R O A D T R I P T O T H E A D I R O N D A C K S
Tuesday, September 21, 2004

Yay! I'm entering Adirondack State Park. Adirondack Park is vast. It's 2.5 times larger than Yellowstone National Park and weighs in at a hefty 6 million acres. The park itself is comprised of a unique patchwork of both public and private land. The park offers a serpentined highway system that snakes its way throughout the park's dominion. The Adirondacks boast 70 native tree species and 55 species of animals. All in all it's a pretty cool place to hang your coonskin hat.

Adirondack. Now that's a funny word. What does it mean? Is it animal, mineral, or vegetable? Nope. It sounds like an Indian word... because it is! It means "Bark Eater." But what does that mean, Bark Eater? Well as I understand it, Adirondack was a term one native Indian tribe used to call another. And it wasn't a term of endearment rather, it was a nasty insult. I'm not sure why it was selected as the park's name. Maybe the name selection committee was composed of all Indians and they pulled a funny on Whitey who took all their land away. Now that would have been a great turn of the tables.