So, there are a lot of hiking challenges in New York.  the biggest ones are of course the 46ers and 3500 in the Adirondacks and Catskills respectively.  Those 2 hit all the highest mountains in those regions.  One that is often overlooked is the Fire Tower challenge though.  Back before modern technology, it was common practice to build towers on top of mountains so that a ranger could look over the area and spot wild fires before they got out of control.  Many of these towers have fallen to ruins and have disappeared to just memories and a few random bits of steel where the towers were.  But, there have been a couple dozen (25 in the Adirondacks, 6 in the Catskills) that remain.  So, the challenge is to hike them.  There also are some newer challenges that are geared to get people hiking mountains outside of the high peaks.  These are the Tupper Lake Triad, Saranac Six, Placid 9, and Lake George 12.  There is a lot of overlap between the fire tower challenge and all these lists except for the 46, none of which have a tower.

So, Monday, I plan to start on the fire tower challenge and to also mark my start of hiking in the Catskills for the season.  First stop is Overlook Mountain, one of the 6 Catskill fire towers.  This is going to be a forest road most of the 4.6 miles up and back.  Views should be good though.  Weather looks to be good and it will be before the snow comes Monday night.