Adirondacks – (May 11, 2023) – The 2023 Great Adirondack Garage Sale will take place on Memorial Day weekend, May 26 – 28, 2023, within the Adirondack region of upstate New York. The event takes place throughout communities along a 200-mile trail, along NYS routes 28, 30 and 3.
The annual event has become a popular kick-off to the summer season, with residents and visitors embracing the opportunity to buy and sell unique household items, gently-used home furnishings, and quirky treasures.
Clifton-Fine, NY – The 2023 Adirondack White Out Weekend will be held Friday, February 17 and Saturday, February 18. The celebration includes activities for the whole family including, outdoor recreation, music, arts, and food. The community of Clifton-Fine boasts a true wilderness area with a friendly, small-town feel. Please visit the White Out Weekend website and Facebook page for detailed information and a printable schedule. This event is put on by 100-percent volunteer efforts and the generosity of sponsors, donations, and fundraising proceeds. Adirondack White Out Weekend is a subcommittee under the Clifton-Fine Economic Development Corporation, a 501c3 nonprofit organization.
J.E. Irvin, a career educator and the award-winning author of five mystery novels, will visit Wanakena at 3 p.m. on Saturday, May 28, 2022, for a book talk about her latest novel – BROKEN – which is set in the hamlet. Irvin will speak about her writing process as well as the local activities and events that inspired the novel. Hosted by Ottos’ Abode, the presentation will take place in the gazebo (weather permitting) or inside the store. Books will be available for purchase and signing, and each attendee will receive a goody bag of book-related items.
When the air is crisp and the leaves are the color of lollipops and hikers descend on Keene Valley like seagulls on a sub, thoughts in this quarter inevitably turn to Cranberry Lake in the Adirondack’s northwest quadrant.
Cranberry Lake in the autumn has the feel of an outpost on civilization’s edge — a port from which the last ship has sailed for the year, leaving behind a skeleton crew of people to keep systems operational through a long dark winter.
Recent NYS DEC Forest Ranger actions:
Town of Clifton
St. Lawrence County
Wilderness Search: On June 3 at 6:05 p.m., Forest Ranger Morehouse received a call from staff at the Wanakena Ranger School reporting a student lost in the woods. Two Forest Rangers responded to assist Ranger School staff who were able to locate the missing 30-year-old student from Marcellus by using cell phone coordinates. Rangers helped her use her compass to find her way out of the woods and the incident concluded by 8 p.m.
The 6th Annual Adirondack WhiteOut Weekend kicks off this weekend. Visitors and locals alike can walk through the luminary lanterns lining the Wanakena Bridge. The weekend full of fun may begin at the bridge but continues through the three communities of Star Lake, Wanakena, and Cranberry Lake. » Continue Reading.
Snow isn’t just for shoveling. These snowy Adirondack days are providing the perfect weather for a February filled with winter festivals.
In all the far reaches of the Park, celebrating snow and ice is a tradition showcasing the playful aspects of wintertime. » Continue Reading.
Locally-made art, visits to the Clifton Town Museum and Ranger School, and a talk on the first County Historian will be the highlights of the St. Lawrence County Historical Association’s 70th Annual Meeting in Wanakena on November 4th.
In celebrating SLCHA’s 70th anniversary, Clifton Town Historian Mark Friden will present a program on St. Lawrence County’s first historian, J. Otto Hamele.
Hamele was born in Cattaraugus County and arrived in Wanakena in 1901 to work for the Rich Lumber Company. He became County Historian in 1945, two years before his death, after years of supporting the local community and Ranger School.
A new store that caters to outdoor sports enthusiasts has opened in Wanakena, a tiny hamlet near Cranberry Lake with a population of less than 100.
The Trading Post at the Pine Cone Grill opened this winter to fill the gap created by the closing of the Wanakena General Store, which sold groceries and basic outdoor supplies.
Rick Kovacs, who owned the Wanakena General Store, shut down in October saying he couldn’t make enough money in the winter months. He had owned the store for about six years, and said one had been at that location for about 60 years. » Continue Reading.
The Wanakena General Store, a community fixture for decades and a purveyor of outdoor supplies to those heading into the wilderness, will close its doors on October 15.
Rick Kovacs, who ran the store for the past five years with his wife, Angie Oliver, said business was too slow in the off-seasons to make a living. » Continue Reading.
Enjoy the beauty of winter in Star Lake, Cranberry Lake, and Wanakena with winter activities for the entire family at the two day-event White Out Weekend on Saturday February 28th, 2015 in the Hamlets of Star Lake and Wanakena and Sunday March 1st in the Hamlet of Cranberry Lake.
Events will start at 11am and continue into the early evening on both days. There is no cost to attend most events. » Continue Reading.
Several nonprofits from across the Adirondack region have partnered to raise funds to rebuild the historic and iconic Wanakena Footbridge in the Clifton-Fine community. The suspension bridge was destroyed in January, 2014 when an ice jam on the Oswegatchie River broke and slammed into its side.
Built in 1902 by the Rich Lumber Company, the footbridge provided pedestrian access to residential and commercial areas of Wanakena. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999. Estimates put the full cost of construction at $250,000.
The Wanakena Historical Association has already raised nearly $38,000, but to extend the campaign’s, reach the Adirondack North Country Association (ANCA) has partnered with other local nonprofits to establish an online Adirondack Gives crowdfunding effort. The Wanakena Footbridge campaign can be found on the Adirondack Gives website. » Continue Reading.
Earlier this winter, after several long days in the office, I went to bed dreaming of my first backcountry ski trip of the season, a jaunt to High Rock in the Five Ponds Wilderness. Conditions would be perfect. Over the last few days, we had received eight inches of fluffy powder.
Then I woke up. Outside, it was twenty-four below zero, according to my Weather Channel app. Like any sensible person, I immediately broadcast this fact to Facebook. A few people suggested I postpone my trip.
“I have skied at 20 below, but I was 14 and foolish. Stay home, for god’s sake,” posted a former colleague.
But most of my Facebook friends were surprisingly indifferent to the possibility of my freezing to death.
“Burrrrrr & Enjoy!” wrote one. » Continue Reading.
On the Peavine Swamp trail system in the northwestern Adirondacks near Cranberry Lake I found a tranquil route through open forest, culminating on a knoll overlooking the Oswegatchie River. Removed from the more challenging terrain of the High Peaks backcountry, the trails allow the skier to settle into a soothing rhythm of kick and glide over level ground and rolling ridges. The occasional gully or steeper pitch is enough to rate the trail’s difficulty moderate or intermediate—but in a low-key way.
It’s a good trip for looking around and appreciating the forest, and on a clear day in early January, I was accompanied by two skiers who were well qualified to be guides through these woods: Jamie Savage, professor at the Ranger School in Wanakena, and John Wood, senior forester for the state Department of Environmental Conservation. Jamie uses these lands as an outdoor classroom for his students. And John, working with Jamie and other partners in the area, has been developing plans for increasing hiking and skiing routes near Cranberry Lake. » Continue Reading.
The general public is invited to attend this weekend’s “Forest Festival” at the Ranger School in Wanakena, NY. The first-ever forestry festival, in 1908, celebrated the tenth anniversary of the Biltmore Forest School in western North Carolina. That school was the first of its kind and, in fact, the first forestry school of any kind in the United States.
Biltmore was a technical school that conveyed lessons in ‘practical forestry.’ Students endured an intense schedule but benefited from first-hand, field-oriented learning opportunities. Empolyers were eager to hire the job-ready Biltmore School graduates. Various factors lead to the closure of Biltmore in 1913, but the need for professional and para-professional foresters was growing. As such, technical forestry schools and colleges were readily being established around the country. » Continue Reading.
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