Palisades Hike to Cliffdale Manor Ruins

Today I was able to take my family on a short hiking trip on the Palisades right outside of the city. It was a beautiful day and a bit warm but the summer foliage was able to keep the heat of the sun off of our backs.
First we parked at the Alpine Lookout Parking area:

The trail that we took starts just north of the lookout and the lot:

Opening up into a nice wooded area and trail. Remember to bear left (or just keep straight) as the right side trail leads to a dead end, at least in the summer.

There are a few good look out points along the trail but other than those there are not many views to take in other than woodlands until, as we were pleasantly surprised, you reach the Cliffdale Manor ruins.

This was actually a pretty cool find. We were stumped as to what we had stumbled upon, thinking they may be some old military fort and barracks with perhaps a prison. We found more subterranean passages below the actual basement line (I found out later researching online) which my pictures mostly show.
As it turns out the ruins were a mansion built in 1911, just over a hundred years now. It was the summer home of one of Bergen County's wealthiest,  George Zabriskie. You can find out more about the mansion and it's history on this gentleman's blog (which is were I found my info) http://www.scoutingny.com/?p=3708

In it's hay day the Cliffdale Manor looked like this:

We ended the hike after finding a little trail that ran off the main trail leading to the cliffs of the Palisades here:

We then hiked back another mile to the Alpine lookout taking in some more trail sites.

Happy trails everyone~!!! And remember it's the weekend, get outside!