The Sky’s the Limit 2015 Hiking Challenge #6
Soapstone Mountain (Shenipsit State Forest)
Somers, June 20, 2015
Updates: In late 2018, the state replaced this rick-rack tower, so there will be another page on this tower for the new one. There was an older page about it from when I hiked through here on the Shenipsit Trail. So instead of three CTMQ pages on one tower, I’ll combine the earlier two here.
Me on the tower in 2011
This page describes visits to the old tower, which was “officially” closed in 2014. A new tower was built and opened in late 2018. This was a 30-foot wooden Tower on the 1,075-foot Soapstone Mountain summit.
I’m hesitant to hit publish on this page because, well, because this tower has been closed for a year. Granted hundreds, if not thousands of people have climbed the rotted steps to the viewing platform despite the 2×4 across the bottom…
Including me. But I’m an idiot. In fact, I let my two boys up to the top as well. I figured hey, if I’m going to fall and die, I don’t want leave my kids without – y’know, those are ghoulish thoughts and I don’t want to even think about that. We survived. But I can’t condone anyone else breaking the rules and climbing to the top.
The structure is rotted out or something and was deemed unsafe by the state a while ago. No one has done anything to fix it. The state also put the tower on its TSTL challenge list. So who’s the idiot here, me or them? How can I expect to explain to my 4-year-old that we drove up to Somers, took a (very short and easy) little hike to a tower, but we can’t scale it?
Good luck with that.
The views here in the fall are extraordinary and I highly recommend them… when its officially opened again sometime in 2044 or something now that it’s officially open again in 2019!
Let’s get going, boys.
Calvin, you go first…
No, Damian, you go first.
Here’s the “illegal” view. It really is spectacular in the fall.
But I’m still going to post three pictures because the clouds look so cool
You see? I’m not lying.
Scofflaws!
Annnnnd, the picture they make us take for the award.
CTMQ’s Sky’s the Limit Challenge Page
CTMQ’s Towers Page
(For more on the hike up along the 50 mile Shenipsit Trail, Go here.)
[…] was closed due to safety concerns. i knew that, but i also checked the website of another hiking blogger who posted on this spot in june, and he was able to easily use the tower in spite of the closure, so i figured i’d […]