Kid Friendly Hikes

Try the going to the Upper Works and hiking to the north side of Henderson Lake.  We just did an overnight there.

We did Chimney Mountain this year. It was loads of fun. There are these big chimney-like rock formations at the top, which the kids loved to climb around. The view from the top was pretty nice too.

In the Keene valley region from easy to harder:

1. Owls Head: fantastic views and great ledges, only about a 20 minute hike up.
2. Snow mountain
3. The nubble of Giant
4. Crows: nice circuit from high parking lot

I second the recommendation for "Kids on the trail"

Lunch at ADK cafe in relation to the above is highly recommended!

Hey, I'm a little late to the party here but I'd like to share our experiences.  We've got three little ones (9, 7 & 5) and although we don't get out as much as we'd like (which is sad since we live here!).  We tend to focus on hiking to peaks as we like to give ourselves and the kids a goal.

Over the last couple of years we've made three hikes that we'd recommend.  Hadley Mtn., Pilot Knob and Cascade Mtn.  Of the three Pilot Knob was the easiest and the kids loved hanging out up top while we took a bunch of pictures of the view of Lake George.  If you ever choose to make this hike I'd highly recommend that you stop in at the Cleverdale Store.  Great food and great people!  Hadley Mtn. was a bit harder (but still easy enough for the kids) but worth the trip.  The kids enjoyed knowing they reached the summit and they thought that the fire tower was cool.  We took on Cascade this past May as our first 46er.  We did it on a very hot day in May and it was a tough one for the kids.  I am very proud to say that they were real troopers and we can say we did it but it took it's toll on all of us.  We learned a lot about how to prepare for a hike like that and will do a lot different in the future.  We're thinking about Porter Mtn. for 46er #2 this fall but we'll only do it if we feel confident that the kids will have a good time (the hike back down Cascade wasn't the most pleasant for them or us).

I really want to do the Ledges but I have a fear about it with the kids.  I've rafted through there in the spring a number of times and I love it there but I've heard about cliffs, steeps, etc. that worry me.  The boys are a little wild and as much as we watch them like hawks they can be fast sometimes!

We've also considered Goodnow and would love to hear more feedback about it.

Good luck in wherever you go.  We'll be looking forward to hearing your reports on your adventures!!

Yo Sno!

I'm curious to hear how your youngest kids did on those hikes, particularly Cascade.  IMO, those 3 hikes might be a bit tough for a 4 or 5 year old.
 
Pilot Knob - what a great hike recommendation (though again, not necessarily for very young kids).  Similar to Buck Mountain but better.  As you mention, it's not in the guidebooks, but here's a link that will give anyone who's interested all the info they should need:
Times Union Outdoors blog-Pilot Knob

Sno, I don't think you should be overly concerned about Blue Ledges.  The cliffs are on the other side of the river.  We hiked there last Sunday, and I highly recommend it as a family hike.  Here's a trip report:
Blue Ledges, Aug 26 2012

I have numerous other kid-friendly hike suggestions and recommendations that are detailed earlier in this thread, and in my own blog:
Family Hikes
Happy trails!
Jeff

Adk Jeff wrote

Pilot Knob - what a great hike recommendation (though again, not necessarily for very young kids).  Similar to Buck Mountain but better.  As you mention, it's not in the guidebooks, but here's a link that will give anyone who's interested all the info they should need:
Times Union Outdoors blog-Pilot Knob

I hiked Pilot Knob last summer with a few friends right around dusk, from what I remember it was definitely a good hike. Then a few weeks ago a couple friends and I headed up there for the meteor shower. The clouds came in shortly after, but we still saw quite a few meteors.

TBatt, your photo is actually from a different hike (the gazebo is the give-away), the Lake George Land Conservancy's Pilot Knob Preserve:
LGLC Pilot Knob Preserve
It's also an excellent hike, one we've done with our kids.
Makes me wonder now which Pilot Knob hike SnoHunter meant.
Cool night time photo TBatt.

Hi Jeff!

The Lake George Conservatory Pilot Knob is the one we did.

As to how the kids did with the hikes:

2 years ago we took on our first hike with the kids:  Hadley Mtn. on a beautiful fall day in 2010.  We chose this because it's right down the road from us and it sounded like something the kids could handle.  We figured worse comes to worse we'd turn around and come back home without having invested a lot of travel time to get to our hike.  We were concerned because even though Zachary is very big for his age and has an abundance of energy he still was only three years old (had just turned three although he was and is almost as big as his brother who is two years older!).  It turns out that our fears were greatly unfounded.  Not only did all three kids do great (they were 3, 5 and 7 at the time) but Zachary lead most of the way with me following/chasing him!  The kids were excited to have reached the summit and by the fire tower.  We lunched at the top and the kids ran around for awhile before we headed back down.  It was a great day and we were excited over the thought of future hikes.

Hike #2:  Pilot Knob in the summer of 2011.  Another beautiful day, not too hot for a summer day.  We again chose this hike due to it's proximity to our home and from the reviews we read.  Although we were looking to up the difficulty level from our last trip we decided not to push the kids and figured we'd be making more than one hike that summer (things didn't work out that way but that's okay) so we might as well start off easy.  This hike we actually had our three kids and one of our daughter's friends but even though some people expressed concern over how we could handle 3-4 kids on a hike we had no problems what so ever.  The kids have behaved great on every hike, making for one less worry.  As with Hadley Mtn. the kids handled this hike with ease and they had a ball playing in the gazebo at the top and looking at the boats on the lake below.  We did have one hiccup on this hike as on the way up we somehow lost the trail and ended up doing a little bushwhacking to get to the top.  No big deal but it annoyed me that I wasn't focused enough on the trail markers.  This kids thought it was fun.  Another bonus for people with little ones considering this hike is that there is a road that we hiked down part of the way that made travel very easy.  For those feeling a little tired this would be a help.

Hike #3:  The big one.  Climbing the Adirondack 46 high peaks has been a dream of mine for many years and I was thrilled when Marcy expressed a desire to do it too (this in stark contrast to my ex who would have nothing to do with the woods let alone hike 4000'+ mountains!).  Since we both wanted to do this we wanted to make this a family quest and hopefully build great memories as we all work towards the goal.  We were (are) concerned though about the difficulty of these hikes, the dangers involved and keeping the trips fun adventures that the kids will look forward to and not moan and groan about.  Our research led us to choose Cascade Mtn. as our first of the high peaks and that only left the question as to when we would give it a try.  We were leaning towards next year when Zachary would be 5 going on 6 but left the possibility of this year open.  Well this past May we had a beautiful weekend and we decided that we were going to give it a shot.  Filled with anticipation we loaded up the kids and headed north.  Not only were we taking on a much harder hike than we had ever done with them before but we were also adding 3 hrs of round trip driving, making for a very long day.  We got to the trail head nice and early (we were just the second group to sign in that day) and began our quest.  It wasn't long before we confirmed to ourselves that we were in a different league now.....the trail was tougher and steeper than our past trips fairly early on and many of the hikers that were catching and passing us were packing more than the little day packs we had and were used to seeing on other hikes.  That said the kids were doing good and we looked forward to reaching the summit.  Well reaching that summit took a lot longer than we expected (around 3 hrs I think) and the kids were getting a bit bored and tired.  We took a lot of breaks and tried to keep them interested and their spirits up.  Our youngest Zachary (4 yrs old last May) was doing as good if not better than his older brother and sister but he was tiring.  At the summit it was disappointing because the kids were tired and Zach was scared of the top for some reason and all three wanted to head right back down.  We spent a little time at the top taking pictures and catching our breath but soon gave in to the kids desire to leave.  The trip down was long and the kids wanted to know how much longer from very early on.  We met many people on the trail who were quite impressed by how well they were doing and we were proud of them but we too wanted it to end before they became miserable.  When we finally made it back to the trail head the kids were thrilled and we were relieved.  The kids were true troopers and we are very proud of their accomplishment but at the end of the day we think that we took this on a bit too soon.  Taking the kids to Lake Placid for ice cream made them happier than the patches we bought them!  We enjoyed how many people in town took one look at our muddy, dirty clothes and faces and asked which one we climbed and when they too were impressed at the fact that the kids did so well.  (NOTE:  Unlike the first two hikes this day in May was also very hot (mid-80s) and humid.  It was far from an ideal hiking day.  Also, I did have to carry Zachary a few times but he truly did 98%+ of the hike.)

Sorry for the rambling answers.  All three trips were great but we're definitely going to regroup before our next attempt.  In the future I'm going to use a bigger pack and take on most of the load and carry extra water for everyone.  The kids all have little packs to share the load but again I don't want to push them.  I'm also looking for new ways to keep them involved.  They all had many questions about what that tree was, what kind of plant is that, what kind of bird is that, etc, etc.  I'm afraid that identifying these things is not a strong point of mine and I'm looking at books and/or apps for the tablet to bring along and show them and explain things as we go along.  I'm leaning towards downloadable books as I don't want to carry multiple books and the kids love their kindles so they might relate to pulling up pics and explanations on the tab a little better.  I also want to carry a GPS in the future so that I can better judge our progress.  This never was important to me before but I'd rather have a better grip on where we are with the kids and I want to be able to honestly answer them (and plan rests, etc).  Any ideas that anyone has for making this more interesting for the kids is greatly appreciated.  (And yes we have the book on hiking with the kids....now maybe I should actually read it and not just skim through it!)

I'm looking forward to hearing about more people's trips and experiences!

SnowHunter-
I'm impressed your younger kids could do Cascade.  Even Hadley two years ago is pretty impressive for their ages.  It's a good illustration of the wide range of abilities that kids have at young ages.  Some 4-yr-olds can do what other 6-yr-olds can't.

You mentioned you wanted to regroup before your next hike, and I have a few quick suggestions:
- Kids aren't as impressed with summit views as adults.  Water features (streams, waterfalls, ponds), caves, a cabin or a firetower, cool stuff along the trail... those are the things kids will enjoy about hiking.  A summit view is a nice bonus (especially if there are blueberries), but won't be the main thing for the kids.  
- Definitely build lots of time into the day for exploring.  It adds a lot if you can point things out, identify trees, plants, birds, animals, frogs etc.  Soon they'll be IDing things for you.  The more storytelling you can do along the trail the better.
- I'd limit the hikes to ones you can complete in 4-6 hours, at the kids' pace.  Longer than that seems to be too long for most kids, in my opinion.  I realize that puts most of the 46ers out of reach for now.  Take some shorter hikes in the Keene Valley / Lk Placid area where you get some views of the High Peaks and can identify key peaks like Mount Marcy.

If you read through some of my Family Hikes posts on my blog (linked in my previous message above), you'll get some more ideas about what has worked for me and my family (our kids are ages 4 and 8, so similar to your age range), along with some specific hike recommendations.  Hope that helps.  Feel free to pm me anytime.

Snowhunter wrote

...Hadley Mtn. on a beautiful fall day in 2010... Pilot Knob in the summer of 2011... and Hike #3:  The big one...

That is a phenomenal tale.  Those kids are awesome.

tBatt I saw that shot shared somewhere?  Albany Wx Examiner?  Nice one!

Harvey44 wrote

tBatt I saw that shot shared somewhere?  Albany Wx Examiner?  Nice one!

The Adirondacks FB page shared it a couple weeks back.

ADKjeff, I was pretty sure those were two different hikes. I thought I mentioned that, guess not! I have done the actual Pilot knob hike before. There is a picture of it hiding on my computer somewhere!

If you continue the hike with the Gazebo, it will take you to a waterfall. Haven't been there yet, but I would like to! Fall is on it's way. That means my body will handle heat of things outside of watersports! wahoo!

the east side of lake george has many options shelving rock, sleeping beauty , log bay loop , buck. lapland,  millman , black mt ponds from huletts all make very family friendly hikes .we did black mt to black mt ponds to lapland pond yesterday beautiful views of lake george

Baldface Mountain on Indian Lake is great with a twist: You can only get there by water. 600' climb over 0.8 miles. Baldface Mtn

we explored the north hudson trails last week.very kid friendly. casual winding moss covered trails, lots  of exploring ,plant identifying to do. also would make for good mt biking ( beta maintained trails ) and xc skiing