On our second outing on the 4-wheelers we looked into a place called Tug Hill in the Adirondack Region of Upstate NY.

I checked the website here and heard things good and bad about it:
Good - wide trails, very ATV-friendly, ATV's legal on roads.
Bad - DEC and cops everywhere, trails are mostly roads.

Well here's our take on it.

If you check my signature you'll see the ATV's we took there. We needed to find a place where our youngest could go on trails that werent too extreme and were wide enough so she could learn to ride better. (Our yard isnt big enough to ride in.) Tug Hill was the closest place to us (3 hr drive) that offered these things.

We stayed at a place called Tug Hill Campgrounds. (Tugger's) We rented one of 5 small cabins they have at the campground for $75 a night - minimum 2 night stay on weekends so it ended up being about $160 for Sat and Sun night. The campground was great if you have your own camper but we probably wont return to stay in the cabins. I didnt feel it was worth the money. No bathrooms in cabins and the well water in the showers smelled pretty bad.
The atmosphere when we pulled in was nothing like we had seen before. Everyone had ATV's in there campsite. People were riding back and forth to the bathrooms, up to the bar, coming back from a night ride on the trails. Seeing campsites with campfires and lots of people enjoying themselves and 20 ATV's parked next to them....it was exactly what we were hoping for when we made our reservations.

We woke up the next morning, got showered early (had to get in those early or they'd run out of hot water) and as we unloaded the ATV's our nieghbor from across the way offered us some coffee - I have to be honest I never even got his name, all I know is he was wearing a Fire Dept shirt from a city that began with an M and I think he was from somewhere near NYC. He was very cool and owned a sportsman like mine. If he is reading this (maybe he checks these forums?) I want to tell him thanks for being so hospitable and nice.

After the coffee we headed out on the trails. Leaving Tugger's you took a dirt trail through the campsite and out onto a paved road ( we werent very happy with that start ) We drove about 1/4 mile and came to a dirt rd intersection. From there on it was dirt roads and trails - I think we hit one more paved rd for about 50 ft and that was it. We even found some pretty hairy muddy trails. We took all the quads through it - even the little 80cc and when we came back us and our ATV's were covered in mud. We had a great time. It wasnt too fast for the little one and we kept a good pace. We had lunch at a place called the Montague Inn, they were very nice there as well. We mustve put on close to 70 miles total which was alot for us and according to the map we barely scratched the surface of how much there was to offer there.

We didnt see one cop or DEC officer the entire time we were there. We saw people riding two-up and little ones riding 500cc's. (dont know if I agree with that but hey-the kids rode well) We did noticed everyone was registered and had their plate in plain view on the ATV.

Anyway the Tug Hill area is definately an ATV town - everyone has one and it seems if they dont, they are very used to others taking theirs everywhere. We had a great time and will be returning soon. I have posted some pictures of us on the trails there.

 

Glad to hear you had a great time there. Tugg Hill is one place I keep wanting to try out and just never quite get there. I live over in Greece, maybe we can hook up for a ride sometime!

Randy

 

yeah, we just went to tug hill 2 weeks ago-awesome place to put on lots of miles, we did 160 in 2 days. we stayed at timberview lodge and rode all over -the roads are like nothing many people have ever seen, especially with atvs on them, it took us 3 hours to get there from southeast new york-best spent 3 hours in a long time, love those roads to get wide open --talk about another great trip to tug hill!!!!!, we ate at martys and the sportsmen and flat rock inn and montague inn- i was surprised to see a lot of riders there from the same area i am from---saw a guy with a monticello fire dept shirt--was that the guy??

where is hilton?, my family likes to ride too, maybe we could hook up

450kodman

 

Randy, You should really go, I cant wait to return. I haveta have the little one's wheeler checked out, she took it thgouh some pretty deep water and ever since the rear end has been making noise. Maybe we can meet down there, we arent that extreme, and we dont really go that fast so you might get bored riding with us, but there are plenty of trails that you can open yours right up on.

450Kodman, That guy did have a Monticello shirt on! He looked a little like Jim Belushi with glasses. Really nice guy, I hope to see him again and thank him for being so cool to us. Hilton is near Rochester, NY.

 

hi all, i just bought my first jeep, a liberty. im not an atv owner, but someone recently told me about tug hill. im wondering if anyone knows if suv's are "permitted" or driven there? im axious to do some off-roading!

 

Glad you enjoyed it [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img],, I have family that lives up there and just a few weeks ago was my first time riding quads up there,,loved it,,i really got to open up my banshee and my son and daughter loved the rides,,well my son wanted a little more extreme but it was great putting 50 + miles a day on them,, i looked into the campground (tuggers)also and yes i think they are a little high priced but if we go again we will either tent or stay with family. Everyone we met was fantastic up ther,,all offered help and knowledge of where to ride and get you back where you came from,,looks forward to going up again before it snows if i get some time off work,,would like to meet and ride with others also,,enjoy the great area,,it is also known as the snowmobile capital of the world..they get tons of snow in the winter,,my mom has told me stories of how the winters were,,take care and happpy trail riding

 

jelohead, I have never actually ridden there, but I did ride at Happy Valley, just a ways down the road. From what I gather, these places have a lot of dirt/seasonal type roads that are accessible to cars. I know we rode by at least a dozen cars at Happy Valley that one day.

 

DON'T own a ATV................. WE need to talk!!!!!!!!!! [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img][img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img][img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img] All it takes is 1 hour on a good quad, and you will be pulling a quad behind that new jeep! [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img][img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img]

Elimin8r.......GREAT post! Thank you for informing us!

 

I went to Tug Hill Friday, just for the day. We put 95 miles on our machines. Had a great lunch at the Timberview lodge, stopped for "pops" at the Montague. We rode mostly seasonal roads. Wanted to get into some good and muddy trails but didn't find any. I'm sure they are there we just didn't know where to look. Enjoyed the trip but would have loved it if we found a few challenging trails.

 

hey thrash! cut me some slack! i just got the jeep and im jacked to go wheelin in it! a/c, tunes, who needs a quad! LOL so, how bout some directions to tug hill from the south-east, namely dutchess county? jelo