Hike #1293; Milford/Upper Black Eddy Loop
1/28/20 Milford/Upper Black Eddy/Uhlerstown Loop with Ken Zaruni, Kirk Rohn, Sarah Jones, and Brittany Audrey
This next hike would be a big loop from Milford NJ across to Bucks County PA, up and through the back roads and some trails, as well as some of the historic Delaware Canal towpath.
The Delaware Canal in Upper Black Eddy
As usual, I was struggling with a hike to post when I was trying to set one up. I didn’t want to do exactly the same spots we’d been doing the past few weeks, and I realized I had never done the new connecting trail from the Delaware Canal to Ringing Rocks Park.
Then and now in Milford
We had tried to find it in the past, and ended up bushwhacking and climbing up the creek and along all of the cascades, which is actually far better anyway.
The back roads of that part of Bucks County are great for walking anyway, so putting together a loop is actually very easy.
I made the meeting point the Milford Market near the bridge. I figured there would be few enough of us on a night hike that we could mostly all park there. Brittany parked over near the station, and Kirk parked on street, so everyone else was okay at the market.
The area of Milford is quite pretty, and very historic. The area was sort of more redneck than a lot of the other Delaware River towns, but it is on it’s way to being more like the others such as Frenchtown, Stockton, and Lambertville. The old Bel Del Railroad station was recently opened up as a new eatery (named Canal House, but there was never a canal in Milford).
We started off by walking over the bridge over the Delaware.
The old Lowry Grist Mill is also still standing with a plan for some kind of preservation, though the adjacent buildings that were part of its operation have been demolished.
Milford then and now
The tracks are still in place through Milford though they are currently not used. The long term plan is that the excursions out of Phillipsburg will run on the route, and that the trail, which follows the old Bel Del Railroad bed up to Frenchtown, will be extended to Milford.
We headed across the bridge, and entered the area of Upper Black Eddy on the other side. We turned slightly right and then left to get closer to the old Delaware Canal.
There is an access to the towpath next to a house on the other side, and we began walking the towpath northbound.
Upper Black Eddy is a very nice little canal town with a lot of history, and it retains much of its historic ambiance. I pointed out the old canal store as we approached it walking through.
We soon crossed Bridgeton Hill Road, then continued to cross Rt 32/River Road. There were some homes on both sides of the canal, and the ones ended on the right after a short time parallel with them. We passed beneath a seemingly abandoned bridge over the canal soon after town, and continued on to the bridge that now carries the connector trail.
The next goal was to try to follow this connector right up to Ringing Rocks Park. I could not find it the previous couple of times I looked for it at all. There was a sign along the canal reading that it was only one mile from there up to Ringing Rock Park. It couldn’t be that hard. Besides, even the website now showed the trail in place.
I remember going to a Highlands presentation when the trail was cleared through Appalachian Mountain Club as part of the Highlands Trail network. I knew it had been open for quite a long time, but I still never saw any blazing.
Delaware Canal
It turns out the blazing was basically non existent. We turned up onto the bridge and walked toward the parking area on Rt 32, which was a really obvious route. There was a guy there when we arrived standing on the bridge, and he asked us where we were coming from. When I said Milford, he said that was quite a hike. He didn’t realize we were only in the first couple of miles. He walked right behind us oddly as we walked back toward the parking lot. We crossed and I began looking for where the trail could be, meanwhile the guy was digging around in the parking lot dirt as we left. Very odd.
The grade above the lot
The website showed the trail going directly into the woods across the street, but there was literally nothing there. I could see some sort of a grade into the woods, so I decided to go in a bit, and then head to it.
I think this might have been the old trolley grade, which would have been along the edge of the highway, but I’m not sure. It was kind of an odd angle. It could be an older route of the road as well. To the right, the path was sort of well worn. It was obvious that some people mistake this for the trail and follow it up. We walked it to the right a bit, since the website showed the trail wrong anyway.
The new Ringing Rocks connector
I soon realized this was NOT the way, and we turned around to walk the other way. The grade came back down to Rt 32, and I saw some orange or pink ribbons through the woods. I decided we would head toward that. Ahead, I spotted an old woods road going up hill that looked a bit more worn.
There was not a single blaze on this route, and there was nothing at all to say to go that way along Rt 32, but nothing else could possibly have been it, so we started following it.
The path was only marked with some random orange or pink ribbons that looked rather recent, and there were also some really badly worn out old blue ribbons that were probably from when the trail was cleared.
If it were not confusing enough, some of the orange or pink ribbons were off the trail well into the woods. I at first could not be sure this trail was the right way.
As we went further up, another more faint trail turned to the right. The official map made it look like there was a switchback, so I had to have a closer look at it. We ended up seeing some sawed logs ahead, so I figured that this was the way and not the switchback.
The trail got rather steep at times, and it made its way close to the ravine that Falls Creek passes through. We could see down into the ravine a bit toward the creek, but it was definitely much nicer walking directly beside it on the previous trip. It would just be too hard to do something like that this time.
The trail ascended a bit more, and left the woods road shortly after a washed out old log skit was on the left, and we reached an overgrown, marshy field at the top. The trail then traversed some rocky terrain and became much less obvious. It was a good thing some of it was worn or we’d have been lost. It was also a good thing we did all of this before dark because it would have been impossible otherwise.
We reached one last section of rock outcropping before the ground started to level off a bit, and it was just cleared foot path. There were still no blazes of any kind. It really drives me crazy that AMC took on the Highlands Trail project in 2006, and still not a single teal Highlands Trail blaze has been added since the first one we put on in Riegelsville PA.
The trail weaved through the woods a bit, and there were branches and such down over it. It was not at all obvious. When it got to the white blazed loop trail around the boulder fields in Ringing Rock County Park, the entrance to the trail was delineated a bit with some sticks, but it otherwise is totally easy to just walk right by.
We turned left on the white trail and went down hill a bit, which skirts the boulder field. It took us down along the creek, and we visited the lovely falls, which were flowing pretty good. We had just enough time to see them before moving off.
The trail took us up and along the south side of the boulder fields. I had picked up a rock back in the woods to use on the rocks to make them ring a while back, because otherwise there is never a single loose rock to be found. Everyone is always looking for them and there are pretty much none.
I went out into the field and found a couple of the rocks that ring, and demonstrated it for Ken, who had never been to Ringing Rocks before. I then passed the rock to him so he could go out and give it a try before moving on.
The trail took us out to the parking area where we took a little break at a picnic bench.
From there, we just cut through the woods out to Ringing Rocks Road directly across from Lonely Cottage Road. We went straight on Lonely Cottage from here.
I had walked part of this road before on another night hike. This time, we followed it south and crossed over Bridgeton Hill Road. Celeste wanted to meet up with us, but I didn’t know the area well enough to find a parking spot. I know of one state game lands lot, but we were going to get by it far too quickly for that one to work out.
I had considered going west into State Game Lands 56 for this hike if there was still enough daylight, but there definitely was not, so I opted to just follow some more roads.
When we reached Lodi Hill Road, we turned left. It took us slightly up hill and leveled off, then got much narrower. This was a beautiful little back road to be on.
The road narrowed as we continued. Barely any traffic came by the entire time. At one time, we had three cars go by us all at once and it was like a kind of shock.
We kept to the right on Old Forge Road when it split, and it maintained the height of the land for a while before slowly descending. We headed down hill a bit and reached Perry Auger Road, where we turned to the left. In this area, we had tried to bushwhack through State Game Lands 56 to the south as it was getting dark, and it was absolutely horrible. I will likely never try to walk any of that section ever again unless there is some sort of more reasonable path.
We followed Perry Auger to the east which took us down hill to Upper Tinicum Church Road. There, on a previous hike we had gone to the south a bit along the creek and toward Erwinna. This time we continued straight ahead, uphill a bit more again, on Uhlerstown Hill Road.
This road is closed in the Winter, and has a sign that reads such. I love this road immensely. Even when it is open, it is only one way traffic. It’s like being out west, or in West Virginia where they have no guide rails and there is a serious drop off.
We hit the top of the hill where there is a very out of place looking development, and then got to the narrow section of road which goes down hill. The gates were surprisingly open. I suppose it’s because the water has been so warm and there’s been no snow.
The road cut to the right on the way down, and there was a stunning view of the lights along the Delaware River ahead. We could see Frenchtown to the right and the lights of the bridge there, and several other lights up the river. There was a rather dimly lit large home directly below the cliffs to the left that had an eerie but beautiful ambiance.
Then and now...
There comes a point when there is a steep cliff face up to the right, and then a steep cliff below on the left. It is barely enough room for a regular car to drive on through let alone two lanes.
The road was so steep that I began doing my own switchback walk to go easier on my knees.
At the bottom, there are some stunning old kilns on the right side of the road with well restored stone. We paused to admire this for a few moments, and then moved ahead to the Uhlerstown Covered Bridge built in 1932 when the canal first opened. The bridge spans the canal.
Like the last hike we were on, the town of Uhlerstown used to be called Mexico. This is likely because of the Mexican American War that had happened from 1846 to 1848.
After we passed through the town lattice style covered bridge, we turned right into a driveway which has a hidden entrance to the canal towpath. We turned right on the canal towpath and passed under the covered bridge. Just barely beyond is the Uhlerstown Lock, Delaware Canal Lock #18, which is in pretty good shape. The house to the right I believe was at one time a canal store. We quietly moved by this site, and continued away from the houses on the canal towpath.
We had a very pleasant walk from here ahead. Ken powered on ahead of us super speed. I fell back to tie my shoe and grab a drink. When we stop like that, there really is no catching up. We were motoring fast all night. Brittany fell back after stopping to separate, and then remained back with us the rest of the time while Ken powered to the end.
This was too relaxing a section for me to just push on through.
We soon reached the maintenance area for the canal state park, which is at Lock #19. The lock house there is still in pretty good shape and owned by the state park.
My buddy Bruce Hockenbury used to work for Delaware Canal State Park, and he told me of an older gent that used to work there with him, who actually locked the last boat through the canal when they closed it. The Delaware and Lehigh Canal corridor is the longest lived of all of America’s towpath canals, having survived into the 1930s. I’ve even heard that a little piece of the Lehigh Canal was used into the 1940s. There were also stories of the old guy getting late night visits from some interesting young ladies, but that’s another entire story.
We crossed over Jugtown Hill Road, and continued through a very quiet and pleasant section back to Upper Black Eddy, and headed out the same way we got to the canal. We crossed the bridge back to Milford, and then took a left along the tracks to the north a bit, where there was a wonderful little view of the lighted bridge over the Delaware.
Milford Upper Black Eddy Bridge at night
We then turned right on River Road and walked back into town. We went by the Ship Inn, and wanted to get some food, but they had already closed the kitchen for the night.
We continued walking then back toward the Milford Market to finish the night rather early.
We powered through a lot of this quickly, which was nice, but in some ways it didn’t feel like enough distance. I know it was because it was an easy one to scale off, but I could have done a lot more. I definitely need to do more up hill, because I was feeling it far too much on that Ringing Rock connecting trail.
I’ll have to do some more of that area of Bucks County some time soon, but will have to figure out good parking and what can be done with limited daylight.
HAM
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