Watkins Glen State Park – Gorge Trail – New York - Aug 7

Watkins Glen State Park – Gorge Trail – New York


Watkins Glen State Park is the most famous of the Finger Lakes State Parks. Within two miles, the Glen's creek descends 400 feet deep and forms a narrow gorge cut through rock by the stream past 200-foot cliffs, generating 19 waterfalls along its course. The gorge path winds over and under waterfalls and through the spray of Cavern Cascade. 


Glen Creek was left hanging when glaciers of the Ice age deepened the Seneca valley, increasing the tributary stream gradient to create rapids and waterfalls wherever there were layers of hard rock.


The gorge trail features stone steps over 800! We hiked about 2 miles today taking a few of the offshoots of the trail and then returning to the main trail. We chose to hike uphill and take the shuttle back to the main park entrance not to have to do all the downhill steps.


The trail was fairly easy and around every turn was a “WOW” moment. I have to say that this is probably the most beautiful place we have visited on this trip. Just amazing how over millions of years the water has created this geological wonder. The deep gorge with all the waterfalls and stone bridges created an amazing place. Mother Nature at her best.


We parked at the Main Entrance and walked to the Entrance tunnel. The tunnels in the Gorge were hand cut in the early 1900’s. The first bridge was the Sentry Bridge. 

 Seneca statues

 Sentry Bridge

 entrance tunnel

 walking over the Sentry Bridge

 Couch's Staircase

 Greg

 me

the next set of steps

 Cavern Cascade

 Cavern Cascade - Greg

 Spiral Tunnel

 stairs at Lover's Lane

Suspension Bridge - 85 feet above the creek 

 views from the bridge

Lily Pond  

 no clue what this is....

Glen Cathedral is more like a desert 

 Central Cascade & Glen of Pools cascade

 Rainbow Falls – another one you can walk behind. 

 12-spotted skimmer dragonfly

Spiral Gorge beyond the bridge above Rainbow Falls is a dark narrow passage with dripping springs pools and Pluto Falls

 Central Cascade & Glen of Pools cascade is more than 60 ft tall the highest one in the gorge. the pools are deep and rounded creating plunge pools

 Mile Point Bridge where all 3 trails meet. We stayed on the Gorge Trail for another half mile past a gentle section of the stream and then up Jacob’s Ladder with 180 steps reaching the upper entrance. We just missed the shuttle and waited for the next one to take us back to the Main Entrance. 

 The Narrows beyond the next tunnel had ferns and mosses on the walls 

We had Thai food for lunch today eating at Thai Elephants Restaurant. Very good food! I had Yellow Curry with Chicken and Greg had Green Curry with Chicken. They came with soup and a salad. 

 saw this cute diner on our drive through town to get to lunch

 World's Smallest Diner

 lunch at Thai Elephants Restaurant

 salad & soup

 Yellow Curry Chicken

Green Curry Chicken

After lunch we checked out Catharine Valley Trail. It was a lovely area and would have been an easy hike, but the gnats drove us crazy, so we called it quits. It also started to rain a bit. 

Our next stop was in Montour Falls. 156-foot waterfall right in the heart of the village. There was a small park there and we took a nice walk around the historic village. The name "Montour" is derived from Queen Catharine Montour, a prominent Native American woman of Seneca Indian heritage who lived at the village site in the 18th century.

 Pileated Woodpecker

We drove back to town and grabbed some ice cream at the Dairy Bar. Super good ice cream and huge portions. Chocolate Lover's Chocolate which was chocolate ice cream, chocolate truffles, hocolate Cake Crunch, & fudge ripple  & Fly Fishing Fudge which was vanilla ice cream, M&Ms cookie dough, chocolate chunks, fudge.

It was now raining quite a lot, so we headed back to the hotel via Wegman’s to pick up some groceries for dinner at the hotel.


https://photos.app.goo.gl/MqH31HcNXaT1GNuA6


Tomorrow, we are visiting Taughannock Falls State Park.