14. Macedonia Brook State Park

Macedonia Brook State Park encompasses 2,300 acres of forested, mountainous terrane. The park has camping facilities with 80 sites along a scenic stream. The Appalachian Trail is part of the lengthy trail system winding around the park. The climb to the top of two peaks (over 1,400 feet in elevation) is fairly strenuous. Barren, rocky exposures at the crest of the north-trending ridge on the western side of the park provides spectacular views of the Taconic Mountains and the High Catskills along the distant western skyline. The park is a particularly spectacular destination during the period of fall colors.

The bedrock beneath the park consists of foliated pink gneiss and rusty-colored mica schists of Middle Proterozoic age. Like everywhere in the Highlands region, the scars of glacial ice are apparent on the barren hilltop exposures, and glacial erratics occur practically everywhere.

Nearby in the village of Kent of of US Route 7 is the Sloane Stanley Museum. On the grounds of the museum is a large iron furnace used for the smelting magnetite iron ore from veins in the Highlands gneiss particularly from the hillside mines along the Housetonic River valley south of Kent. The Kent Iron Furnace was active in the late nineteenth century. The museum also includes exhibits depicting the operation of the blast furnace and the smelting of pig iron. In addition, the museum provides an extensive collection of tools and implements from the nineteenth century.