A Few Rock Piles

These are photos of a few rock piles and a rocky outcropping along Melondy Hill.

The first rock pile was found right along a logging road at an elevation of 1841 ft. The thing that I found intriguing about this pile was the upright, triangular rock in the pile. There is another rock pile at the top of this hill that I have not yet seen. I will be going back to find that one and will post some pictures.



This photo is a close up of a 'hole' or natural den in one of the boulders at a very high elevation - 1951 ft. There were several small to medium sized boulder outcroppings in this area, but they were impossible to photograph due to the brush. If the area was clear of brush, the boulders would have been a nice vantage point to look down into the valley.



The next two photos are of rocks stacked on a boulder and a rock pile or cairn. They are about 15 yards apart and are right next to a colonial looking stone wall that runs along the road. The elevation is 1724 ft.




The next 6 photos are of a rock I found at the boulder outcropping site. I don't touch anything on or next to cairns, stone piles, or at any site that appears significant. Because the boulder outcropping site is purely natural, and just an interesting feature of the land, I picked up this rock. I thought it had a nice feel to it, and, so, wanted to look at it more from home. I've looked around on the internet and haven't seen anything at all like it, so I'm inclined to think it's 'just a rock'. However, I can't help but also think that it would make a great knife or hide scraper if I needed to use it for that purpose. It just has a great feel to it when you hold it in your hand. If anyone looking at the photos has any idea, please let me know. Thanks for taking a look!

Resource for Native American waterbody, village and place names

I was nosing around on the web this morning and found this great resource for Native American waterbody, village and place names for the Susquehanna and surrounding River Basins.

Boulder site

This is a boulder site about a mile away from the cairn site in my 9/10 post.


The first picture is of the northeastern most boulder I photographed.

This was an interesting feature of another boulder at the site.




Some of the boulders had crevices between them. This one was of particular interest to me because the direction of the crevice is true north. The photos below show the crevice looking into the boulder field and out of the boulder field.




This is a niche in the bottom of one of the boulders.






The next two photos are of a natural 'stone bridge' at this site. The first photo looks through the stone bridge, into the boulder field. The niche in the previous two photos was visible through the stone bridge. It's difficult, if not impossible, to see the niche in the photo. The second photo of the stone bridge is looking out of the boulder field. I was standing on top of the boulder with the niche in the base to get the photo of the stone bridge looking out.





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The next two photos are of two 'dens' under boulders that face each other. This site was a little scary because both dens are inhabited by animals.





Fortunately, the big animal wasn't home!



This is a photo of the smaller den in the background. I was trying to get a good photo of the upright rocks, but they were very close to the boulder and that made it hard to get a good angle to focus. When I was at the site, I didn't notice any alignments with these stones. Since then, I've mapped this site and the den site is at 282 degrees true to the niche. The niche, however, does not face the dens. The niche faces the Stone Bridge at 28 degrees true.



This is the southwestern most boulder I photographed. It is right next to the water source and the dens. There is a niche or den to the right (being used by a woodchuck).

This last photo is of the water source next to this site. There was no running water when I took this photo, but there was some water pooled below.

Within the next few days I plan on getting a few more pictures posted of rock piles north of this site.

Stone piles on Melondy Hill

I've been looking at cairns, stone piles, boulders and some stacked stone on boulders in Melondy Hill. They are on the east side of a hill, above a creek that runs into the Susquehanna River. On my first outing, I located 6 stone piles. I went out again to this site, just the other day, and found 3 more piles. Two of the cairns are about 13 feet in length, five and a half feet wide and four and a half feet tall at the highest point. There are at least two piles that appear to have a depression in the center. Another pile looks like a cairn with a 'snake like' effect to it, but it also seems to be collapsed on the south side.

This photo is of the large cairn, the farthest south of the group. It is also the most intact of the nine.

This is the same cairn, south face (looking north).

The third photo is of the 'snake like' cairn. The north end is still intact, but the south end appears to have collapsed. If you look carefully, you can see the first cairn in the background of this photo. I plan to get out here again when the leaves are off the trees to take some more pictures.

This is a picture of the 'snake like' cairn on the south side (looking north).

The cairn in this photo is very similar in dimension to the first cairn. It is very large, but appears to have collapsed some on the south (right) side. Ironically, the north side has the large tree on it. Some stones appeared to have been knocked off by the tree, but the cairn did not appear to have collapsed on this side, due to the tree falling on it.

This is the same cairn from the opposite side, to show how well the stones are still stacked beneath the tree. The tree that is on this cairn extends out so that the upper branches are on top of a round cairn next to this cairn:


This cairn has a very clear depression in the center, which is hard to see in photos because of the branches on it.


There was also another cairn or stone pile with a depression in the center, that was higher up the bank, to the west. Here is a picture of that one:



You can see to the very far rear/left of the above photo, a tree down along the horizon. That tree is down across one of the three cairns I missed on my first visit out to this site. Here is a closer picture of that cairn:




There was one large rock, or boulder, with stacked stone on it that was in this cairn field. It was closer to the road than the cairns, but it definitely caught my attention:




Lastly, there was a small boulder toward the north end of the cairn field that was most likely there by coincidence. I couldn't help but notice it, however, I think because of the color of the lichen on it. I often find myself taking pictures of some odd things when I'm out looking at stone piles. Maybe I'm hoping for a touch of serendipity!





I hope you enjoy the photos!!

Why Two Headwaters Stone Piles?

There is an area in Central NY that lies within the headwaters of the Delaware and Susquehanna Rivers. The Susquehanna to the North, the Delaware to the South. For quite a few years now, I have walked the woods surrounding these headwaters and have seen stone walls, perfectly straight rows of pines, and seemingly random stone piles and boulders. I'd like to use this blog as a place to share photos and comments about the Stone that exists within the headwaters of Central NY. Many thanks to stonepilewhisperer for being an inspiration for this blog!