Pining For The Fjords – This Apparatus Must Be Unearthed

The Sullivan County Catskills are no longer the prime vacation spot they were for most of the last hundred years. Once known as the Borscht Belt and the Jewish Alps, the region was the birthplace of stand-up comedy and the ski lift, and once known for bumper to bumper traffic all the way from Brooklyn to the mountains. Air travel, air conditioning and middle-class Jewish families moving to the suburbs brought hard times to the Catskills, and resorts started closing through the 80s and 90s until by 1998 only two remained, out of nearly 100 abandoned and destroyed.

The Pines was one of the last survivors, falling into bankruptcy just before the summer of 1998, and shuttered once and for all in 2005 after a few attempts at reopening. Commonly considered the third-largest and third-most luxurious (after Grossinger’s and the Concord), the Pines included not only a massive resort hotel, but also a golf course and ski mountain on adjoining land, none of which are still in use. Entry to the abandoned resort is remarkably straightforward, as long as you can climb a fence. Otherwise, it takes quite a bit of searching for one of the few holes.

Vandalism and nature have done far more to this resort in 10 years, than Grossinger’s suffered in 25. A botched partial demolition, which struck asbestos and quickly ran out of money, did not help the cause.

I think this is one remaining wall of the building that was once the indoor swimming pool

Any ideas? I think it may have been an amphitheatre, although the rows are extremely wide for that

An Army cot. First, why was this in a hotel? Second, what is wrong with me that I actually kind of miss these things from my Massawepie days?

There is no logic to the setup of the Pines. Rooms were just stuck together anywhere they would fit, and the numbers reflect this, being more or less chronological. The newest rooms were in the worst condition by far, both from being the last ones used, and of well inferior quality.