The Sunday Drive
September 13, 2026
by Robert Brune
As summer begins to wind down, there comes a brief pause in the northern Catskills. The busy weekends of July and August have passed, while the autumn leaf-peeping season still waits a few weeks down the road. For a little while, Delaware County seems to belong again to its winding roads, quiet fields and the people fortunate enough to wander them without any particular hurry. It seemed the perfect Sunday to bring back the Sunday Drive.
Autumn had begun painting the hills, though summer still held command of the air. Here and there, maples flashed their first patches of scarlet, burgundy and burnt orange against a canopy still overwhelmingly green. Goldenrod filled the roadsides with yellow while late-summer wildflowers stood tall in the fields. And everywhere there was sound. Crickets, katydids, grasshoppers and the lingering calls of cicadas joined in a great late-summer chorus from the grasses and trees, an orchestra of hums, chirps, buzzes and trills. It is a sound so abundant that we scarcely notice it until autumn begins taking the musicians away, one by one, eventually surrendering the countryside to the profound quiet of a Delaware County winter.
Cruising along Route 30 toward the Pepacton Reservoir around 6:30 p.m., the evening remained surprisingly warm and slightly humid. The first stop was the Shavertown Bridge, where the reservoir rested nearly motionless beneath the lowering sun. Hills and tall pines reflected from the glassy surface while small rowboats pulled onto the exposed shoreline waited quietly for another season. The evening began changing almost immediately.
Heading north on County Road 1 toward Upper and Lower Dingle roads, the air suddenly cooled as though someone had quietly turned down the thermostat. These were roads remembered from the Andes Garden Tour earlier in the summer, places deserving another visit when there was time simply to look. The road climbed, dipped and twisted through the hills, disappearing beneath tunnels of trees before unexpectedly opening onto broad views of the surrounding countryside. Early autumn was more evident here. Deep reds appeared among the maples, with occasional splashes of orange and yellow interrupting the summer green.
Near the heights of Lower Dingle Road, the trees gave way to open sky. A bank of clouds slowly approached as the sun sank toward the mountains, catching the evening light in streaks of white, peach and pale orange. Deer began emerging from the woods and into the fields. Two stood nearly motionless in the gathering mist, watching their visitor as intently as they were being watched. At this hour, they are another reminder to travel these back roads slowly.
On the descent toward County Road 1, the landscape changed once more. After the day’s earlier rain, cool air settled into the low country and the river’s breath began spreading across the fields. Wisps of mist gathered into broad white ribbons, slipping between trees and wrapping themselves around the lower slopes. The warmth of afternoon disappeared quickly now. September evenings have begun remembering autumn.
The summer’s generous rainfall remained visible throughout the drive. Streams still carried water, fields remained remarkably green and the Pepacton sat peacefully among the mountains. Along its exposed banks, the evening sun transformed layers of Catskill stone into bands of gold before disappearing behind the ridge. Soon these mountains will undergo their annual transformation, and the quiet roads will once again fill with visitors coming to witness it.
But on this Sunday evening, autumn was not yet the grand spectacle. It was something quieter. A red maple among a thousand green leaves. Goldenrod beside an empty road. Mist gathering beneath the mountains. Two deer standing silently in a field. And somewhere beyond them, the fading orchestra of summer was still playing.
