Lake George (New York) Lake George (New York) Lake George, nicknamed the "Queen of American Lakes", is a long, narrow oligotrophic lake located at the southeast base of the Adirondack Mountains, in the northeastern portion of the U.S. state of New York. It lies within the upper region of the Great Appalachian Valley and drains all the way northward into Lake Champlain and the St. Lawrence River drainage basin. The lake is situated along the historical natural (Amerindian) path between the valleys of the Hudson and St. Lawrence Rivers, and so lies on the direct land route between Albany, New York and Montreal, Quebec,
Lake Champlain 'door of the country' or 'lake to the country'. The lake is an important eastern gateway to Iroquois Confederacy lands. The lake was named after the French explorer Samuel de Champlain, who encountered it in July 1609. While the ports of Burlington, Vermont, Port Henry, New York, and Plattsburgh, New York today are primarily used by small craft, ferries, and lake cruise ships, they were of substantial commercial and military importance in the 18th and 19th centuries. New France allocated concessions all along lake Champlain to French settlers and built forts to defend the waterways. In colonial times, Lake Champlain