Unnamed St. John's Lake Ledges(Wilcox Lake Wild Forest-Adirondacks)

Headed north after work to do a small bushwhack hike to some unnamed ledges near Harrisburg Lake in the Wilcox Lake Wild Forest on a beautiful spring day.  The peaks I was climbing have no official name, but are located very close to St. John's Lake, hence the name.  Parked in a large, unmarked parking lot off Harrisburg Road, where a sliver of state land comes down to meet the road and provides access to the mountains.  You have to look carefully to find the start of the trail, but it leaves the corner of the parking lot at an elevation of 1575 feet and heads north.

The trail is sporadically marked and tough to follow in spots, but does offer a nice footbridge crossing over a pretty brook.

The trail abruptly ends where the state boundary line opens up just over 1/3 of a mile in.  I then made my way NW up through an open hardwood forest when the black flies began to swarm.  Horrible little demons!  They were just terrible for the next hour or so and almost made me turn back.  They weren't really biting, however, just swarming, so was still able to enjoy a very nice ascent.

As I closed in on the summit, I swung around to the west ledges, which were boulder filled and steep.  

There are several okay views along the way, but persistence pays off, as a sprawling area of open ledges just below the summit offer spectacular views.  Harrisburg Lake and many of the peaks that make up the western part of the Wilcox Lake Wild Forest can be seen to the west/ SW.

 A fun scramble between ledges.

 From another open ledge, I enjoyed this zoom view down to Harrisburg Lake to the SW.

 To the west, this zoom view takes in a multitude of peaks.

There are multiple photo ops from the numerous open ledges, each with a unique perspective down on Harrisburg Lake and its surrounding mountains.  A truly amazing spot...partially ruined by swarming black flies.

 The area of open ledges continues almost all the way up to the summit.

 The wooded, nondescript 2528 foot summit sits less than a 1/10 mile away from the ledges.

Just off the summit, I found screened views to the east in a bit of a clearing, but nothing compared to the the west ledges.

A nice and easy descent west brought me down into the col between the two peaks.  Just above this spot, on the next peak, is an old woods road, that is now a pretty good unmarked foot trail but didn't go in the direction I needed so I crossed it and continued on.

Unfortunately, as soon as I began to ascend, I hit a wall of spruce.  I was actually a bit shocked to see just how much spruce was on this particular peak....probably the most I have seen on any southern Adirondack peak, and especially below 2500 feet.

I fought my way through the spruce, picking up rough game paths along the way to help out.  Staying below the summit ridge, where the open rock was  I soon hit the first of two open ledge views at about 2400 feet, with a perfectly framed look down at Harrisburg Lake.

The second ledge is just a few yards away(although you'll have to fight through spruce to get there).  This ledge is a bit more open and at a slightly different angle, with Harrisburg Lake again front and center.

After enjoying the ledge views, I carefully made my way down through the scratchy spruce to the SW, circling back under the steep ledges from below.  They look even more impressive from below!

Thankfully the bugs eased up the second half of the hike so I could actually enjoy myself.  Looks like the bug net will be coming every hike from now on, just in case.  Hiked 4.3 miles RT with 1400 feet of total ascent.
Today's route below.  Red=Ascent   Blue=Descent