Northern New York Waterfalls
Home Alphabetical List County List  Listed by river  Bookstore  Official Falls  Submit Pics  Credits
Slideshow  Definitions  Disclaimers  Rivers of NY  Coordinate Conversion Contact Us  Links 

Opalescent Upper Falls

Directions

From I-87, exit 29, proceed west on the Blue Ridge Road (CR 84)  for about 17 miles. The turn for Tahawus (CR 25) will be on your right.  From the other direction, this is about 1.6 miles from the intersection of CR 2 with NY 28N.  Follow CR 25 north  and it will become a dirt road leading to the parking area for hikers.

County: Essex
Town: Newcomb
USGS Map: Mt Marcy
Waterway: Opalescent River
Latitude: N 44° 6' 22"
Longitude: W 73° 59' 29"
Drop: NA
Type: NA
Region: Off CR 2 between Newcomb and North Hudson
Parking: Unpaved lot
Trail type: Dirt/rock
Length of hike: 5.0 miles, one way
Difficulty: Difficult
Accessibility: Public
Name: Unnamed

Keene Quadrangle

There are a number of other waterfalls accessible on this hike.  This one is about 200 yards upstream from Opalescent Falls.  Because of the foliage, the views from the trail are limited and this is an area of the gorge that is difficult to get into.

The Opalescent River empties into the Hudson River just south of Tahawus, a former mining community.  The Hudson flows into the Atlantic Ocean in New York City.

Last  update:  April 8, 2016

Hover on any of the thumbnails to see an enlarged image

Opalescent Upper Falls Opalescent Upper Falls
Directions

on NY 28 in the village of Eagle Bay, Big Moose Road will exit to the north.  In a little under a mile you will come to the trailhead parking lot on the right.

County: Hamilton
Town: Inlet
USGS Map: Eagle Bay
Waterway: Cascade Lake Inlet
Latitude: 43o 14' 41"
Longitude: 74o 47' 5"
Drop: 40'
Type: Ribbon cascade
Region: off NY 28 between Inlet and old Forge
Parking: Unpaved parking lot
Trail type: Dirt
Length of hike: 2.6 miles, one-way
Difficulty: Moderate
Accessibility: Public
Name: Common

Eagle Bay Quadrangle

We will start with a word of caution about the trailhead parking lot.  As you proceed north on the Big Moose Road, you will round a curve to the right.  There is a sign on the left hand side of the road indicating trailhead parking with an arrow to the right.  Because this is on a curve, it looks like it may be pointing across the road to a small parking area large enough for maybe three cars.  This is not the trailhead parking lot although we suspect you could access the trail from there.  Continue a short distance and you will come to the parking lot which will easily accomodate ten cars.

From the parking lot continue to the trailhead where you will find a registration kiosk.  A DEC facility, the trail is fairly well maintained but the signage could be better.  Less than 1/4 mile up this trail, you will come to a "T".  Take a left here and continue for a little less than 1/2 mile.  You will come to a "Y".  The sign here indicates that the falls is 2.5 miles further on the trail to the right.  The trail actually loops around the lake so you could take either trail at this point, but the one to the right is a bit shorter.  Please note that the mileage is inaccurate.  The entire distance from the kiosk to the falls is about 2.5 miles.  At this intersection, you have a little more than 1.5 miles to the falls.

You will come to the clearing, shown in our last photo, that is about 100 feet across.  The trail continues across a small wooden bridge on the left at the back side of the clearing.  At this point, there are two trails visible at the back right side of the clearing.  Either of these will take you to the falls and it is less than 200 feet away.  Since there are other signs on the trail, we aren't sure why there isn't a sign at this point, but there wasn't when we were there.

We will stress that there is no sign at this clearing.  We missed it and walked over 1/2 mile further.  Fortunately we ran into another hiking party that told us where we should have gone.  on our return to the clearing, we encountered two other hiking parties that had done the same thing we had.

At the waterfall, there as several rocks where you can sit and have a snack if you brought one.  In fact, when we were there, there were at least six other parties snacking, relaxing and taking pictures.  You can get on the rocks in the creek and go right to the base of the falls.  The trail also goes to the top where you can get an over the top view.

Another fact about this area is that the parking lot and the first half of the trail is in Herkimer County, but the waterfall itself is in Hamilton.

As with many streams in this area, the waterway containing this waterfall is shown on topographical maps but is unnamed.  It flows into Cascade Lake, continues to flow into Moss Lake, and eventually joins the North Branch of the Moose River.  The water from here flows into the Middle Branch of the Moose River at old Forge and then joins forces with the South Branch just northeast of McKeever to become the Moose River.  This continues into the Black River in Lyons Falls which empties into Lake ontario near Dexter in Jefferson County.

Hover on any of the thumbnails to see an enlarged image

Cascade Falls Cascade Falls
Cascade Falls Cascade Falls
Cascade Falls Cascade Falls

©2020
Reproduction of this World Wide Web Site in whole or in part is prohibited without permission. All rights reserved.
 Trademarks and copyrights are the property of the respective owners and may not be used without permission.
nnywaterfalls.com is a service of Fourth Coast Creations