Happy Sunday my fellow Adventurers!…read more This is a relatively new hidden gem that I just found. From what I know it was a swimming hole back in 1989 however they closed it down when it was used for a water resource until recently they decided to bring it back to its original roots. (Please fat check this) It has the brand new man made beach complete with what seems to be quarry sand that is course and not like beach sand. Its a beautiful white and lovely when the sun hits its crystalline in texture. The beach itself is small relatively compared to say a lake community beach. There are two lifeguard stations and several rotating guards. The small beach has four areas with noodle ropes in order for you to make sure you are swimming in the right spots. They offer swimming lessons which is really good for the local communities. They also have a platform in the middle which is about 11 feet deep which is reminiscent of the 'Blob' Movie. I half expected that the Blob would come especially if you sneak in after hours. (I don't recommend this lol) You basically pull in and park either on the grass or follow the road to the concession stand. You can purchase a day pass for $10 with no residential requirement for the area. I believe you can purchase an annual badge which I think runs $25-35 per person. You fill out a form that is all legalities and liabilities in order to get the badge or wristband for a day pass. The staff are really helpful and accommodating for any questions you may have. They have very clean porta-potties that are frequently serviced. As well as a concession stand that offered hotdogs, hang burgers, and various other carnival like foods. They sometimes run out of items like sauerkraut with no compensation of any sort which I get they can't help but it's a small area and was open at 11 am, we got there by 12. Always purchase back ups in order to provide for your customers. The hot dogs are pre-grilled and wrapped in aluminum so don't expect a fresh dirty water dog. The overall experience is a really nice one considering you battle tons of traffic going the shore versus the short ten minute drive from Hamburg and $10 fee. It's also really brand new and still working itself out.

Nice, clean park. Dog friendly place to walk. Fun local events. Very nice children's area.read more

Such a cool play space for kids (big and small)! Funded by the local parents, this space has…read moreeverything a kid could want in a playground--- jungle gyms for little & older kids, rock climbing walls, low-zipline (sit and stand versions), outdoor musical instruments, a playhouse, and a variety of swings (toddler, special needs, older kids and a large one for a group)!! There's even a Free Library kiosk to encourage reading (take a book, leave a book). Bathrooms on site will be a welcome relief to parents (pun intended). We stopped by here after grabbing lunch in the area, what an awesome find. Fortunately, it's within walking distance to a deli and coffee shop. Hope to come here again... best free entertainment for the kiddos.

Hermoso muy lindo y agradable . Todo à la perfection la naturaleza lo es todo . Para compartir en…read morefamilia

The boathouse was closed so kayaks and boats were unavailable, but the beach was open and it was…read morebeautiful. It opens by 10 and if you are there early, you'll get a nice spot and time to enjoy the water before the crowds get there.

Super nice 3 mile trail around lake with tall walls from an old marl factory half way around. Water…read moreis super clear and tho' it says no swimming, you may fall off your paddle board sometimes! Has parking w boat launch and a porta potty.

On a beautiful fall day my wife and I decided to take a hike…read more Halfway into the hike we came across an area that was a gay kook-up spot We tried to avoid this but ended up in a clearing with a giant tree stump this was later discovered this was called the $@&$ stump

Nice trail that has a steep section, but is worth the views. We followed the yellow trail up to the…read moreoverlook and then turned back down at the mailbox shortly after. We visited in mid October and had perfect weather. The trail was moderately busy so I'd suggest going early if you want to be more spaced out from other groups.

Wallkill River National Wildlife Refuge was established to conserve and enhance populations of…read morewildlife and their habitats, to protect and enhance water quality, and to provide opportunities for wildlife-dependent recreation and research. The refuge conserves the biological diversity of the Wallkill Valley by protecting and managing land, with a special emphasis on forest-dwelling and grassland birds, migrating waterfowl, wintering raptors, and endangered species. The North American Waterfowl Management Plan identifies the Wallkill River bottomlands as a priority focus area for waterfowl management within New Jersey.

***2 1/2 stars***…read more Wallkill was the site of our First of the Year hike this year, on a warmer than usual January 1 with some decent sunshine. We picked this based almost solely on location - in recent years, a Sussex native has been trekking all over the state to participate in this noble event so a nearby spot was selected as a gesture of good will. Our specific sojourn took place exclusively on the Wood Duck Trail, a back and forth hike that was about three miles in total (perfect mileage for this event). The parking lot is easy to spot, just off 23, and while the lot itself does not have a port-a-potty, the spiffy QuickChek nearby does - and for what it's worth, the bathroom there was pretty clean and the employees very pleasant. I am always warmly received in the Kingdom of Sussex. It absolutely could have been the time of year, but this place seemed super desolate and not conducive to decent optics. It's a lot of marshy/swampy areas off to the sides of the trails, which can be spooky under the right circumstances (maybe they could do some kind of Halloween hike over here with lanterns?) but after a while it's just repetitive. At the end of the trail (very easy to spot - it's literally gated so you have no choice but to turn around), there's a pleasant little off-shoot where you can get pretty close to the Wallkill River and admire the water features. Our Honorary Young Pup scampered down to the edge and played around there for a few minutes before we headed back. There were also one or two wooden bridges to cross over little streams, which were nice enough. However, they were a bit slippery - all of us watched the Honorary Young Pup skip across them with gritted teeth, but she stayed upright. I don't know if that's just the result of recent thawing and the prior day's rain, but something to keep in mind if you're tromping around there in similar weather. Once or twice we also encountered lookout points ostensibly to view birds and other wildlife, but they were not interested in making themselves known on January 1. Our only wildlife sighting of the day was a cardinal hopping around on the ice nearby. It would have been improved if this trail permitted pooches, but alas - only service animals are allowed, and they were off doing their duty elsewhere on this particular day. I don't see any reason why the powers that be couldn't at least allow leashed canines here - I can't imagine a tethered retriever doing any damage to the waterfowl, but I don't make the rules. On the positive side, the trail IS pretty well maintained. Part of that could be the minimal brush along the edges (there were a few sticker bushes but nothing that really hindered our journey), but it was very easy and straight-forward to follow, and even on a morning where everything was still in the process of drying out, I was impressed by how solid the path was. I'd anticipated navigating around a few puddles, and there really weren't any to speak of. Also in that regard, it's very young pup friendly. Our Honorary Young Pup is now a cagey veteran of this event and was comfortable frolicking by herself further down the trail and had no issues completing this adventure. This wasn't terrible by any means, but personal preference-wise, I prefer hikes/trails that are more interesting.

Worst experience ive ever had with my son. When to bike park ,Overpaid and ripped off, $450 for 2…read morehrs. Paid for 2hr intro, 150 each, didnt use instructor, and then was made to pay for an all day ticket to ride the twilight. I could have rented bikes and bought all day ticket for less. Beginner trail was like an intermediate, steep rough, nothing that 9yo could handle. This is no beginner terrain. Not to mention his bike seat wasnt even adjusted correctly and he couldnt touch the ground. Met bikers on the trail from vermont that said its not a beginner mountain. Went to management, jackie obrian, she could care less. I will never go to this mountain again for any reason. I would stay away. They are just out for your money.

Customer service and trying to get someone to answer the phone with regard to mountain biking is…read morehorrendous. I made the mistake of booking my bike rental and ticket in advance. The weather report then changed to lightning storms for that day, which obviously is dangerous to be outside on a mountain. I tried numerous times calling and leaving emails early in the day before my booking. Never got a call or message back. I would have been happy with a raincheck but impossible to get in contact with anyone. The website makes it easy to take your money but zero provisions or explanation on rainchecks. Don't book in advance here and hopefully you don't need anyone on the phone. Hope they are happy stealing my money.

Really beautiful site, but it was hard to find. The address in the tour book took us to a closed,…read moreprivate road, and it's a windy two lane road with no shoulder, so it was also hard to find a place to turn around. There is a bit of a pull off area, and there is a restroom, but when I went off season (warm but not declared in season) it was locked. So mileage may vary on its usefulness. Luckily, if your eagle eyes spot the pullover parking lot, the falls are a pretty short walk. I recommend taking the path to the right to the top of the falls so you can then move down the steep incline instead of going up. The view from the bottom is very pretty. It's a good view and only needs like 20 minutes tops of your time. It was quite doable for my senior mother, but some parts were very slow moving. She enjoyed it, so it does still work for beginners as long as it's not been raining. Would recommend stopping by if you like seeing waterfalls. It's the tallest in the state and very scenic.

After a week of downpours we headed up to the Poconos to chase some waterfalls. Raymondskill was…read morefull of fury exploding over the weir like it had somewhere to be. The mist expanded well over the entire overlook of the middle falls where it swirled and danced almost to the top falls overlook. We parked in the bottom lot and took a light hike to the middle falls overlook - there were steps to the top overlook but my arthritic knee would not allow it so we drove up to the top parking lot and took another easy "hike" to the crest and I am glad we did. Photos don't do justice to the majesty of this natural wonder. The trails are friendly even to the weary and wobbly like me! Easily traversable but could be slippery in bad weather. The complete hike is only about a mile but you can still get a great view at the middle falls platform at roughly 1/2 mile in and out. Majestic & magical Raymonskill is glorious, but after the rain is a thunderous wonder and truly something to behold

This was great for my granddaughter who is 18 months. Pretty low key so not over stimulating for…read morelittle ones. She loved to push buttons in Santa's village. The live show was mildly entertaining but a little too much for my granddaughter to grasp. Appreciate this as an option for entertaining a youngster.

Cute playground right in back of Kinnelon library. It's in great condition, has benches inside and…read moreis fully fenced in. Age range is referenced as 5-12 but I think smaller kids can manage parts of it quite well with parents help.

***3 1/2 stars***…read more This was my first time ziplining outside of a random high school gym class and I could tell it's something I'd love doing in the future. The problem is that the Mountain Creek setup is less than ideal and in my opinion not the best bang for your buck or time. The Millennial Chum and I attended the 10:30am session yesterday just after Mountain Creek opened. Would definitely recommend going at that time - parking in this area is a chaotic nightmare, which we experienced on our way out around 1pm, but thankfully avoided the drama coming in. If you're not familiar with the resort and the parking situation, try to allocate some additional time; there's multiple parking lots, some of them aren't open at the same times and they're not monitored particularly well by the staff so people go rogue and create a third row in the lots that there really isn't room for. I literally broke a sweat backing out of here. The staff at Zip Tours is fantastic and by far by the biggest selling point here. We had Cooper and Meg (I think?) as our guides, both of whom were super professional and personable. Cooper was blasting some Good Charlotte about halfway through on his mini speaker so now the Millennial Chum and I are officially back into turn-of-the-century pop punk. I am absolutely derp level when it comes to straps (airplane seat belts, bras, you name it), and everyone was very patient with me and basically just did all of the buckling and strapping while I just stood there like Ed from the Lion King. The instructions for the actual ziplining and positioning the body for landing at the other end were easy to understand and it didn't take long for everyone in the group to be acclimated, regardless of experience/background. The session/class was two hours long, and involved four ziplines. The first is the short training line down at the bottom of the ski lift. After that, you go up the ski lift to the top of the mountain and do the other three, which are basically crisscrossing one of the lakes at the top of Vernon Peak. After completing the four lines, you navigate across a narrow suspension bridge to an ATV/trailer/truck - I'm sure there's an obvious, much better term for it - that takes you back to the ski lift to wrap up the adventure. My favorite was the second line, which is the longest and offers the best views. I hike up mountains on a pretty regular basis so heights aren't much of a concern, but I DO get queasy on aggressive rollercoasters so that was a mild caveat in the back of my mind. This wasn't an issue at all; there's no significant dropdowns and the speed isn't that fast. I will say though that the landing can be a little abrupt/hard at the end, which they mitigate as much as they can with this cushioning spring system. Probably given the height/distance, the second line had the most intense landing, but it wasn't egregious. Would have hated to be one of the metaphorical test dummies when they were figuring that system out though. Here's the main problem - it's two hours for four ziplines, one of which is a very short training line that takes about five seconds if I had to guess. The actual ziplining is minimal (and maybe that's just the nature of the beast - it doesn't take long to zip down a line) and a huge chunk of that two hours is you just standing around waiting for other people to go down the line. Probably the best way to fix that is to either slash the class size in half (which I'm guessing they don't want to do because they'd be leaving a sizeable chunk of money on the table) or investing in adding another one or two lines at each stop to speed up the process. I have no idea how feasible that is from a financial or logistics perspective but it did look like there was room to do so if it came to it. Another issue (and I think this is more on the company overall and not the guides) is that they allowed three people who were late to join us, and they caused delays as well. The rules on the website clearly say that if you're late you're going to get slotted into the next available session, but they made an accommodation for them. It honestly wouldn't have been a big deal, but these guys were pretty disruptive and self-centered. One of them had a loud Go Pro that he kept turning on and off and he even asked one of the guides to confirm it was recording. It might be too extreme to ban those devices especially given the type of activity you're doing, but it was a definite distraction. The other two were intermittently making out and filming the rest of us; that latter part I think arguably should have been shot down by the guides or cited in the rules. You want to film yourself or the scenery? Fine, but I think it's pretty douchey to film the rest of us without permission. Your mileage may vary. I don't regret doing it, but I'd like to try this at a different venue with longer ziplines and less wait times.

I've gone zip lining at many different places and sadly have to say this was in the bottom of…read moreexperiences. First, they seem to have staffing issues. I'm not sure if that's due to staff shortage or mismanaging the staff but it was chaotic checking in. The staff that was there was doing their best and friendly but it didn't set the tone that this was going to be a smoothly executed experience which is important when doing an activity where safety is very important. Second, the amount of waiting you do verse actually zipping is way out of portion. The group moves together so you have to wait for all 15 people in your group to go before going and waiting at the next zip. There is also only 4 zips. So for a two hour tour that can tell you how long you wait for. The best thing about this tour is the basket harness you get strapped into. It made it more comfortable and less strenuous when you hit the breaks. The guides did try to make it fun and were willing to take your picture too which was very much appreciated. I do not recommend this zip tour at the end of the day however.