Esopus Creek is a 65.4-mile-long (105.3 km) tributary of the Hudson River that drains the east-central Catskill Mountains in the U.S. state of New York. From its source at Winnisook Lake on the slopes of Slide Mountain, the Catskills' highest peak, it flows across Ulster County to the Hudson at Saugerties. Many tributaries extend its watershed into neighboring Greene County and a small portion of Delaware County. Midway along its length, it is impounded at Olive Bridge to create Ashokan Reservoir, the first of several built in the Catskills as part of New York City's water supply system. Its own flow is supplemented 13 miles (21 km) above the reservoir by the Shandaken Tunnel, which carries water from the city's Schoharie Reservoir into the creek.
Anglers in the Esopus near Phoenicia, with Mount Tremper in the background, 2020
Source of the Esopus at the outflow of Winnisook Lake
Otter Falls
The Esopus above Shandaken
The Catskill Mountains, also known as the Catskills, are a physiographic province and subrange of the larger Appalachian Mountains, located in southeastern New York. As a cultural and geographic region, the Catskills are generally defined as those areas close to or within the borders of the Catskill Park, a 700,000-acre (2,800 km2) forest preserve protected from many forms of development under New York state law.
Slide Mountain and nearby peaks as seen from Twin Mountain in the northern Catskills
Views of the Catskills from the Hudson like this led to the name "Blue Mountains" for a time.
Free-floating tubers on Esopus Creek
Kaaterskill Falls on Spruce Creek near Palenville, New York. One of the higher falls in New York. Two separate falls total 260 ft (79 m).
