Hiking Black Dome Ridge
Hiking the Black Dome Ridge: Black Dome, Black Head, and Thomas Cole Mountains | Camping in South Mountain State Forest | Catskill Mountains, New York | May 2025
While planning for our time in the Catskills, I had decided that I wanted to hit all 3 of the peaks with 600+ meters of prominence. We had covered Hunter Mtn. back when we lived in New York, and I had completed Slide Mountain the week before. That left Black Dome, the third highest and third most prominent peak in all the Catskills.
But first, I needed to take care of some work things. After driving down the very steep road from Huntersfield Mtn, we once again stopped at the Windham Path trailhead just outside the village of Windham. Unlike the day before, Charlotte was all for walking the trail at a brisk pace and soon left Jess behind at the parking lot…which would be fine if I didn’t have an impending meeting. Fortunately, Jess kept track of time and we traded places – Jess with Charlotte, me with the van.
Since my chosen hike was longer than any of the previous hikes I had been doing, and with the threat of afternoon rain, we opted to go straight from here to the trailhead for Black Dome at the end of Big Hollow Road along Batavia Kill. This was also the most popular trailhead we encountered during our stay in the Catskills, with the small parking lot filling up shortly after we arrived in the late morning.
We had a quick lunch, and then I set off on my route. I had decided early on that, while my main goal would be Black Dome, I wanted to add on its two sub-peaks: Black Head and Thomas Cole Mountain. These two peaks had nowhere near the prominence I seek, but they are part of the Catskill 3500 list, a fairly popular hiking list. And while I doubt I will ever spend sufficient enough time in the Catskills to complete that list (the whole reason I’ve been focusing on prominence based peakbagging is because we don’t ‘live’ anywhere long enough to complete these types of lists)…I also didn’t want to not complete the list, just because I had neglected these minor summits. (EXCEPT – the Catskill 3500 Club, unlike almost every other mountain based hiking club, requires winter ascents of four of the peaks…including Blackhead – but I’m choosing to ignore that wrinkle in my logic).
Fortunately, all my peaks had established trails leading to the top. No bushwhacking today. I could even create a loop of sorts and hike on part of the Long Path. And so with that sense of confidence I started on the trail following the headwaters of Batavia Kill.
I soon passed a hiking pair who had started while we were lunching, and then took a fork towards the ridgeline to the North of Black Head. The trail was easy going, well marked, and I made the ridgeline (and the Long Path) easily. I then started South along the Long Path, and for the first time in these two weeks of hiking, it got steep. I paused on a short hillock to catch my breath and admire the view of the Hudson Valley to the East. I looked through the trees to the South and saw the huge bulk of Black Head. It was very close and very high and the trail somehow got steeper.
At this point in my hiking career I’ve done a fair number of peaks across the Appalachians up and down the entire continent. I’ve hiked portions of the AT, the Long Trail, and other random Long distance paths. I’m a New York Fire Tower Challenge Completer. So I know that – for whatever reason – East coast trail makers disdain switchbacks and will often send hikers straight up a rocky defile to reach a summit. But this – the North Slope of Black Head was the steepest established trail I’ve hiked in recent memory (I’m not going to count some of my more creative route finding out West). Stone steps, boulder drops, root hand holds. It had it all. 800 feet in about half a mile doesn’t sound bad, but it felt terrible. (In hindsight, I once again probably went up too fast which contributed to my struggle. There was never a point of ‘danger’, just a lot of almost scrambling, but it definitely got the heart pumping)
When I reached the top gasping and out of breath, I found two older hikers enjoying trail snacks. After I sat down and let my heart rate return to normal, we chatted a bit, but soon I was off again. I had two more summits to reach after all.
Fortunately, the worst was behind me. Even though I had to go down and back up to reach the summit of the even higher Black Dome, the grade was nowhere as steep or prolonged. The views during this stretch were also among the best of the hike (all three summits were tree covered). I passed by the first pair of hikers as they were heading up Black Head. They were a bit surprised to see me coming down already, and we compared hiking notes regarding the North Slope.
From here to the summits of Black Dome and Thomas Cole, the trail was empty, though I ran into the older pair coming up Black Dome as I was heading down. Neither summit was particularly interesting, so I didn’t stop to enjoy the view, or really stop at all. Once it was downhill and back among the trees I let gravity take me and the miles rolled by.
Once I had reunited with Jess and Charlotte, we headed back to the Northern forests outside of Catskill Park. We opted to stay in South Mountain State Forest just on the other side of the ridge from Huntersfield. Since I had several meetings coming up over the next couple days, we just needed a quiet spot with good cell service to plant. And this spot was perfect for that. We found a decent sized pull off from the forest road right before the road started going steeply up the mountain. Our first day there was cloudy, but the rain held off until the evening and we enjoyed the views from our spot. I also spotted a porcupine that first night. After that first day, it continued to rain off and on every day, and even when it wasn’t raining we were basically living in a cloud and it was always misting. We still got out to walk Charlotte up and down the forest road a few times a day, but we ended up being cooped up inside more than we would like. Still, it was a great spot to wrap up our almost 2 weeks in the Catskills.
