No Safety Net, No Internet: Kingfisher Tower
Sometimes it can take decades before you get to do what you thought you should have done when you were young. Hopefully you’ve been able to jump out into the uncharted waters in life, and swim back to the surface. Our online lives can prevent us from thinking that the risk is worth it.
June is the start of the adventure time, and as a kid I couldn’t wait for summer to begin. When I was a teen it meant I got to drive truck, yes, even before I legally allowed to drive. It meant garage band, community marching band, working and actually having some money. But somethings are just remote goals, until you say “life is running out, just run the damn ball. Do it!”.
The world is out there to test you. You have to be in it to take the test. The tower in that photo is Kingfisher Tower on the shores of Otsego Lake near where I grew up in the Catskill Mountains of upstate New York. For decades I’ve wanted to explore it, but being on private property, there have been, well, some constraints. Until June last year when I said screw it, and went on a quest.
At the beginning of each summer I still feel those moments of anticipation that I experienced as a kid. You could say I never grew up and you would be right. Each season brings forth a childhood memory of some type of outdoor adventure. My first thoughts are always of my 2nd grade summer and having to a sweatshirt up to the community pool at 8:15 AM to be early for swimming lessons. The water was freezing. The community pool was outdoor pool with no cover. So if there was rain that night before, it would be super cold plunge, but you got over it soon enough. Home for lunch after the lesson, only to jump back on the bike and ride back to the community pool and spend the rest of afternoon swimming. Pure heaven. But that first splash in that water - I still get chills thinking about.
I grew up in the Catskill Mountains, a dark and cold place even in the summer compared to where I live today. Yet I was lucky that I was untethered and unfettered as a kid, and despite that my recollection is that there was never enough time outside, never enough days without rain to go swimming and while I could lose myself in the days of summer on thunderous rainy days on the porch with comic books, I always thought the clock was ticking because with September looming, it would all end. And back in the 1970s there was so much to do, so many different ways to play army while we explored Steel Brook, or so many different times a spontaneous softball game would break out. Undirected time. And it fueled our imaginations.
Growing up in the Catskills you get a sense of the old ways, as you are surrounded by history. Battles of the American Revolution had been fought all over the region of upstate New York where I grew up, and nearby Cooperstown always seemed mysterious and wonderful to me, being the setting of great adventure books like The Deerslayer and The Last of the Mohicans. Herkimer, where my father was from, had been attacked and decimated by the French and Algonquin tribe before the revolution in the French and Indian War, and there were houses in the region that had been preserved prior to Cooperstown’s founding in 1805. And Cooperstown is home to many stone buildings that have a brooding, somber character that once dusk sets, cause your imagination to ignite. I’ll save those ghost stories for another time. I want to focus on Otsego Lake, which adds even more mystery to the region.
Otsego Lake, or Glimmerglass as they call it, is a small glacial lake whose shores harbor the village of Cooperstown. It’s stunningly beautiful, and as a kid I always wondered what could lurk in those waters. If you’re from the region you no doubt have heard of Champ, the creature that lives in Lake Champlain and is the long lost cousin of Nessie. A 10 year old’s mind could easily place a creature in those crystal waters whose depths reach up to 165 feet. Those mountains that surround the lake will trap fog and mist easily, and that adds the eerie nature of the region. I know this is about summer adventure, but take a look at that vista where the dark gloom springs from those mists, even in winter time. The day I took that photo my son asked me sarcastically “where do they push the sacrifice into the waters to be able to plant in the spring?”.
Route 80 runs along Otsego Lake’s shores, and on foggy days when we would drive by, you caught a glimpse of Kingfisher Tower, somewhat reminiscent of the Urquhart Castle on the shores of Loch Ness Scotland, or at least to my 10 year old mind it did. I always wanted to visit Kingfisher Tower, but because it was on private property owned by the Clark family it was off limits to the public. I have driven by that structure for decades, and always wanted to explore the building and the shore. You see it from the opposing shore but not from the road above since the pine trees and foliage on the side where it’s located is too thick for your eyes to penetrate. In some of these photos you can see that the “drawbridge” is the only thing that connects it when the spring water levels are so high.
Here is a description of the tower’s history:
http://www.dupontcastle.com/castles/kingfish.htm
As excerpted from a September 1876 article in The Freeman's Journal written by Edward Clark, the builder/owner, himself:
" ... Kingfisher Tower is a miniature castle, after the style of the eleventh and twelfth centuries .... The tower is about 20 feet sq. at the base, and at a height of five feet above the water is the main floor. Ten feet above this is the first platform, provided with ramparts and machicolated parapets.
"Above this stage the tower alone rises, eight feet sq., crowned with a pyramidal roof pierced with a window on each side, the walls bearing at one angle a bartizan with conical roof. The walls of the structure are most solidly built of stone from the shores of the Lake, the roofs covered with earthen tiles ... The main windows are brilliant with stained glass, and each bears in the center a heraldic shield. When first built a drawbridge connected the castle with the causeway running to the main land, while a portcullis could be lowered to close the entrance.
"The drawbridge, portcullis and doors were all of solid oak. Stairs lead to the highest platform of the tower, and from the numerous openings and loopholes with which the walls are pierced, a fine panoramic view of the lake and county can be obtained. ... The original design for "Kingfisher Tower" was selected from several drawn by Henry J. Hardenburgh, Esq., architect.
Of note, Mr. Clark was actually criticized for his folly as few people saw, at the time, the benefit of having such an attraction on the Lake. Today however it is a loved landmark which is still owned by the descendants of Edward Clark. Please note the castle is very private, no tours are available, and outside of viewing it from a boat no other attempts to occupy castle should be attempted :)
You’re not supposed to find a way to get to it, it’s off limits.
You see, I grew up in an eerie region of the country. Look at these photos with the fog trapped on the waters. Of course as a red blooded kid I wanted to violate that “no trespassing” ordinance. That was a given. To be at the place of mystery, and that goal staid with me for decades.
Summer of 2008
During the summer of 2008 my sister and her husband took my wife and me out on the boat for a late dinner at a Lakeside eatery and bar called The Blue Mingo, a great place to witness sunset and enjoy the summer evening on the veranda and drink in Lake Otsego in the summer evening. Being young parents and having an evening without our kids, we stayed out late, and hadn't noticed that fog was rolling in. That's pretty common in those hills that trap moisture at night. The trip back took twice as long because we couldn't see more than 10 feet in front of us. On that side of the lake near Blue Mingo is a sand bank, and while marked and easily sighted during the day, we had no chance of seeing it until we would be upon it in the foggy conditions. Despite that, my thoughts kept wandering to Kingfisher. It's a monument to mystery, overlooking the lake. Perhaps under the cover of night you could land there undetected.
That same week we all went out on the boat again, this time with an inner tube tethered to the rear and to my kids' delight, my brother-in-law managed to throw me off into the wake several times as the kids watched dad hang on like some goofy family version of James Bond. We passed by Kingfisher Tower several times, and I asked my sister if we could land.
"No trespassing - it's private," was her answer.
"So? You can't tell me that the locals just don't pull up with beer at night and just hang out."
"No, they chase you off fairly quickly - people just don't do it."
As you can see from the photo, it's just there, waiting to be explored.
June 2023
I broke my ankle skiing in December 2021, and that put things into perspective for me in many ways. Time is running out, and at 58 I'm happy that I'm active, healthy and still adventurous. That injury told me that I had to take advantage of the time that I had left. And while working on our documentary Severed Conscience we realized that what made us feel healthier and that our sense of adventure and wonder in nature was an answer to the time consumed by online life.
My dad had an operation that June, so I needed to be back home to help while he recovered. Once again I was driving Route 80 on a daily basis, and the thought of getting out to the tower kept nagging me. My sister no longer had the boat, and I wasn't about to just pull over on the side of the road and wander in across the property.
But I could kayak out to the area. I asked my sister if she knew if there were signs posted that you could see while approaching the shore from the lake, and there were none.
Sounded like an open invitation to me.
You can see a map of Otsego Lake below, the orange dot is where Kingfisher Tower is located. If you look close enough you can see the change in depth of water, and to the left of the orange dot you'll see a light green line which is the sandbar we worried about. Depending on the time of year and water levels you can stand on the sandbar and the water will be just below your chest. There is a current to the lake, as it is the source of the Susquehanna river and that's indicated by the blue line that crosses the lake perimeter and the bottom. In June it is an active lake with the wake from motor boats causing extra turbulence too, but nothing too bad.
As you can see from the photos it was a perfect morning, the shoreline has all sorts of fallen trees, tiny coves, brilliant orange fungus clinging to logs like candy barnacles. If you have read the Deerslayer by James Fenimore Cooper you may recall the scenes where Hawkeye was attacked from the trees hanging out over the shore, and as I paddled I could imagine many of those scenes quite vividly. It's no wonder that my imagination as a young boy was so inspired by these surroundings, and to be truthful with you I do regret having left the area to live in the suburbs of Detroit. There is a magic to this time of year where I grew up, it's a mixture of the dark nights in the valleys surrounded by mountains and vistas like Lake Otsego. Being the source of the Susquehanna river that flows through New York and Pennsylvania adds a sense of wonder as well. It's easy to picture where skirmishes had been fought during the Revolutionary War, Leatherstocking Country was in the center of a lot of activity.
Picture yourself paddling along the shoreline, and that castle is growing as you near it. That's Lord of the Rings level, and I admittedly regret not taking this journey far earlier, and I wish my kids were with me, they share my sense of adventure.
The surprising thing that I didn't anticipate was how choppy the waters became. As I drew near I spotted a float bobbing in the waters just below the huge wooden door. But after reconnoitering from the kayak I decided I'd pull up on shore and just swim out to the float. When you listen to the video you can hear the racket it made. The water was cool and crystal clear, and after paddling for a half hour I was ready to cool off.
And this is what it looks like when raiding a tower from a watery approach. That sun couldn't be in a better position for the photo. I swam along the walls to the float with my wet bag and hauled my butt onto the float.
For fifty - that’s FIVE ZERO - years I have wanted to do explore Kingfisher Tower. I don't have a bucket list, because I'm just too impulsive and do things on a whim, but I also have opportunities that I have missed that I still feel the urge to take advantage of should they arise. I tend to do these things by myself as well; again, in part because I do things on impulse and also because I am a loner by nature and not a good planner. It's called running the ball - you just go for it.
So as I stood on the float, bobbing up and down, I could see across the waters to the Blue Mingo on the far shore. From this distance it looks like a tiny cabin and in my mind's eye, I think I can place the sandbar that we were so worried about that night years ago. That was before my sister had her child, and I realize that I have quite a few memories stored away from my return visits to Otsego Lake.
You're probably wondering if I set off any alarms, and while I didn't see any cameras and there were definitely no "No Trespassing" signs on the shore, I figured someone would come along sooner or later. A gentleman rode out in a motor boat, I knew that I would have to leave. He was pleasant, and my time as a rogue kid who ignored the rules, delusional as it was, ended. And that was unsurprising to me as well because I'm usually the one who stands out and gets caught. Sometimes blamed for being the instigator too. In some cases I am, in other cases people sense my disregard for the rules. So I paddled away from Kingfisher having fulfilled a silly boyhood dream. It's funny how those ideas are cropping up more often as I get older. Like I say. time is running out, and while I am not afraid of dying, I am afraid of not having lived to the fullest. You can detect that theme in many of the articles and podcasts that I have done, and will continue to do. And it's why I pushed my kids to do the same.
There’s a song by Rush titled Lakeside Park about a pier that the band members frequented in their youth that comes to mind as I’m writing this for you.
Lakeside Park, willows in the breeze
Lakeside Park, so many memories
Laughing rides, midway lights
Shining stars on summer nights
Days of barefoot freedom, racing with the waves
Nights of starlit secrets, crackling driftwood flames
Drinking by the lighthouse, smoking on the pier
Still we saw the magic was fading every year
I have to say that some of that magic can still reside in your heart while you may be unaware of its presence. The trick is to return to regions where you missed an opportunity and recall those memories, as they will inspire you. In this day and age there is so much aligned against us, and as we age we see history repeated, with betrayal and tragedy on a daily basis beamed at us on our social media feeds. But what better thing to feed to yourself than getting out into the beauty that surrounds us? What is implanted from that experieince is far healthier for you than pundits, emotional triggers and endless scrolling. Some call it bounty, some call it the Glory of God in Nature. It is a gift. Take the plunge, it restores more than what you can imagine.