Leaning in
The work chant echoed from the hillside and across Lake Colden as a line of men leaned on a rope strung through a treetop pulley.
“Oy! … Oy! … Oy! … Oy!”
It was the sound of an enthusiastic band of volunteers—outdoorspeople who joke that they toil weekends in the woods because they’re “dumber’n a bag of hammers”—pulling the iconic Adirondack lean-to into the future.
That’s something that the crew from Lean-2Rescue does both literally (pulling the Beaver Point Lean-to log-by-log to restore it in a state-approved new location away from the water) and figuratively (salvaging historic structures that would otherwise rot and return to the forest).
It’s a grueling job that some of them say they would never do for pay, but would go out of their way to do for love. It’s also not without controversy, as people with long traditions of staying in particular lean-tos get upset when a crew moves it on the order of state environmental officials.
Along with the Adirondack 46ers and the state, these volunteers this spring
