At home in the wild
Family campers find peacE And quiet
By Jeff Nadler, Explorer Correspondent
We introduced our two children to
the Adirondacks at an early age. At
first, we took them to beaches with
just enough toys, food, drink and sunblock to
last the day. We always arrived home in time
for dinner. Eventually, it dawned on us that
we might be missing out on something.
 Why not spend the night? We imagined ourselves
canoeing calm waters at dusk, chatting beside a warming
campfire, marveling at the shimmering Northern Lights,
listening to the haunting call of a loon.
In short order, we purchased camping equipment for
four and pored over brochures for state campgrounds in
the Adirondack Park. We figured that the campgrounds
would give us the perfect balance between comfort and
wilderness. That first summer, we took our energetic preschoolers
to one campground after another and soon discovered
that these places vary widely in their degrees of
peace and quiet.
At the Moffitt Beach Campground on Sacandaga Lake,
for example, there were crowds of families with enthusiastic
children playing in the sand and the shallow water,
and we happily joined in the fun. But at the more remote
Lake Harris Campground in Newcomb, on the southern
edge of the High Peaks, we often had the small beach to
ourselves.
Our fondest experiences were of the natural world: paddling
past great blue herons and loons, hearing the slap of
a beaver’s tail, being lulled to sleep by a gentle breeze and
a chorus of frogs. And so we zeroed in on the more tranquil
campgrounds such as those at Lake Harris, Forked
Lake, Brown Tract Pond and Putnam Pond. We enjoyed
them all, but if I had to pick a favorite, I guess it’d be Putnam
Pond.
This secluded campground sits on the western edge of
the Pharaoh Lake Wilderness. Looking across the pond
(really a good-size lake), you see no signs of development,
just forests and hills. The 72 campsites are well-spaced
and quite private. Nine of them can be reached only by
water. There is an intimate beach on the northern end of
the pond, with a picnic area nearby.
Putnam Pond is ideal for canoeing. You can paddle
around islands and explore deep bays and marshy coves.
The wind is rarely troublesome. Motorboats are not prohibited,
but we never saw more than an occasional small
fishing boat. In all our visits, we were never bothered by
water-skiers or jet-skiers.
Putnam Pond must have the greatest number of hiking
trails of any state campground. We ventured into the
Pharaoh Lake Wilderness to visit Rock Pond, Clear Pond
and Grizzle Ocean, all reached via gentle trails perfect for
children. Backpackers and strong hikers can push on deeper
into the wilds to Pharaoh Lake, Pharaoh Mountain and
other remote destinations.
One of our most memorable hikes was up Treadway
Mountain, a small peak with a panorama so breathtaking
that Carl Heilman chose it to adorn the cover of his beautiful
book of photographs, Adirondacks: Views of an
American Wilderness. If you start at the campground, it’s
a 3.9-mile hike to the 2,240-foot summit. If you canoe
across the pond, it’s 2.3 miles from shore to summit. In
summer, you’ll find a profusion of wild blueberries on the
trail.
On our hike, my daughter and her friend spotted a
black bear cub tumbling off a fallen log, right along the
trail. The girls were a short distance ahead of me and
excitedly ran back to report their sighting. It’s dangerous
to get between a mother bruin and her cub, so we proceeded
cautiously and soon heard the distant grunts of a
retreating bear.
We had plenty of other wildlife experiences at Putnam
Pond. The waters are home to numerous ducks and other
waterfowl, including nesting loons whose calls can be
heard frequently during the night. We also heard barred
owls at night from all directions; they created a surroundsound
of “who-cooks-for-you, who-cooks-for-you-all.”
Other times we listened to the croaking of ravens that nest
on nearby cliffs. At dusk, beaver made their rounds and
startled us with tail slappings.
As our children grew older, we took fewer camping trips
together as weekend sports and social activities started to
take over their time. One recent summer, however, we
decided to return to our cherished Putnam Pond. We
stayed at one of the campsites accessible only by water.
The visit reaffirmed my belief in the value of wilderness.
With dusk approaching, my daughter patiently cast a
nightcrawler from shore as the loons began their wild serenade.
It wasn’t long before I was helping her unhook a
sizable smallmouth bass. That night, the calls of loons,
owls and coyotes awoke us, and when we peered out from
the tent, we noticed mysterious flickering lights reflected
on the still pond. Reluctantly, we left our cozy sleeping
bags to investigate. When we looked up and saw a starblanketed
sky, we realized we had discovered the source
of the mystery: Mother Nature’s splendor.
Map by Nancy Bernstein
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