Little Holmes Lake

Randy and I joined up with the Herkimer Alpiners club for a day hike on Sunday. We've gone with this group before over the past year on a few hikes. Anyway, we met at the trail head Sunday morning about 9:45am. The trailhead is between Benson and Caroga Lake NY. It was a large group this time, counting myself and Randy, a total of 9 people. The day started cool and cloudy. Overall, an easy hike along a snow machine trail for part of the distance and an old logging road, mostly overgrown the rest of the way. Besides Little Holmes Lake, which is small but very pretty and containing beaver, we came across two old ruins. The first ruin was the remaining pylons and some walls from an old spindle factory. Apparently owned by the Holmes for whom the Holmes Lake and Little Holmes Lake were named. This ruin was about 1/2 way between the trailhead and the lake. The second ruin was about 1/2 mile past Little Holmes lake. All that is left is what appears to be a fireplace and some stone walls and a huge boiler looking iron thing, laying on its side. It started to rain on the way out but not hard enough to be a problem. Overall, the hike was about 5 miles round trip and a really pleasant way to spend a Sunday.