Adirondack Sports October 2023

HIKING
OCTOBER 2023 11
Nun-da-ga-o Ridge
P
Hurricane Road
O’Toole Lane
MAP BY BILL INGERSOLL
An Outstanding Fall Hike
By Bill Ingersoll
Maps of the Hurricane Mountain Wilderness tell
an unfortunate story: that these mountains
were once not viewed in terms of their wildness,
but in terms of the resources that people hoped
might be extracted from them. Thus we have inherited
today a region full of features named Potash Mountain,
Soda Range, Coal Dirt Hill, Spruce Mill Brook, Big Slash
Mountain, and Limekiln Mountain. These were not places
for adventure or romantic contemplation of the sublime,
but places where commodities were to be exploited. This
historical ambivalence perhaps explains the current scenario,
in which only a patch of wilderness remains preserved
– almost all of it in the highest reaches of the range.
Maps still label the arch of mountains connecting Big
Crow Mountain with Weston Mountain as the Soda Range,
but for hikers this is better known as Nun-da-ga-o Ridge.
From a distance the range may not look like much – a span
of indistinct flat-topped summits – but it is threaded by
a 3.2-mile path that connects a number of highly scenic
ledges. Therefore, the experience of Nun-da-ga-o Ridge is
among the best days you can have in the mountains.
Because this is not a marked trail – except for a few
key turns – it is not a route for everybody. But for those up
to the navigational challenge, Nun-da-ga-o is an excellent
hike. (This unmarked section is colored red on the
accompanying map.) The path is most often hiked as part
of a loop, beginning and ending at the Crow Clearing trailhead
near Keene. Altogether, the loop is 6.1 miles long
with numerous ups and downs.
See HIKING 13 ▶
▲ NUN-DA-GA-O RIDGE.
BILL INGERSOLL