Chimney Bluff State Park

Hiking in Chimney Bluff State Park | Wolcott Falls | Oswego, NY | March 2023

For our first full day off while in Oswego, we decided to go on a little day trip to visit a state park 45 minutes West of us. I had starred Chimney Bluff State Park on Google Maps back when we lived in New York, but we never had the opportunity to visit. Now we were this close, and it looked like some of the best hiking we could do along Lake Ontario. The weather even looked like it would cooperate with our plans, as it was supposed to be sunny and in the 40’s.

We drove East out of Oswego on NY-104 towards Sodus Point and Chimney Bluffs State Park. The park was thankfully free and open during the winter, and when we reached the parking lot it was only us and one other vehicle just starting out. We packed light, deciding against taking snowshoes before heading North towards Lake Ontario.

The path to the Lake was paved, but we were here to see bluffs and soon veered off onto the Bluff trail. This trail entered into the woods and was partially snow covered. We soon bridged a creek and then started climbing up onto the top of the bluffs. The trail itself was not hard to follow, but it was both muddy and icy at the same time. The combination of snow, cold nights, and warm days was really putting the frost-thaw cycle to work. We did our best to stay on the trail while also remaining relatively dry. Poor Charlotte doesn’t have the luxury of boots to keep her feet warm if they get wet — she much preferred walking on snow over the mud.

Eventually we reached the top of the bluff and were rewarded with views out over the Lake and of the eroded ground. It looked almost like the Badlands in miniature meets the Great Lakes. It was a clear day, and we could see the power plant far in the distance to the East. We continued on the trail, stopping at every break in the trees to admire the different angles of the bluffs. At one point, I could see a person walking down on the shore, and we wondered how to get down there.

As we neared the end of the Bluff Trail, we found a staircase that took us down to another parking lot and the start of the shore trail. AllTrails seemed to suggest there was a way we could loop back around to the parking lot, so we decided to follow it. We walked West along the rocky shore, now looking up to see the tall bluffs on our left. As it turned out, the trail ended up being washed out so if there was a way back up the bluffs, we couldn’t reach it. Oh well, the views were worth adding this bit of trail to our hike. We returned to the parking lot, went up the stairs, and began taking another trail through the woods to complete our loop back to where we parked. At this point, it had warmed up more so the snow was even softer, and there were even more puddles and muddy sections.

Once we made it back to the car, we decided to take the scenic route back to Oswego, driving through the smaller towns North of the state highway. On our way, we stopped in the town of Wolcott to see Wolcott Falls, first taking it in from the upper viewing deck, then walking down the short trail to the side of the falls. It was a fun reminder of our weekend trip 6 years ago to see the snowy waterfalls in the Finger Lakes region.

After that, we wrapped up our day’s adventure and drove back to Oswego, where Curtis began shifting his sleep schedule to prepare for nights, and we hunkered down for a big snowstorm that was arriving over the next couple days.