Saturday April 3rd, 2021 - Solo (Chris only) - Rock City State Forest - near Ellicottville NY (SW NY) - About 3 miles, some modest amount of elevation gain

 Brian was away visiting family in Vermont and I wanted to find some time consuming physical activity I could do to stay busy and out of trouble.  I had a Rock City hike on my Alltrails list for a while but hadn't made it to it yet.  I guess there is Rock City state forest and Little Rock City park nearby but I'll blur the two together here because they are nearby and similar.  For what it's worth, I was definitely in Rock City State Forest.  It was a long but enjoyable back roads drive from home but a gate prevented me from driving the last uphill half a mile before the trailhead I linked to above.  I parked at the gate and started hoofing it up the small hill towards the trailhead.  Between the long very lightly traveled dirt road I had already been on and now an even less used road behind a gate, this was more remote than I was really hoping for a solo hike and 5 miles was plenty long for a solo hike, adding another mile walking to and from the trailhead was more than I was likely to want to do.  Luckily only a quarter mile up the road there was a clearly signed trail with a map. This trail was called the Rim trail and while it wasn't a loop, it at least allowed me to size my own adventure by being free to turn around at any point.

I actually got some glimpses of the 'Rock City' scenery even on the road past the gate. The area is full of giant weathered Limestone(?) blocks that stick up in interesting shapes, some with mushroom or toadstool like forms.  The Rim trail was very tidy and clear, perhaps it had been groomed already to prepare for the soon to begin summer season.  True to its name, it hugs the edge or rim of a plateau.  At the edge of the plateau there are many gigantic rock formations that have small but clear crevices separating them from the otherwise edge of the drop-off.  Basically its as if the edge of the plateau is made up of hard rocks which are (over geologic time) sliding down off of the plateau they are on.  In several places there are multiple giant rocks with a few feet between them creating narrow passageways you can walk through.  Irresistible for kids and some adults but I was happy just looking down into the crevices from above.  Still, it was highly scenic.  I also wonder why it seems like the edge of the plateau is hard exposed rock when even 20 feet back (where the trail often ran) it was relatively soft pleasant soil.  I'm sure somebody does an interesting presentation explaining how it came to be but I'm not here to provide a geology lesson, just reporting what I saw and experienced.

It was pretty cool that morning and there was snow here and there and also little frozen icicles hanging from some of the more shaded rocks.  I wrote before that I thought we'd seen the last snow on our hikes but this one slipped in after it.  I was a little wary of being so remote so I ended up only walking about 1.5 or 1.6 miles away from the car when I turned around.  So in terms of a hike it was modest at best but it fit what I needed for the day and I know we'll return again because it has the kind of dramatic drop offs and rock formations that we don't have a ton of in the Finger Lakes Region.










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