Every named river in the Adirondack Park — the Hudson, the Moose, the Raquette, the Sacandaga, and the rivers that drain the High Peaks.
The Raquette River is one of the longest and most significant waterways in the Adirondacks — a 146-mile run from its headwaters at Raquette Lake north through the Adirondack lowlands to the St. Lawrence River. In the Raquette Lake region, it's a short connecting flow between Raquette Lake and Forked Lake, more of a passage than a paddling destination, with most traffic headed to or from the lean-tos and campsites on Forked. Upstream, the river drains Blue Mountain Lake and flows through a chain of smaller ponds before reaching Raquette; downstream, it widens and slows through Long Lake and Tupper Lake before picking up speed again in the northern reaches. For paddlers based at Raquette Lake, the river is a launch point — not the destination.
