Potter Kill Preserve and Pizza - A fun day in Schenectady County

*Sorry if this is a double post for you... somehow reverted to draft status? No idea...

Last Sunday a friend and I decided to go hiking and I finally got a chance to check out the Plotter Kill Preserve in Rotterdam. 

It's such a beautiful place, I need to kick myself for waiting so long to check it out.

We were rewarded with plenty of gorgeous fall colors. The sun came out on the last 10 minutes of our hike (of course) but it was still gorgeous fall day. 

This is apparently an active landslide. It was a mess in this area. 

I borrowed this map from here but added the purple box to indicate the landslide/wash out area. Status as of October 2011.

I suspect that the hurricanes did some damage along this section of the trail. All the other water crossings had bridges but there was none to be found here. Eventually I saw a sign across the water that indicated where we needed to head and we were able to cross without too much trouble. 

I'll hike anywhere with a good waterfall so this hike was certainly rewarding. If you check out the trail map (you can get it here and I'd recommend you bring it along) you'll see that if you park at the Mariaville Rd. entrance you don't have far to go to see the waterfalls. Afterwards there are plenty of trails to check out before swinging by the falls again on a return trail.

There is an alternate trail map here that contains an orange trail not found on the map hosted by Schenectady County. It also links to a great blog all about this Preserve. We took the orange trail so it certainly exists but I'm not sure why it's not featured on the county map. Take at your own risk I suppose.

After our hike, clearly we needed to refuel. We just happened to be near 5th and 50 Pizzeria in Scotia, the winner of the 2011 Tournament of Pizza organized by All Over Albany. We placed an order as we left the trail head and 15 minutes later we arrived to this! 

This was some good pizza and I could certainly taste why they won. If I had to pretend to be a food critic, my only nitpick would be that there was a bit too much sauce for my taste. Just a minor critic to a delicious pizza. I wish I lived a little closer to try some of their specialty pizzas but you can never go wrong sampling an original cheese pizza.

If you are looking to maximize your time out in Schenectady County I don't think you can go wrong with pairing the Plotter Kill Preserve and pizza (alliterations for the win).