Walk In The Footsteps Of Dinosaurs On This Short And Easy Hiking Trail In New York

Although the Empire State may not be the first place that comes to mind when you think of the Jurassic or Triassic periods, you may be surprised to learn that there were dinosaurs here - and not in the Museum of Natural History - and we have the tracks to prove it. That's right, scientists discovered dinosaur tracks in New York, right along the Hudson River, and you can walk an easy hiking trail in the very place where the tracks were found.

Rockland County's Nyack Beach State Park is a bit of a hidden gem in the Empire State.

Those who visit it are taken aback by how peaceful and, amazingly, uncrowded this park is.

There are many trails in the park, most of them wooded and relatively flat, so you don't have to worry about elevation or obstacles when you hike here.

Visitors marvel at the stunning vistas across, as well as up and down, the Hudson River

But there's something special about this part of the river's gorge.

In the Palisades region, the river has carved its way deep into the bedrock, exposing hundreds of feet - and millions of years - of history.

The cliffs and unusual rock formations in this area have yielded fossils and other clues to New York's natural history in a state that is not particularly known for having a rich fossil record.

It was among these unusual rocks in the early 1970s that two graduate students stumbled upon a momentous find.

Dinosaur tracks! They had been pressed into mud that, over eons, had hardened into stone. The slab containing the tracks is now housed at The New York State Museum in Albany, where you can visit it.

But you can also walk along the Hudson at Nyack Beach State Park, knowing that you're walking in the footsteps of dinosaurs, as you look for your own clues to our state's ancient history.

Maybe you'll stumble across a set of dinosaur tracks in New York! To learn more about The New York State Museum and its collection, visit the museum's website. The Nyack Beach State Park website has downloadable maps and other information you may need before visiting.

Although New York, itself, does not have a robust fossil record, it happens to be home to the world's largest collection of dinosaur fossils. You can find it in Manhattan at the American Museum of Natural History. If you want to feed your inner paleontologist, there's also a fossil park near Buffalo where you can dig your own fossils.

Have you visited any of these sites or museums? Let us know in the comments!