The Adirondack Lean-To

There is something very Adirondack about the simple open camp pictured here, the lean-to. This structure was used when the Adirondacks were just being discovered and developed, by builders and loggers and hunters. Today, they are used by local landowners who hold barbecues or sleepovers in them. As a child, I begged my parents to let me sleep in our lean-to, but I was usually spooked by something and scurried up the hill back to my warm bedroom. On the occasions that my mother supervised the kids sleeping in the lean-to, she usually woke up alone! The lean-to affords a closeness to nature and yet provides shelter from the elements. It is eminently practical, useful, Adirondack.