Although it is signed as an east–west route, it heads generally southwestward at first, following the two-lane Warners Lake Road through a forested yet populated area just south of NY 157.

The homes and forests give way to open fields soon afterward, and the rolling terrain follows NY 157A into the adjacent town of Berne.

Here, the number of homes alongside the highway rises as it approaches Warner Lake, a small waterbody northwest of the hamlet of East Berne.

The waterbody that gives the community its name is due north of the junction, and Thompson's Lake State Park is a short distance to the northwest along NY 157.

At Thompson's Lake, the route proceeded northeastward onto modern NY 157 and continued toward Albany.