Hike #1143; Point Mountain, Penwell, and Changewater

Hike #1143; Point Mountain, Penwell, and Changewater

7/17/18 Point Mountain, Penwell, and Changewater with Justin Gurbisz, Jessica Anne, and Kellie Kegan

This next hike would be one of those things I want to try to do at least once ever Summer: a group hike that passes by the Penwell Rope Swing and Point Mountain.

Yum yums

I had, after all, been hiking this area my entire life. Part of this one would be part of the first ever hike I ever took at the age of 3 with my grandfather.
I made the meeting point the Changewater Trestle site, where the old graphite mill used to stand. From there, we would shuttle the short distance to my grandfather’s house where we could start our trip. My grandfather is always welcoming and happy to see everyone.
This time, he was gearing up for a speaking engagement at the Lebanon Township Park for the historical society, and so he told us some of the stories of that before we started.

Garish Farm, Mountain Top Road

The first part of the hike was to simply follow Mountain Top Road to Point Mountain South, the old Wattles Fields, where the white blazed trail goes out to the rest of Point Mountain.
The road is just beautiful for walking. It goes by the old Addicks fruit orchards, and then by Jay Garish’s farm. Garish was a rich hat importer that got probably lyme disease years ago when they didn’t know what it was, and it crippled him. Despite his being limited in a wheel chair, with use of only one hand, Garish donated a lot of money and items to charitable causes and was a good friend to my grandfather.

Clouds over the Wattles fields.

We walked the road, and I pointed out things from my youth to everyone. I actually started walking this route earlier than I did with my grandfather, thought not as far. My grandmother would bring me out picking berries or for walks on the road when I was very little. I have vague memories of being on these roads in a stroller.
We continued past the Garish Farm, and then turned to the right into Point Mountain south. One of my trail marker posts I had put in in 2008 or 9 was still standing to show the trail head.

Wattles fields

The trail led out across the fields, which are no longer cultivated. A lot of them are really going. Small trees are coming through, and soon they’ll be woods again, but probably with a lot of invasive species.
The wetland restoration project in the corner of the field I had worked on with Don Donnelly was looking good, and the trail had very recently been rerouted a bit up hill from it, because it was getting too mucky to get a mower through it. We followed the path to the end of the field and turned right. It was still mowed very well all the way to the east side of the field, but then the trail got bad.

Point Mountain South

Immediately, the trail got horribly overgrown. Multi Flora Rose are growing so badly across, it’s miserable to try to get through. This was the worst I had ever seen this trail. A little bit further down, there was a large tree blocking the way.
I wanted to point out to everyone where the old spring house was, but I couldn’t even see it, and I was concentrating too much on fighting through without getting all torn up.
It didn’t help matters that the trail was marked horribly. I had done it correctly, but when new blazes were put up, they were not done with turns to them.

Point Mountain South

Someone at Hunterdon has been stubborn about marking trails what I consider to be the wrong way for too long. Most everywhere has trails marked with turn blazes, and I know for a fact that some of the rangers have agreed with me that they should be done that way. I know some other people (not necessarily rangers) that were totally averse to marking trails that way, and are probably still doing it the way they always had. At this point, the white trail that connects Point Mountain main section and south section is pretty much closed.

Point Mountain view

We made our way to where the white trail meets the yellow trail and turned to the left. This part was much clearer and easier to follow, though it needs some work. We followed the yellow trail out to Point Mountain Road and crossed directly. From there, the yellow paint blazes I had put up a decade ago are still holding on strong. Someone had stolen the yellow plastic tags from the trees for that entire length (I think some of the rangers thought I was behind it, but I had nothing to do with it). People tend to take trail markers down as souvenirs of the trails they’d done.

Point Mountain view

We continued on the yellow trail up to the main overlook, where we took a nice break. It was clear and nice at this time, and there weren’t too many people around.
From here, we made our way back down slightly and to the orange blazed Ridge Trail. This took us up hill, and I showed everyone the “Dinosaur Footprint”, a weird thing in the rock that resembles such a print.

Point Mountain view

We continued walking the ridge, and we paused again when we got to the highest point, “The Point” itself, at 934 feet above sea level.
We continued from here, as the trail dipped down along a stone row, climbed back to the ridge, then dipped back down again to cross a small brook. Just beyond, it turned left on an old woods road that continues into the property of Camp Bernie. There’s a spring on the right side there, which I’ve been drinking form my entire life. I paused and took a drink from it before we continued further down hill.

Dinosaur footprint

We continued down the woods road, and just before we reached the Rosan fields, we turned right on the white blazed trail which heads out toward Penwell. It took us over the height of land above the farm fields, and then descended down to the Beattys Brook.

SCA trail steps on Ridge Trail

We crossed Beatty Brook on stepping stones, and I pointed out the old foundation of where a mill used to stand. We followed the trail up stream a bit, then turned to the left to cross Penwell Road. Beyond, the trail was always pretty tough to follow.
This was a trail I helped to lay out with Hunterdon County, but no one had been maintaining it for a long time. It had trees down over it and such. This time, I was happy to see that at least this one had been rather recently cleared and remarked so that the blazes were understandable.

Beatty Brook crossing

The hill on this side would be the toughest climb of the entire hike. We had short climbs up Point Mountain, and then up from the brook near Camp Bernie, but this would be much higher. Kellie was afraid she was too slow, but in reality those of us ahead were just being super fast. She was getting over a leg injury, but handled this hike great, especially considering this was her first real night hike. We managed to get to the top rather quickly, and sections of the trail had been slightly rerouted to deal with some of the multiple blow downs.

Fields near Behr's farm

At the top, the white trail turned to the left. We continued straight on a red blazed trail through woods, and passed through the opening in a giant stone row. From there, we turned right on the blue blazed trail which led out from the height of the land to near a property corner, then descended over some rocks in what proved to be the most confusing part of this hike. It really needs some more blazing out there.
We found the trail soon, and it picked up an old logging road grade to descend back toward the white trail again. We followed this down to the base of the Musconetcong Mountain.
In this area, the white trail used to parallel a former through road known as Hermit’s Lane. Now, this trail has not been maintained, and it appeared to be closed in badly.
So, we ended up covering a bit of trail that I helped to lay out, but may have never totally utilized for my hikes before. We continued straight out to the next farm field, and then turned to the right to skirt it heading north.
I remember using a farm lane out here on one of the Winter hikes, but we cut to the right over a wall to end up in the Point Mountain North parking lot that time. This time, we simply came out at the farm access below the lot, where Hermit’s Lane came out.

Wydner Farm Bridge

We left the farm land and turned left on Old Turnpike Road, formerly the route of the Easton-Morristown Turnpike. This took us across the Musconetcong River over the Wydner Farm Bridge, an historic stone arch.
We turned left on Rt 57 on the other side, and then continued along until we got to the old Penwell Road turn off, also part of the old road route. We followed the old road down and to the rope swings at Penwell, which were still in great shape. I went off the thing first, always a fun time, and then swam up stream against the current for some extra exercise. Both Jess and Kellie went off the thing, but I don’t think Justin wanted to this time (we once got him to do it on a cold September night).
We continued from here along the old road out to Penwell Road. We turned left and crossed the Musconetcong once again, but walked on the adjacent gas line bridge.
We continued up Penwell Road to the right turn to Point Mountain’s Rosen field access. Just as we were getting there, I saw head lights coming down. I had everyone nonchalantly turn around and act like we weren’t going that way.
Once the car was out of that lot, we headed up the dark driveway to the lot, and continued on the blue blazed trail through the fields heading west.
This was a really nice section, and the temperature was perfect. We headed from the end of the fields back down to the Musconetcong, and started following it to the west. I got way ahead, because I can see pretty well in the dark, but then everyone else was pretty far behind. I went back to check on them, and things were good.
We headed on to where the blue trail split, and we took the right. I went for one more dip in the river after this, but no one else wanted to go in.
We made our way out to the Point Mountain Bridge, and I pointed out where the old mill used to be, as well as the dam over the river.

Historic image of Pidcock-Skinner Grist Mill

The mill was the Pidcock-Skinner Grist Mill, and even after it deteriorated, the foundation was bulldozed in, at some time just before it had become a park.

Site of Pidock Skinner grist mill from my hike

The old mill was built in 1800 by Stephen Van Atta. Today, only the one abutment to the dam is really recognizable, and only if you’re looking very hard for it.

Historic image

The “Point Mill” was run by George Painter by 1810, and was then owned by a Mr. Clark of Belvidere. Pidcock & Skinner may have been the last owners of the mill while working.

Van Atta Mill, later Pidcock Skinner Mill, Point Mountain

We made our wayu out to the road, and it had started to rain. My friend and co-worker Darryl Schmidt lives right along the route I was planning to hike, and he told us that if we saw his outside light on and heard No Doupt playing, to come on up and visit.

The old mill dam

Darryl called me asking where we were, and then said “I’m coming out to find you ass holes!” because it started pouring heavily. While we appreciated it, I didn’t want to “cheat” and not do the hike, so we all walked to his place, and he passed out towarls to everyone.
The storm passed, and we didn’t get any more rain.
We all hung out and did shots with Darryl, and he told everyone entertaining stories of the past. Darryl and my father were once close friends, and so he’s known my family forever.

At Darryl's house

We hung out for a while, and Darryl offered up some drinks.
Back when my schedule first got wacky, Darryl worked his schedule out so that he covered all of my Sundays, and I did all of his Saturdays. It made for screwy weekends and scheduling, but it kept me able to do my hikes every weekend without doing night trips. To thank him, I brought him a bottle of Helbing’s Liqueur, made by some distant cousin of mine in Germany.
Darryl brought out the Helbing’s and we all did a shot of it.
Justin decided to start walking after the rain was all stopped, to get back to his car. After a bit longer, the rest of us were ready to go. I had to be to work at 7. Darryl offered us all a ride back, but I didn’t want to cut it short. With only 1.1 mile left, I detcided I would run it.
I took off running as quickly as I could. I didn’t even bother to put my shoes back on. Even I was surprised at how easily I ran the thing. As I reached the intersection with Hollow Road, I paused and saw someone walking. I didn’t even realize at first it was Justin I was passing. I walked for just a moment and then took off top speed again.
Timing it, I did this route in only about seven minutes, which was about my high school speed. When I ran into the lot, my feet were feeling like they were burning up from pushing so hard at it, and I stood immediately in a mud puddle. I got no blisters of course; it’s been years since I got those.

Changewater bridge, railroad trestle, and old graphite mill that is now the parking lot.

Darryl took me back up to my grandfather’s house where my van was so I could get home.
The next day, I was a bit sore, but I know it was more from swimming against the current than it was the running. Either way, I need to do more of both to keep myself in better shape.
It was great to again have a trip around areas I’m so familiar with. There was some disappointment with the trail system, but overall it was a really great night to be out.