Catskills Experience Book a stay The Walking Tour · Vernooy Kill Trail
Five Waterfalls Catskills History & Ecology Walk.
Walk the Vernooy Kill to five cascading waterfalls with your host — the official NY DEC forest steward for the Vernooy Kill Waterfall Trail. Along the way: the ecology of a Catskills hemlock ravine, animal tracks and who left them, and three centuries of Ulster County history written into the stone walls and mill ruins.
- Where: Sundown Wild Forest, Kerhonkson NY — trailhead directions on booking
- Pace: an unhurried naturalist's walk — made for questions and photographs
- Bring: sturdy shoes, water, and a jacket; the ravine runs cool
- Who: curious adults and kids alike — this is a walk, not a race
Why walk with a steward
The forest reads differently when someone translates.
Anyone can hike to a waterfall. Walking it with the person responsible for caring for the trail is a different thing: you'll learn why the hemlocks hold the ravine together, where the bears cross in October, what the jewelweed is doing at the water's edge, and how a colonial mill town disappeared back into forest. You leave knowing the place — not just having seen it.