unless the timing is just right.

Once we got to a good spot, everyone went down to the stony edge of the water. The excursions were running through the trolley museum, and an orange gas powered trolley went by us to the point.

I knew the trolley would be coming back, and so I held back with Ev to make sure he could see it going by. I suppose they can get away with having the trail there because the trolley cars can brake so quickly.

Once we were down on the Hudson, it was a bit muddy, but I got in and cooled off one more time anyway. I really needed it.

Here, I got a video, and Russ did his ceremonial throwing of the coal into the Rondout confluence. We had officially walked from the Lackawanna River valley to the Hudson tracing this historic route.

From this point, we headed back the same way we came. Ev walked most the entire way from where the tracks turned away from the road to the throwing spot, and then all the way back to the road most of the way again.

Once we were back out to the road, we were on the Empire State Trail official route. We walked along, and Brittany and I tried to find a good spot to go out to the water again, but there was too high a pier to climb down.

We got on the road and I put Ev back in the stroller again. We made our way to the Strand, and then turned to the right when we got to the Rt 9W bridge again. 

A paved trail passes uphill gradually here parallel with the highway, and then climbs up to the former Ulster and Delaware Railroad grade just on the north side of a through girder bridge that used to go over a road that was either an extension of Rondout Drive or Hudson Valley Landing.

We started on the trail, which heads to the north and crosses Garraghan Drive which goes to apartments to the right. It then weaves to the east a bit.

We made our way down from the fill, and crossed over a couple of apartment access roads at grade, and then weaved to the north, crossed Murray Street followed by Delaware Avenue, and then 3rd, 2nd, and 1st Avenues. 

Brittany really wanted to stop and eat soon, but there was no way we were going down by the waterfront. I knew other stuff was coming up, but the first things fell through.

We looked at a place called The Strand, and it was closed, and reviews looked like it was permanently closed. We had to go for something further ahead.

A place called Sonder which wasn't far off of our route ahead looked promising, so we decided we would stop in that area to eat.

We soon made our way across Delaware Avenue, and then over the bridge across Route 9W. Immediately on the other side, we reached and entered the Hasbrouck Avenue Tunnel. 

This was the only "tunnel" on the entire Ulster and Delaware line. It is not a proper tunnel like those through mountains and such. This one was a cut that was covered over for roads. Basically a culvert, but at such length that it is actually a tunnel.

It is kind of amazing that the only line to pierce the high Catskill Mountains doesn't actually go through its only tunnel IN the Catskills!

I had passed through this tunnel a couple of times before, before and after the tracks had been removed, and this was again my first time going after it was turned into a trail.

It was actually kind of nice; there was lighting all the way through it, and the ceiling looked to be arched brick, where I recalled only seeing oblong passageway until the west portal.

We exited the tunnel and came out in a long, deep cut lined with masonry. This brought us out to Chester Street where we went straight for just a bit.

We turned to the left down behind the Burger King, and came out to the Sonder restaurant. We went inside, and it ended up being only Russ, Brittany, and I that ate in there as I recall. Everyone else went for the cheaper stuff elsewhere.

I thought it was quite tasty. The burger I had was a bit overpriced for what it was, and it came with no fries or sides, so in that way it kind of wasn't worth it, but it was good anyway.

The others went to Burger King and other area stuff and then just continued. Russ ended up heading somewhere out of the place and I think he followed closely to where the Ulster and Delaware used to be. Brittany and I went back up to the Kingston Standard Brewing Company because I figured they might have something good. All of their beers were weak, so I opted not to get anything.

We had to head out to Broadway and walk through town for a bit. The trail ends on this bit of town because the Ulster and Delaware used to cross over the West Shore Railroad just to the east of Cornell Street, and the trail couldn't do that.

We headed down Broadway and made the right on Cornell Street heading north, and then I was surprised to see paved trail built right over where the tracks used to go through this bit of town, where the Catskill Mountain Railroad used to store machinery.

We crossed Downs Street, and then went beneath Elmendorf Street by way of a lighted culvert. After that, we went under both Routes 32 and 28 on the trail.

By this time, we were approaching the Kingston Plaza. A train of the Castkill Mountain Railroad is stored on track in this area behind fence, and the trail moves to the left of the tracks the rest of the way out to Kingston Plaza.

Only Brittany, Ev, and I remained on this bit. I'm not sure what way the others took to get there, but I'm assuming they went on the streets.

When we got to the cars at the plaza, it turned out they had only just arrived slightly before us. 

We'd finished quite an undertaking, and in some ways it was kind of disappointing that there was no big celebration. We didn't go out to eat afterwards like we did in the past, partially because I have to get Ev home and it is too difficult to do things like that these days.

Hopefully we'll meet Bill Merchant and have a boat ride on the Rondout in the near future for a coda to this event that will be a more fitting close to the series, but as far as the walking of the historic canal goes, we'd completed it. 

I may go back and revisit some of the spots in the future if it works out as part of another hike, or if one of the few locks I have not seen in person becomes public (think there are only 8 of them I have not actually visited, 7 in New York, 1 in Pennsylvania).

I may actually re-do a bit of the series in the future if Bill Merchant's dream of getting a national historic site completed. The entire section from Port Jervis north could easily become a major trail in the future, in which case I'll be back.

In the meantime, from here, we'll continue with the Empire State Trail series north which will soon bring us to Wallkill Valley Railroad again, and then heading south along the Hudson with all of the associated preserves. I can't wait.