Been in the Adirondack mountains and know what you mean...and it is big. They are contained within the 6.1 million acres of the Adirondack Park and is the largest park and the largest state-level protected area in the contiguous US. Also the largest National Historic Landmark. The park's land area's about the size Yellowstone, Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Glacier and Great Smokey Mountains combined.
And most people think NY is just one big city and New Yorkers are just a bunch of city slickers. Go a few miles north of NYC and it can get pretty lonely.