Stony Clove Notch is a narrow pass, roughly 2,220 feet (677 m) in elevation located in the Town of Hunter in Greene County, New York, deep in the Catskill Mountains. It is traversed by New York State Route 214, although in the past the Ulster and Delaware Railroad went through it as well. The notch divides Hunter and Plateau mountains. There is just enough room for the road, and the steep, soaring slopes of both mountains are some of the Catskills' most striking scenery, with landslides and rocky cliffs visible. It sits at one end of the range of mountains known as the Devil's Path, and early visitors found it a terrifying place to visit. Today it is a popular destination not only for tourists in the region but for outdoor recreationists as well. One of the Catskills' major hiking trails crosses the road near the notch, and ice climbers and snowboarders have lately been attracted to the cliffs and slopes in winter. History Natural origins Stony Clove Notch was created during the end of the last Ice Age, when meltwater that had accumulated in what is now the Schoharie headlands to the north of the notch gradually began eroding its way through the gap between the mountains, eventually becoming the Stony Clove Creek. Human use When the first Europeans were taken through the notch, it was narrow enough that not only was travel through it possible only on foot, those travelers had to go through in single file. As painter and writer Charles Lanman said in the 1840s: Catskill historian Alf Evers suggests that those interested in getting an idea of what Stony Clove Notch was like before the construction of the roads visit nearby Diamond Notch, where it is still possible to put one foot on Southwest Hunter Mountain and another on West Kill Mountain. A few years later, at great expense, the route through the notch was widened to allow enough room for a single wagon by Charles Edwards, a local tanner. Later excavations allowed the Stony Clove and Catskill Mountain Railroad to build a narrow gauge rail line through the gap. It was later upgraded to standard gauge and used until 1940, with a flagstop Stony Clove Notch Railroad Station located nearby. The railbed remains visible in the woods to the east almost all the way to the height of land. The Stoney Clove Turnpike was