Geocaching in Central New York

Often you hear geocachers complain about parking lot LPCs and about how they prefer the nice walks in scenic woods.

So, what ARE the "nice hike" caches in the area?

I'll start: Hiking around Great Bear up between Phoenix and Fulton is a nice area, particularly through the woods to the north of the Ornament cache.

Too true.  Night Owl is awesome.

I'll put a plug in for Winona State Forest, to the north end of the CNY zone, near Sandy Creek.  This holds Ride Sally Ride, Sirius' Cache, and a six-stage 5/5 multi I've heard is pretty cool.  There ought to be many more.

Highland Forest trails, Letchworth State Park trails, Glimmerglass State Park trails, Geo golf course at Tuller Hill State forest which is part of the FLT system, Sterling Nature Center trails and my most recent favorite was the 5/5 at Winoa State Forest by SD. :) ;D

Excellent! The only suggestion I have done thus far is Letchworth, so my to-do list is already looking good! Who else has some good ones?

Beaver Lake Nature Center, Green lakes SP, Clark Reservation, Heiberg Forest, Labrador Hollow Unique area which has Tinker Falls,the pond board walk, FLT to Spruce Pond and Morgan Hill(glider overlook) all a short distance from Syracuse.

Travel north to Selkirk SP, Thompson park in Watertown and South to Lime Hollow Nature center near Cortland.

All have nice trails to hike with smileys  :) to find.

Bald Mtn hike outside Old Forge.   Great for kids!!  Short about a mile, cache near top!

For beginners, I would recommend Clark Reservation. The setting is perfect and although there are ups and downs, they aren't so steep that you spend the next half hour sucking wind.  Bear Swamp has some great caching trails-going in one directions grabbing "isn't it grands" and returning on the trail with the "glimpses" caches, with a few extras here and there, was around 7 miles by the end of the day.  Of course my new favorite hike is at Pratt's Falls, but I may be prejudiced.

My wife and I hiked the South Rim Trail at Watkins Glen State Park this past summer. There were a few caches along the way. Probably not considered CNY but part of the FLT system.

for cachers that are looking for a good hike try the Beaver Creek open, an 18 hole oops I mean cache loop in the Beaver Creek State Forest located in Brookfield New York. some easy hikes and a bit of history along  a great area to "Go Take a Hike" 

One of our favorite places we have cached is Oxbow Falls park.  There are 3 caches in the park.  It is also a frisbee disc course.  The trails are great and so is the scenery.

Ah yes, one of my favorite caches is there! Clark Reservation is very pretty and has 4-5 caches.  You can go the long way around or just do the caches and loop back avoiding a big change in elevation.

Another nice spot and a day of fun is Glimmerglass State Park with 19 smileys to get. Nice trails to hike. Check it out.  :D :D