Joanna and I got up early and snuck of the room as quietly as we could then headed to the trailhead for Bonticou Crag. It was a foggy morning, and the wide trail looked really cool as we found our way via the criss-crossing paths and open fields. There was some uphill on the way, but it was pretty mild.
The trail opened up to a large boulder field that we climbed over, through, and around. This was the fun part. There were a few areas that necessitated hand over hand climbing. It wasn't so bad, but my sneakers were slipping a bit.
We got to the top and wandered around the big open rocks with great views all around. It was a beautiful morning and there were clouds laying low in the distance.
After enjoying the view for a while and jumping around and taking photos on this outcropping, getting too close to the edge, we started back down. After finding out that there was a ridiculous parking fee at the Mohonk House trailhead, we came back to our original parking spot and got a map, beginning our hike about a mile or two earlier. We started at the same spot as our last hike, but branched off soon after that in the direction of Mohonk.
There were several steep climbs on the hiking/mountain biking path up to the Mohonk Reservation, but it was a nice trail; rocky, well-marked, and beautiful with fallen trees and stream crossings. It got a bit confusing when we got on the actual grounds because trails went everywhere, but we followed our instinct and got to where we needed to. The place is beautiful and gargantuan! Look at that monster. There's a reason we're staying in our friends' room at a hostel and not in one of these rooms.
Along the edge of the lake is where the trailhead for The Labyrinth is. It is a bit hidden, but that makes sense. We climbed through the narrow opening and began down the path, over some stairs, and through some more narrow slots we had to climb through.
Our progress quickly halted when we got behind a group of older people on some kind of team-building exercise. These were not outdoors people and they were not really into this. We slowly overtook them, one by one, very slowly, after standing still at each obstacle for minutes at a time. We finally got by them and starting crawling over and under the huge boulders, following the path that was laid out or something like it.
The tight squeezes and big rock climbs were great fun, and we thought it ended too quickly when we finished. So we went back down and did it again! This time there was almost no one there so we got to go at our own pace, up ladders, through the lemon squeezers, and over big gaps. It was a lot more fun on round two. We started to do it again as a race, but it was a little wet, so a short distance in we called it for the day and started hiking back.
After our long hike back down (that's how it always goes) we went back to New Paltz downtown and wandered through the little downtown shops and got something to eat at the health food store. After going back to the hostel for showers, we came back downtown with Chuck and Alex to go to the Gilded Otter Brewing Co. for lunch. I sampled their beers. Nothing of note, really. The root beer was good so I got one of those. We had a good lunch and then went for a walk around the nice, quiet neighborhood.
After regrouping, we went out to the Bacchus Bar for a few beers from their big bottle list and hung out there talking for a while. I'm not sure what I expected, but it was more of a chill evening and we were all kind of tired and not wanting to stay there too long. We headed back to the hostel and hung out there for the night until we were all ready for bedtimes.
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