Guided Winter Hike - Castle Ruins

In order to officially secure your spot on this event and to receive the details email of where to exactly park and meet with us you must register on our site by clicking the link below.

https://www.trailboundproject.com/service-page/guided-winter-hike-castle-ruins?referral=service_list_widget

This guided winter hike has a $15 nominal non-refundable registration fee to secure your spot.

Add a $5 microspike rental to your cart after registering for this event if you need to borrow microspikes for the day as well. We only supply the best - Hillsound Trail Crampons or Kahtoola Microspikes.

The Van Slyke Castle ruins hike is 4 miles and 600’ of elevation gain.

We’ll head out from the trailhead and weave through the forest until we reach Ramapo Lake. From there we’ll begin our short but steady uphill push to reach a fantastic view of the NYC skyline and visit the ruins of the mansion.

Known as Foxcroft, it was built around 1910 by William Porter, a stockbroker. His widow occupied it until her death in 1940, and it fell into ruin in the late 1950s.

After exploring the castle and taking some pictures, we’ll continue on the trail which passes the remains of its concrete swimming pool. Just beyond that, we’ll reach an unobstructed west-facing viewpoint over the Wanaque Reservoir and the Wyanokie Mountains. A short walk from here leads us to a stone tower that held a cistern that supplied water to the mansion. From there, we’ll begin our descent back towards our vehicles, enjoying the views from up high before we head down into the tree cover.

Although we hope there will be snow and/or ice for some fun winter hiking with microspikes, the weather is completely unpredictable. If we end up with a dry winter hike, we'll still have a great time and go over winter hiking best practices and skills such as how to dress, the different gear we carry, and other seasonal trip planning considerations to make winter hiking just as comfortable and enjoyable as the rest of the year.

We will email the parking and hike details to those registered closer to the hike date.