Hike #1014; Coney Island to Howard Beach

Hike #1014; Coney Island to Howard Beach

2/20/17 Coney Island to Howard Beach with Scott Helbing (Tea Biscuit), Amanda Lance, John Kosar, Corrin Dylnicki, Kellie Kegan, John Pershouse, Brian Coen, Jim "Uncle Soup" Campbell, Captain Soup (David Campbell), David Li, Neil George, Craig Craig, Kelly ?, Cindy Browning, and Serious Sean Dougherty.

The group along Belt Parkway

Our next hike would be a point to point, connecting two of our previous couple into the body of Long Island.
I’d been looking at the area for a good while, and using donated funds to Metrotrails, I purchased the map series for Long Island. After doing the Holiday NYC hike into Brooklyn and along the waterfront a few years back, and then a month prior the section from the Verrazano Narrows to Coney Island, I wanted to keep with it and move on along.
Jack mentioned the mermaid parade in June, but I didn’t want to wait that long to explore more of the area. Two alternatives diverged when we got to the area, one of them along the Jamaica Bay on the trail system, the other on the waterfront and beaches themselves. I could save the latter for the Summer, but the the one along Jamaica Bay looked like a good Winter activity. It would surely be better if there was snow on the ground, as there would be less fighting through any of it.
The weather didn’t cooperate and it turned out it would have been a better straight beach day, as it was quite warm, in the upper sixties. We didn’t get as big a group; a lot of the group was camping at Mohican with Lerch that weekend, which he planned out before I scheduled this.

Nathans!

My plan was to meet at Nathan’s where we’d finished the previous one in the series and continue from there. It is the original Nathan’s restaurant, which I find incredibly impressive; I liked the idea of eating there so much that I felt we had to start and end this hike at that establishment.
Nathan’s is named for it’s founder, Nathan Handwerker, who opened the place in the same building back in 1916. The recipe came from Nathan’s wife, Ida, to whom the “secret recipe” was passed down from her grandmother. Nathan Handwerker had worked for a competitor, but he and his wife left to start their own, using their entire $300 life savings. They undercut the competitor by selling higher quality dogs at five cents each.

Nathan's in the 1940s

Nathan’s had been opened seven days a week, 365 days a year since it’s opening, until Tropical Storm Sandy forced it’s closure for several months. Today, there are over 1,400 Nathan’s stores.

Roller coaster and parachute jump

I got a dog to start off the day, which was pretty tasty. Everyone got all together in front of the store, and when we had just about everyone, we headed out toward the Steeplechase Pier.
The pier takes it’s name for the original, and the Steeplechase Park which operated on Coney Island longer than the others, from 1897 until 1964.
The park was founded by George Tilyou, who’s family owned and operated a Coney Island restaurant. He visited the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago where he first saw the Ferris Wheel, and decided to construct his own as a local attraction. It became the park’s biggest and most famous draw.

Coney Island board walk

This was probably the real beginning of the boardwalk and vacation craze. Coney Island almost suffered the fate of being a place for “undesirables”, as famous city planner Robert Moses was trying to turn it into a low income place.
The area suffered a great deal during the Great Depression, and like other amusement parks, suffered hardships. The park burned almost completely to the ground back in 1907. Many entrepeneurs ould have given up at this time. Tilyou put out a sign reading:

To enquiring friends: I have troubles today that I had not yesterday. I had troubles yesterday which I have not today. On this site will be built a bigger, better, Steeplechase Park. Admission to the burning ruins -- Ten cents.

The park did open bigger and better than ever, and in 1939, Tilyou’s son Frank purchased the Parachute Jump at the close of the World’s Fair, and erected it at the park.

Steeplechase entrance

We walked along the board walk for a little bit when we got to it, but then soon headed out to the beach. Tea Biscuit had his dog, Tinkerbell, off leash for a bit, and she kept running up and disturbing people laying on the sand and such. Kind of funny, but a good thing we didn’t have any further problems!

I was wearing my blue blazer and a butterfly collar shirt, looking out of the ordinary of course. It was pretty warm, and I told myself I would try to wear the suit for as long as I could, but brought a pair of shorts and a tee shirt with me. I figured I wouldn’t be able to handle keeping that on all day, but I somehow managed!
We continued along the beach front heading to the east fo ra while. The old Parachute Jump was in view most the time as we walked, a constant reminder that we were on the famous Coney Island.
There were a good amount of people on the beach, but less as we continued to the east.

Historic image of Steeplechase

We got to the end, and then it was houses and such. Some were still battered from past storms. There was no way over to the waterfront even though maps read “esplanade”.

Beach at Coney Island

We made our way inland a bit, and I climbed over a bit of chain link fence. Just then, everyone else realized there was a gate in the fence they could just wal through. It’s just like me to do something the difficult way when there’s a much easier alternative.
We emerged onto a small development street and followed it north to Brighton Beach Ave, then turned right on Corbin Way, and left on Oriental Blvd.
While walking the road section, we came across a rather funny sign reading that people would be towed for parking there for “even five minutes”. They must have a tow truck sitting on call somewhere! Quite funny.

We continued along the road until we got to Ocean Ave with the idea that we’d use it to get into Manhattan Beach Park, but all entrances were closed. We could easily have scaled the fences, but there were employees within the park, as well as an NYPD contact station. We’d be obviously doing wrong right within their sight, so we went on back to the main road and went out via the main entrance.
We got into the park and had a short break by the restrooms before moving on to the east. We followed a walkway up from the sort of arc shaped beach, and then exited the Manhattan Beach area through a field pathway to the east.

Manhattan Beach view

We tried walking down the first road on the other side, but a security guy told us there was no access to the waterfront through there. It was some sort of hospital place. We headed back out the way we came, and then down the street a bit to the entrance to Kingsborough Community College. Again, another guard came out and told us we were not allowed to walk through there, even though they have a very nice section of waterfront. He was a very angry looking fat man. We just laughed and said ok, then headed up Oxford Street until we got to Shore Blvd.

Bridge over Sheepshead Bay

There was a good paved walkway along Shore, along the south side of Sheepshead Bay, which is sort of the east side of the Coney Creek, which we followed on the previous hike. We walked for a bit and came to a very nice blue foot bridge that crossed the entire little bay. We headed across to the north side, and then turned right following the waterfront to the east along Emmons Ave.
Tea Biscuit and Uncle Soup went to use a restroom, and we continued east to Norstrand Ave, where we made a right turn to head north for a bit. It’s possible to stay on the waterfront here, but I wanted to check out some other parks, because we would be doing that waterfront bit ahead on the next hike out of Coney Island, and it’s better not to repeat as much.

Wheelie!

Tea Biscuit and Uncle Soup met back up at the intersection with Shore Parkway, and we took a break under the Belt Parkway bridge and had a few drinks. We then continued north to Avenue Z where we paused to get more sustenance at a local store. While there, a showoff on a motor bike popped a wheelie and rode it out down Avenue Z, but only after Uncle Soup egged him on to do it!
Some of the group pissed off one of the store owners by going in and using their restroom without asking, which Tea Biscuit argued had no sign saying not to, and that they were paying customers.
We went left on Batchelder Street, then right when we got to Avenue X. That turned to an angle and became Allen Ave, which we followed to Gerritsen Ave. We headed down the road and stopped for our lunch break when we got to Victoria Pizzeria. There was The Gather Inn Again next door, and a bagel place as well which gave people some lunch options.
The owner of the pizza place told me he had great burgers, so I went with that. Kellie and Neil went over to the Gather Inn, and some went to the bagel place for drinks. At this time, Captain Soup realized he’d lost his phone, and then remembered he’d sat it in the store where they’d gotten mad at them. Tea Biscuit accompanied him back to get it.

Marine Park on Shell Bank Creek

The rest of us continued on to the south on Gerritsen for just a bit, except Kelly who was planning on leaving early. She decided this would be her cut out point. Serious Sean and Cindy met up with us at this point, and Cindy brougth brownies, which were absolutely delicious. We ended up carrying the plate of them as we turned left into Marine Park.
The guy at the Gather Inn told us there was a lot of old cars out on the salt marshes, so we figured this would be cool.

Marine Park truck

Sure enough, we got across the ball field and skate park areas, then into the salt marshes to the waterfront of the Shell Bank Creek, and there was a truck. We could see another just to the south of us as well. Sean and I climbed up on the first one, as he strummed the guitar. The first section of beach found him playing as I sang “Sea of Love”, originally by Phil Phillips, and covered by Robert Plant’s post Zeppelin project, the Honey Drippers.

Sumacs on the salt marsh

We continued on both the beach, and then on paths that were just inside the salt marsh heading to the north parallel with the waterway. Tea Biscuit and Captain Soup were at the Nature Center to the north, The Salt Marsh Nature Center. We came out to a wider developed path on Avenue U and headed to the east to get there. From that point, another trail headed south into more of Marine Park, this time with some more developed walkways. It was a lot more heavily used in this area with lots of families and such.
There were some really nice views in this area following the opposite side of the Shell Bank Creek.

Marine Park

We could see one of the lift bridges out to the barrier islands from the outlook over the Jamaica Bay. One a hike soon, we’ll cross that.
A lot of people tend to think that Long Island is a barrier island. On a big enough map, it might look like it would be, but Long Island has barrier islands around it, and it is actually itself a terminal moraine left over from the Wisconsin Glacier, more similar geologically to Staten Island, with more hills and such. It’s one of the reasons I have so much interest in hiking the length of Staten Island as a series.

View at Marine Park

We skirted the outside of what was probably once a land fill. It took us then out to an area with ball fields, and we emerged from the park near the corner of Avenue U and 38th Street. We turned right on 38th, and then left on Avenue V to Flatbush Ave.
I had told Kellie and Cindy earlier that it looked like we had good greenway out along Belt Parkway, but that in this area it went from “good good good good good good” to “suck suck suck suck suck suck suck suck suck” and back to “good good good good good”. It turned out more to be the “suck” version toward the end.
At our last break before there, a car full of people stopped at the traffic light and chatted with us. I don’t even remember what I said, but they must have thought we were nuts.
We soon found our way onto paved path, and crossed over the highway to the south side of Belt Parkway to head east. There was a trail into the wooded area on the south side, and I didn’t think we’d find a way through if we followed that, but unfortunately we could have done that and made for a better walk.
We followed Belt Parkway’s adjacent paved pathway, behind a fence much fo the way, out to a draw bridge over an estuary known as the Mill Branch.

View from Mill Branch draw bridge

The view was pretty cool from here, and a new bridge was under construction next to the old lift one. I suppose the next time we get out there maybe this bridge will be gone. It’s not likely that we will ever try to walk the Belt Parkway section again. It ended up being the worth part of the entire hike, really more like a glorified sidewalk than a trail greenway like the maps make it out to be. It might have been better if we weren’t so tired and so close to the end of the hike. I’m glad we did it to see the views along the way, but it’s nothing I would ever repeat on foot.

Bridge replacement on Belt Parkway

The group was getting segmented here. Some were more tired than others. We regrouped on the other side of the bride at the Jamaica Bay riding center, an equestrian facility. Stephen Argentina had told me about this place, and he and Corrin had gone there a while back. It was ironic that he was talking so much about the place, and this was Corrin’s first long hike with us in way over a year.
We continued from this point along a boring stretch of Belt Parkway until it opened up again to a view over the wider section of the Jamaica Bay, all part of Gateway National Recreation Area (the same as Sandy Hook in NJ).
Some of the monotony was broken up by Sean playing some amazing stuff. John requested several different songs, and Sean was able to pick them out surprisingly well. We had snippets of Jethro Tull, Chicago, Elton John, and more.

Belt Parkway

Some of those sections were actually really nice. I checked the gps on my phone to reveal that it was only less than five miles back to the cars, which put me a bit more at ease. Still, the hard paved surface of the Belt Parkway path was murder on the joints, especially the knees.
We regrouped again when we got to the bridge over the Paerdegat Basin, another estuary inlet. We got our group photo there and continued on along the Belt Parkway across the bridge. Beyond, there were not really any more views of the waterfront except for one more stop at a pier called Carnasie. We stopped there to try to use the restrooms, which were closed. The porta johns there were probably the worst I have ever seen, with feces all over the place. I checked the service numbers inside, and they had not been seen to since November. The shit was literally up to the top inside the bowls.

Fugheddaboudit

The restroom stop literally did nothing for the morale at this point. We moved on from there along the path, and soon left Brooklyn at one of the next estuary crossings. I don’t remember which one, but there was both the Fresh Creek and Hendrix Creek. Between these two, there was a former land fill area that had a proposal for some kind of park on it. The sign leaving Brooklyn humorously read “Fuhgeddaboudit”. The final estuary, closer to Howard Beach, was Spring Creek. It think this was my first time ever hiking in Queens, though this particular time was nothing really special. We just followed Belt Parkway east to the first place we could exit.
I found a dumb hat and other stuff sitting along the right side of the path, and decided to put it on. It was a bright white and zebra striped black. With my suit, and with Sean wearing his santa hat (simply because he forgot to on the holiday NYC hike), we must have looked nuts.
We were able to remain on the pathway until we got to the exit before Cross Bay Blvd. From there, we had to exit to the road. We discussed two potential train stations for return, one of them being Howard Beach and JFK Airport, and the other Aqueduct. We decided for the latter as it was like a tenth of a mile shorter and every bit matters. We paralleled Nassau Expressway and then turned left on Cohansy Street over the highway.

Upright guitar!

We got to a spot where we could get to the tracks, but there was no place to buy a Metro Card! I feared the worst here. We went down from the platform and left David Li there, who could get his train because he had his card and could go.
We took the underpass to the other side, headed south, and fortunately found another entrance with cards. We nearly had a few disasters trying to get in, but we made it all to the platform and onto the train.
The commute back was far more complicated than I’d thought it would be as well. There were like three switches of trains we had to do. Part of me was annoyed and tired, but the other part immensely amused by the silliness of it all. I kept putting the silly hat I’d found on different members of the group as we rode the trains heading back. The waits at each station were not very long at all for the most part.
Sean refrained from playing too loudly for a bit, because some of those subway folk don’t appreciate it, but before we got to Coney Island, he saw a sign for “Brighton Beach”, and could not resist busting into “Pinball Wizard” by The Who from “Tommy”. We finished our train ride with a nice little singalong.

Tea Biscuit dancing with the hat

We exited the train and station right about where we were parked, and went right back into Nathan’s for round two. I was getting really hungry, and I’d also run out of water. I got a giant container of iced tea. It wasn’t even a “large”, and it was giant. I let my friends sample it, and a few agreed it was so good that they too had to get some of it. Quite delicous.
I scarfed down my dog, and we relaxed for a time before the long drive home. Tea Biscuit danced around all silly in the place, quite happily despite the fact that we were going to be back so late, and his normal bed time is around nine due to work.
It certainly would have been a better hike if it were a cool winter day, when such a route was taken more out of a practical necessity.

The group

So farm, 2017 has had a long list of absolutely amazing hikes. This was actually a good one up until the Belt Parkway part, and even that had it’s positive points here and there.
We have a great schedule planned throughout the year, and as long as things work in my favor with my work, this year will only continue to get better, and we have a list of beach hikes ready to go on Long Island for the Summer.