Monksville Reservoir Kayaking

Monksville Reservoir in Ringwood NJ is right in my backyard, but I’d never heard of it until the other day. Somebody saw my kayak on top of my car and struck up a conversation on paddling. When we were done discussing what we liked about our boats, we shifted to where we paddle and he said he always goes to Monksville.

Monksville Reservoir boat launch

Huh, really, where is that? I punched it into Apple Maps and realized I’d driven over it many times on my way to Mountain Creek Ski area. It looked like an cool spot so I went ahead and pencilled it into my list of stuff to do on my week off. So I looked up the stats.

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Kayaking North South Lake

I used to spend more time at North South Lake than I do now. When my kids were younger, we would go there for weekend camping trips or just to use the lake and beach for a day. It’s a great place to introduce kids to camping.

North South Lake map

In addition to swimming and hiking and canoeing at North Lake, there are all the other great things the Catskills offer in the surrounding area. Hunter Mountain is right up the road.

The trailhead to Kaaterskill Falls is right there and just a little further south is Esopus Creek where you can rent tubes and spend the afternoon floating downstream.

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Superstar to South Bay

Once you say it, you have to do it. I’ve been talking one more at Killington for weeks now. Spring is a busy time with lots of things happening. When the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend opened up, my course was clear. On Thursday night I bought tickets online and started making plans with Junior.

Killington Memorial Day Weekend 2023

Once again, I have a vehicle suitable for camping, so driving up on Friday evening was a no brainer. We got on the road after work and joined the throngs of Memorial Day celebrants on the Thruway. It took a little bit longer than usual to get to Albany with the extra traffic but it wasn’t too bad. We got off in Latham to grab dinner at Ted’s Fish Fry and buy some beer and ice. It was close to eight when we reached Killington.

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