WURTSBORO, NY — In the 19th century, in Sullivan County’s first major business, children and mules dragged boats through the D&H Canal. Those boats went by mule-power and bore families and goods, often coal, transporting their loads from Pennsylvania mines to New York furnaces and coal cookstoves. 

The towpath is now a hiking trail. But if you can’t head straight to the trail—although you should put it on your calendar—you can at least see it from above. Brian Scardefield, director of parks and recreation for Sullivan County, showed a video of the Delaware & Hudson Canal Linear Park at the Thursday, October 8 parks and rec committee meeting. 

Taken using a sheriff’s office drone, the video, written and produced by county director of communications Dan Hust, follows the canal’s towpath as it wends its way through Summitville and Wurtsboro. 

See the video at the county’s Facebook page @sullivancountygov.