Cascade Lake Park

Cascade Lake Park, Warwick, NY (3/4/2012)

When the 2012 edition of the NYNJTC's North Jersey Trails map 116 came out just recently, I noticed a network of trails blazed just north of the AT and Surprise Lake in Warwick NY labeled "Cascade Lake Park". This park had appeared on the previous edition of the map, but as a network of unblazed woods roads, so this time I took notice and mentally noted it for a future visit. And we headed there today to hike the majority of trails. We parked at the dead end of Seminole Drive and following this map hiked the part highlighted in yellow. (For a larger map of the area, click here.)

First we did the Orange loop, which climbs to partial views over the lake. Then we headed south on Red along the western bank of the lake and stream until we crossed the stream on a bridge at the southern tip. Here we noticed that the Red trail actually continues in two different directions: to the NE, as is displayed on the map, and to the north along the eastern bank of the stream back to the lake. This part is not on either the town map or the NYNJTC map. We continued on Red in the NE direction, next heading east on Green until we got to Blue.

One of the highlights of the hike was just south of the Green/Blue intersection and something we stumbled upon unexpectedly: a beautiful lean-to built into the side of a boulder on the northern side of the trail, with its own stone walkway. It is surrounded by cairns, plants, decorations, mobiles made of seashells, the American flag, painted trees, and various plaques. It's a loving shrine to the memory of Daniel Rocco Battista of Warwick. He died in 2008, just two months before his 21st birthday. A web search produces Facebook and MySpace fan pages, memorial blood drives, art festivals dedicated to his memory. He clearly had a huge impact on many people, and this shrine was made in his memory with an incredible amount of love. It's something to behold, and has been respectfully undisturbed.

Next we took Blue east and did the Aqua loop before taking Blue all the way back to Red, at the dam and lovely waterspill for the lake. The car was no more than a quarter mile further.

Total distance hiked today was 4.5 miles, in just under 3 hours.

(Click on the thumbnail to bring up a bigger image in a pop-up window)