Wakley Mountain - 3,744'
Wakley Mountain is one of the longer Fire Towers climbs in the Adirondacks. It isn’t notably difficult but it is a long walk in and a pretty solid elevation gain near the end. This trail is very rocky and very wet, constantly crossing overflows and running streams, it’s hard to say where the runoff is coming from exactly but it’s just pretty wet all around.
The trail it’s self is littered with fist sized rocks, not large boulders or stones. Sections near the top of this climb have some stairs and hand-rail style boards that can be helpful both up and down the trail. The clocked and commonly sited milage here is 3 out and 3 back, but it felt like more than that to me. My Garmin watch recorded 6.1, which is reasonably within an acceptable margin of error.
The tower at the top here is one of the tallest Fire Towers still standing (70 Feet), you can hear it creek in the wind. There is also an observation cabin here, these are almost always closed down, relics of a bygone era. Another anomaly on this climb is the helicopter pad near the tower, very cool and a nice spot to hangout on. It was so cold and windy here that I couldn’t make it all the way up the tower.
- There is a small parking lot here and roadside overflow if needed.
- We ran into a few groups which was unexpected, this one seems to be fairly popular.
- There is a long walk in here, this one feels longer than your average fire tower climb.
*this excerpt was salvaged from the now defunct www.nysforestrangers.com, thanks to the Way Back Machine, written by Captain Paul T Hartmann (ret.)*
LOCATION: 12 miles southwest of Indian Lake.
STATUS: Remains and is awaiting Adirondack Park Agency approval before any restoration work can begin.
The first structure on Wakely Mt. was a wooden tower constructed by the Conservation Commission in May 1911. In 1916 it was replaced with a 70′ Aermotor LL25 tower. It was of a lighter weight than their 1917 design and had no stairs but only a ladder up the exterior for the purpose of ingress and egress. Wooden steps were added within the structure to ease access for both the Observer and the general public in 1918 or 1919.
A self-supporting staircase was developed by Aermotor, for installation in the towers purchased in 1916. This staircase amounted to a tower within a tower and was anchored to the original tower. These were purchased to replace the wooden stairs currently in use and were installed in this tower.
This tower ceased operation at the end of the 1988 season. The tower was officially closed in early 1989 when the Department of Environmental Conservation determined that towers were no longer effective and decided to phase them out of service.
This tower appears on the National Historic Lookout Register and the National Register of Historic Places being placed on the latter on November 3, 2003.
The tower and related facilities on Wakely Mountain have been closer to being saved. The current plan is to leave the Wakely Mountain Primitive Area in tack and to provide for restoration of the trail, fire tower, cabin and helipad and to install a radio repeater station solely for the use of the New York State forest rangers and environmental conservations officers.
Opponents of this plan are liking the radio installation to some of the TV antenna and cell-phone towers that are large and visually offensive to some. The following news release from the Forest Fire Lookout Assn. offers evidence to dispel these allegations and show that the installation has no visual impact.
A local chapter of the NFL has submitted an application the DEC to formally adopt and restore the cabin and tower.
Wakely is one of the mountains included in the Fire Tower Challenge sponsored by the Glens Falls-Saratoga Chapter of the Adirondack Mountain Club (ADK). “To complete the Challenge and receive the official full-color patch, hikers must climb and document, by date, ascents of at least 23 fire tower summits: 18 of 23 Adirondack Park summits and all 5 Catskill Park summits.”
We Give This Trail: 6.5/10
Rating considers trail conditions, difficulty, views and other notable characteristics