If you live in the Bronx and are looking for a nice hike without having to travel to distant climes, the Palisades in New Jersey — those cliffs you can see across the Hudson River — are a great option. From the George Washington Bridge there is a blazed trail called the Long Path, which runs northward through the woods along the top of the 500-foot-high cliffs, affording spectacular views as you walk of the river below and the unfolding geography across the river.
Parallel to the Long Path but along the shore below the cliffs is the Shore Trail, which is flat and very easy to walk. The roughly twelve miles of the Palisades offer several roads and trails connecting the upper and lower trails, making possible a “loop” hike on the Long Path and the Shore Trail so that the hiker does not have to retrace his or her steps.
My friend Robert died last year, and we never did manage to hike the Giant Stairs at the Palisades. He had been a friend of mine since second grade. We grew up in the Bronx in the 1960s at a time when if the neighborhoods had names we surely didn’t know them. We walked along Bruckner Boulevard before it became an expressway.
We enjoyed hiking, and our first walks took us to the New York Botanical Gardens,
Pelham Bay Park and Orchard Beach. I carried my gear in a green canvas knapsack with unpadded shoulder straps, Robert used a messenger bag. We both had old-school surplus aluminum canteens you could hook onto your belt. We packed peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches and maybe an apple for lunch.
We began to look for more exotic opportunities. I think we became aware of the Palisades as a wilderness choice by reading trail descriptions in the New York Walk Book at the library.
Our choice of destinations was limited by our need for public transportation to the trailhead. We could get to the George Washington Bridge by subway, so that worked! We photocopied the trail map for the Palisades (it cost a quarter!).
After changing trains a few times, we found ourselves standing on busy 181st Street, where the George Washington Bridge was!
Our photocopied Palisades map was no help. We wouldn’t ask for directions. Ultimately, spotting a bridge tower looming over an apartment building gave us a big clue. We finally crossed the bridge. The span is about a mile long. Seeing what a mile actually looked like was pretty cool.
On our first hike we walked across the bridge and back.
On each subsequent crossing, we ventured further north along the Palisades. We were like the Portuguese explorers of the 1400s slowly working their way down the western coast of Africa. After we had explored trails both atop and at the base of the cliffs, we hatched our plan for a glorious hike.
Just below the State Line Lookout on top of the Palisades, a dozen miles north of the bridge were the “Giant Stairs.” We had little idea what that term meant. Some kind of stairs to climb 500 feet seemed to us most likely.
On the map was a trail which connected the upper and lower trails. Why not hike out along the Shore Trail, climb the Giant Stairs, and then return on the Long Path on top of the cliffs, a round trip of around 25 miles? When we returned to the George Washington Bridge we would already be on the top of the Palisades.
Piece of cake!
Off we went one fine Saturday in June 1969. We crossed the bridge and descended to the Shore Trail. It was easy walking, with picnickers, boaters, cyclists and sightseers along the way. Initial portions were paved for automobile access.
Further north the numbers dwindled, and by the time we were walking on a dirt path we had the trail to ourselves.
Around lunchtime we came upon a jumble of massive boulders which had fallen from the cliffs in eons past. Here must be the Giant Stairs!
The Shore Trail had been marked with white blazes, so we looked for white blazes on the rocks to guide us. While there were patches of white lichen and scattered white bird droppings (all of which looked like trail blazes), we could find no white paint.
We tried to work our way through the rock field without trail markings, but the boulders were huge and endless. Our progress was exceedingly slow. We were limited by time
We had to be out of the woods before dark.
Admitting defeat, we turned around and went back. At the end of those twelve miles we still had to climb 500 feet back up the Palisades. We were really tired as we trudged back across the George Washington Bridge in twilight.
One night 45 years later, I was wasting time on the computer instead of doing work I did a search for “Giant Stairs.” There was a detailed route description! With the printout and better maps we should certainly have been able to find the route and finish the hike.
I called Robert and proposed a rematch. He declined. He already had “too many miles on his personal odometer,” he told me.
That was a decade ago.
Robert died last year after a relatively short illness, and while I don’t think he actively lamented not completing the hike it still rankled with me. I took the trail description of the Giant Stairs resurfacing in a pile of papers on my desk this year as a sign from above that I should complete the mission.
I picked a day. I took water, a few tangerines, and (you guessed it!) a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and set out. The day was glorious, sunny and cool, with considerable leaf color.
The trailhead was a bit difficult to find even with the detailed description, but eventually there it was, just behind a little snack bar by the parking lot.
The trail description very carefully described the hike as a counterclockwise loop, first south along the top, then down the Palisades, then north along the Shore Trail, back up the cliffs, and finally back to the parking lot.
Even with the map and descriptions I found myself first proceeding north and then descending in the opposite direction from the directions.
Over the years Robert and I had an ongoing discussion as to which was more dangerous, ascending or descending a mountain. We had agreed descending was probably the more dangerous, as it was harder to see footholds on the way down when you are already fatigued from the initial climb.
So there I was, maximizing safety, climbing down while still fresh. It turns out that the ascent and the descent, both around 500 feet, were long and steep, but made easier by the presence of hundreds (thousands? I lost count) of small steps
mostly slabs of stone placed by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s and maintained by hiking groups. You can see evidence of their work throughout the park.
I reached the bottom by the Peanut Leap Cascade, in good times, a waterfall but that day a mere trickle.
At the river I turned south. Were those stairs the Giant Stairs?
The answer was emphatically no. Those steps up and down the Palisades are more properly called the Tiny Stairs. The Shore Trail, shortly after several warning signs, traversed several (I counted four) jumbles of huge boulders which had broken off from the cliffs above and piled up here for hikers’ delight. These are the Giant Stairs!
The first stretch looked as though some of the rocks had been rearranged to provide flat surfaces to walk upon, but crossing the subsequent rocks you had to pick your route from boulder to irregular boulder. Though the blazes were a useful to guide for general direction, the hiker had to choose the specific route. The boulders were more obstacles than stairs. My principal concern was needing to be rescued after a fall. My other fear was losing my cellphone in one of the gaps between boulders.
One of the warning signs had indicated that mile of trail over the Giant Stairs would take two hours to traverse. I ultimately emerged safely beyond the boulders onto the conventional Shore Trail after an hour and 50 minutes. Whew!
After the Giant Stairs, the route continued as a conventional path parallel to the Hudson perhaps 100 feet above the river before it turned and ran down to the shore.
To my amazement, I suddenly realized what had happened to Robert and me 55 years ago!
The Shore Trail is essentially a jeep trail parallel to the river for most of its length. The jeep trail continued along the shore past where I had just joined it! There had been no marking, no signage, nothing indicating the Shore Trail turned away from the river to head up to the Giant Stairs! Robert and I, on that fateful afternoon, had been walking blithely along the Shore Trail and missed the turn which would have taken us up to the Giant Stairs! Instead we had arrived at an impenetrable boulder field, and as Chico Marx had put it, “We turned around and had to go back.”
I felt better knowing why we had never made it across that boulder field. Maybe it was good that we hadn’t. The actual route was only a short distance uphill from where we were. Even if we had found the trail, it would have taken us two hours to cross the Giant Stairs, ascend the Palisades and walk the twelve-plus miles back to the George Washington Bridge. It would have been well after dark by the time we got back to the Bronx.
My legs were complaining as I climbed up the hundreds of Tiny Stairs to the top of the Palisades. The uphill part of the hike to the end might have been safer, but it was still tiring.
Back at the parking lot I bought a cookie at the snack bar and sat on a bench looking across the Hudson River at Hastings on Hudson. It was really clear. I could see the water of Long Island Sound towards the horizon, across Westchester County. I don’t think there was a refreshment stand when Robert and I were here. I wish he could have enjoyed the hike with me, but it almost felt he was here anyway. As I was eating my cookie, maybe he was sitting up there with St Peter, putting moleskin on his blisters. Hey, Robert, I miss you!
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