Chimney Bluffs

Rarely does Charlie actually congratulate me on my selection of activities for entertaining out of town guests. But on the way home from Chimney Bluffs, I think he said “nice choice” at least three times!

We made a slight detour to the Pultneyville Deli for sandwiches on the way to Chimney Bluffs State Park, just east of Sodus Bay. Although our car’s GPS told us to keep going, we parked in the first lot we came to (that was almost filled to capacity), which put us at the western end of the Bluff Trail. We were lulled into a false sense of security with a wide, paved path, which fairly quickly turned to a narrow earthen path that climbed high above the rocky beach. 

Our friends Theresa and Ryan, visiting from the city, were as awed as we were, although Theresa’s awe was tempered by her fear of heights. Luckily, in many places there are two parallel paths – one that takes you right to the edge (we could hear another visitor caution someone that every year people die falling over – we weren’t sure if that was just to scare a child into behaving!), and another that stays a bit inland, protected from the edge by the trees. But near the edge is where you have to be for the best view of these majestic “chimneys” of earth.

According to the brochure, Chimney Bluffs are the tip of a drumlin – a hill “made of ‘glacial till,’ a mixture of sand, clay, silt, gravel, cobbles and boulder that were scraped, pulverized, pasted, smeared and dumped on the land beneath the passing mountain of ice.” The bluffs have eroded and continue to erode, in some places 3-5 feet annually.

Once we reached the beach at the eastern end of the Bluffs trail, we sat on a fallen tree to eat our picnic lunch and admire the beautiful colors of the rocky coastline. We returned to our car along the beach, frequently stopping to crane our necks up. Many times the chimneys looked almost two-dimensional against the cloudless blue sky, as if they could easily break off with just a little tap. 

We occasionally had to climb around or over large trunks, the result of the slow march the trees are doing over the fragile precipice.

I have to thank my friend Sue for recommending this amazing park. This is definitely a return-worthy destination, especially in the fall, for the colors, and again in the spring, for spotting migrating birds.