Hike #1574; 10/15/23 Hackensack, New Milford, and River Edge Loop with Serious Sean Dougherty, Justin Gurbisz, Galya, Jenny Tull, Evan "Joe Millionaire" Van Rossum, Diane Reider, Alyssa Lidman, Olga ?, and Bobbi Landrock
This next hike would be the next in our Hackensack River Watershed series, and one of my favorites in the entire series so far.
Like some of the previous stuff in this series, I decided to double back on some of what we had already done on the previous one in the series, and then extend a bit further to the north.
We had really enjoyed the visits to the visits to Hackensack River County Park as well as to Historic New Bridge Landing, and so I decided to do variations of that segment with new stuff added.
Our meeting point this time would be at the Hackensack Campus of the Fairleigh Dickinson University. There was a large parking are we skirted on the previous hike, where FDU Bridge Park crosses the Hackensack River.
The attractive bridge has benches and a park atmosphere about it. We started out by crossing over this. I let Ev run a bit right from the beginning just to get some energy out.
Once on the other side, there were some more pretty flower beds which I recall had some vegetables like tomatoes growing in them (we ate some), and the trail turned to the right.
The wide, paved path was quite pleasant following the west side of the Hackensack River, and passed some impressive, large trees.
We passed the big parking area, track, and ball fields before emerging on a lot at the end of Carol Court. We came up to Hackensack Ave, turned right, and crossed over Rt 4 on the bridge. Immediately on the other side, we cut down through grass to the right, and then into the lot for The Shops at Riverside. We kept to the right through the parking lot and around buildings, and then headed to the Hackensack waterfront.
The county park land is in back of the place, and we walked through some grass as well as on some walkways to the south.
There was a nice dock out on the river we had visited previously, and then a very nice seating area and hard surface walkway directly behind a parking garage area associated with the shops area.
We continued through this, and around the back of the next building area, through grass. It was obvious that at one time a crushed stone aggregate walkway had been established through this area parallel with the lots, but that has long been grown over by grass.
Pretty soon, we reached the start of the boardwalk trail section to the north of the shops, directly behind the residential area.
This boardwalk is really very impressive, and apparently not very well known. There is a little loop of trail boardwalk, and then a side section that ends where it becomes a regular foot path.
The foot path continues out to an abandoned but impressive little nature center out on the wetlands. They have odd roof lines and some of the covers of the structures are completely rotted away. Other sections have wood falling apart. Vegetation grows through and closely around it. I feel that it really adds to the mystique of it, but the place is clearly under utilized and rather neglected.
We continued out to the viewing platform at the end, right on the Hackensack River. It looked as though some recent floods had taken some boards off of it, and it had some caution tape on it as I recall.
Ev walked right out into this area with no trouble really, and even through some of the sticks and such.
After taking in the scenery, some of which we would be seeing just a little later on in the day, we continued back the way we came through the little nature center area, and onto the boardwalks.
We turned right when we were back behind the residential area again, and I decided I would take the path that stayed closer to the tree line this time. Previously, we stayed on the road on the other side of the building until we got to this side.
As we got closer to the end, we came upon a chain link fence. It would have been easy for the entire group to get over it probably, but with the stroller it would be more of a pain, so I decided to head back and go around the building while much of the group opted to go over the fence. We just met back up on the other side with a little extra walking.
This next residential bit, the Avalon at Hackensack Riverside, had a walkway from its upper level into the large retail parking lot to the north, known as Hackensack Commons (where the Home Depot is).
We turned to the left along some store fronts, and then headed out around the Home Depot and past Applebees. Joe Millionaire went into a store to get some pastries or something as I recall, which he shared with everyone when he came out.
We got back out to Hackensack Ave, and had to stay on that to cross Cole's Brook, and then turned to the right into the Steuben Arms Apartments.
We walked around the outside of the apartments, and then a sidewalk began between buildings sharply to the left. We headed in there, and walked these odd sidewalks that passed between the buildings named for General Von Steuben.
We made a right, another right, a left, another left, a right, and another right through this maze of buildings and emerged at another parking area directly across from New Bridge Landing.
This is an area I came to love and understand over the years, first off because I worked there regularly.
It was a time in my life I like to think back on, because when the local historic group that runs New Bridge Landing had less than amicable relations with the state, they liked me. In particular, former DEP employee Kevin Wright had a combative relationship with the state, but he liked me, and I respected him very much for his research and contributions to history. He told me plenty of stories about different sites during my time working there.
The plan was to have New Bridge Landing be a miniature Colonial Williamsburg, where endangered historic homes could be brought and restored.
Plans never quite panned out the way they wanted them to, with a museum and lots of other stuff. Still, it is a very cool place to visit.
The first building we came to was the Campbell-Christie House.
The home was built in 1774 by Jacob Campbell at about the time of his marriage to Altche Westervelt.
The property changed hands which included the Christie family from1795 to the 1900s. It was moved to New Bridge Landing in 1977.
The second building we came to was known as the Demarest House.
For years, it was thought that this was a Demarest homestead built in the late 1600s due to its proximity to these locations in New Milford where the house once stood. However, those dwellings were all gone by the 1920s.
This home was constructed about 1791 for John J Paulison in style consistent with "starter homes" of the time. The Demarest name is not terribly inappropriate as the property was conveyed by a Demarest, and Paulison himself was descended from Demarests two different ways.
The homestead was moved to New Bridge Landing behind the Zabriskie-Steuben House in 1955-56.
The Westervelt-Thomas Barn was the next structure, back a bit farther from the road.
The barn was built about 1889 in the Township of Washington, Bergen County, and moved to this location in 1954-55. The building houses multiple historic area artifacts of different kinds.
Last but certainly not least, the historic Zabriskie-Steuben House, built in 1752, and the only of this collection of buildings that still stands on its original site, despite the fact that it floods so badly.
The home was built by the prominent Zabriskie family, who made fortune with the added trade that came from the French and Indian War.
Jan Zabriskie lived in the home at the time of the American revolution, when Washington and the Continental Army crossed the new bridge retreating from Cornwallis and the British army.
Major General Baron von Steuben was awarded the home for his services to the Continental army, but he leased to Jan Zabriskie.
Now a state historic site, the location has had ongoing problems with flooding of the Hackensack River. Mass development and creation of impervious Services have caused excess runoff, and the river was historically dredged for navigation from colonial days until the 1900s. As a result, flooding has worsened.
We walked by all of the buildings, and I gave a bit of history on each one of them. We headed past the buildings and across the pony truss, and then on the other side my plan was to continue on the rather disconnected Hackensack River Greenway to the north.
This area floods really badly, and when we made our left turn to the north, there was one of those flood scales alongside the road. Serious Sean laid on the ground by it like it was a Cialis commercial.
Just ahead as we walked to the north, there was a bunch of stuff sat out on the curb in front of a nice, big house. This is certainly the neighborhood to pick up some quality road swag! In the stuff, I found a portable mini DVD player, with a screen that flipped up. I grabbed it up and put it into the bottom of the stroller (it actually works, and Ev has used it).
There were also balls, and a little razer scooter, which Justin grabbed and pushed Ev around on for a while. It was actually a pretty high quality one I should have gone back and picked up later.
Sean also found a bunch of balloons somewhere along the way, and carried them with him for a while.
We walked a few blocks on road, and passed by another historic home, somewhat altered, the Cole-Siegel House, built in 1709.
We headed west to Steuben Avenue, and then turned north to follow the river. The road switched to gravel, like a driveway, and we were able to continue upstream.
There was a house at the end of the drivable road, but we could continue on a sort of trail.
It seems that Steuben Avenue used to go through. We passed the lone house at the end of the lane, and continued beyond. There was a concrete bridge over a tributary, which we crossed and entered woods beyond. It wasn't as obviously a former road beyond this point, but it was very pleasant along the river.
In a short distance, we came to another tidal stream coming in. It was rather deep, and it would have been up to my hips to try to cross. There was a way of doing it over branches and such, but no one was going to want to take that chance.
We looked around for a way over, and if we'd been on foot only, we could have managed it, but I was not going to chance it with little Ev in the stroller. We'd have to go back the way we came and find another way around.
This hike was intentionally left a little open ended so that I could handle things like this. Of course, now we'd do a little extra mileage, so I would not travel as far north on the Hackensack River as I thought I might. That could be added to the next one we do.
We followed the gravel road back to the south, which was a bit awkward because we went right past that single house at the end again. We then continued to the last intersection at Arlington Road where we turned left. We went one block on this, and then turned left on Lynnwood and went another block.
A ninety degree turn to the right at the end of Lynnwood on Maple took us across Roosevelt Ave and to a dead end. There was a path to the right of the dead end, around the outside of a fence, which took us into a housing complex on Cantebury Lane.
I recall we went to the left and then right to skirt the north side of this development, to see if there would be a way into the next development to the north, but I do not believe there was a path through.
I recall we had to walk out to River Road rather than try to push through any of the other mess. We followed that north for a few blocks, and then turned to the left when we got to River Lane.
Along the way, we passed by the Demarest-Latz House, another historic but somewhat altered old homestead built in 1760.
River Lane turned left, and Oxford Lane went right, and we should have gone left. It turns out there is a trail head into the New Milford Woods Nature Preserve over there, but we missed it.
We followed Oxford Lane, then went left on Trotta Drive to Columbia Street, and then entered New Milford Woods from there.
Sean went to a store in the area and was going to meet back up with us in this area, but he wasn't there yet. We continued onto the trail, at the end of a tennis court area, and near a swim club. The trail made a loop in the property, just to the north of the water course that kept us from going through earlier, so I wanted to at least get back to that point.
We followed the trail to the left, which was the inland section. It was rather easy to push the stroller on even though there was no improved surface. We came to a spur trail that followed the old road to the south, and we walked it all the way back out to where we had been before.
We turned around from there, and then followed the trail along the river the rest of the way back, which provided some splendid views.
We eventually came back to close the loop in New Milford woods, and the group made fun of the sign out front of it.
We left the park, and headed to the north, soon on Robert K Chester Way which was the same stretch as Columbia Street. We passed by the New Milford Department of Public Works, and then headed left briefly, and into a baseball field. I just followed through a bit of this to stay off of the road for a bit longer.
After passing another smaller baseball field, we reached the end of the road, and there was a grassy connection to a paved path at Hard Castle Pond, another park area.
This pretty pond with an aerator fountain had a paved path around the outside of it, and a connection to the Dorchester Apartments at Dilworth Road. Another disconnected segment of Columbia Street was to the north. We followed along that and a parking lot beside the Hackensack River.
At the end of the north side of the lot, there was public land in wetlands below us. There was no visible trail, but if we didn't have the stroller, we could have bullied through that to get to the next trail piece. Again, I wasn't going to subject Ev or the group to that kind of mess, so we turned right and headed to the east a bit again.
Annoyingly, there was no way out over there either. We came to the end of the apartments, then had to turn back to the west again. We followed a sidewalk around the other side of the last building, then up to the next level of parking lot. We walked out toward River Road again, and it turned out we were behind an abandoned former Shop Rite.
It is not often we see something as big and successful as a Shop Rite go out of business. We turned left from this lot, went by Care One New Milford, and then reached the Dunkin Donuts. We stopped here for everyone to use the restroom and get snacks.
Once everyone was done, we were able to get through an opening in the fence to the north side, and then descend to the next parking area below. There was an insurance company, and then another building with a receiving area, which eventually took us through to Yale Street.
We soon reached Henley Avenue and turned to the left. We followed that to the end, and there was supposed to be a loop trail to the south that came back around to Henley again.
I turned to the left on what I thought was "the trail", which was on a power line, but then it came to a sort of end. Maybe at one time it went through for the loop like what I was seeing on Google maps, but there was nothing of that there this time.
I looked around a bit, and there was no good way through. We ended up cutting back to the parking lot, I think slightly a different way back to the spot where we went in. From there, north on Henley Ave, there is a paved trail that went to the north to yet another bit of Columbia Street (this really might have once gone all the way through).
We followed Columbia Street through a small neighborhood to River Edge Road.
At this point, I had to look over the maps and our timing, and make a decision where we were going to be going.
Because of all of the out and around stuff we were doing, I decided that this would be the point we would turn around to return to our start point.
We got to the River Edge Pizza Kitchen and hung out outside. Next door was Country Wine and Liquors, so I went inside to see if they had any good beer.
I think I found some Stone Imperial Stout in there and got it. I sipped one of them outside the building while we were having some pizza. I got a slice and let Ev have some of it, which fortunately he ate (it's often hard to get him to eat). Some of the group hung out in an alley alongside one of the buildings.
When we were all done with lunch, we headed to the west on Lincoln Avenue, which was a rather steep uphill, and then turned to the left on Summit Avenue to the south. This was a pleasant enough street, which we followed to the Roosevelt Elementary School. There was a walkway along the right side of the building.
On the west side of the school, there was a large ball field and a nice playground. We stopped for a break here and let Ev play on the playground for a bit.
Once we were done, we headed to the south along the edge of the field to Continental Avenue, turned left, and then right onto Bogert Road.
We reached Tenney Avenue and turned to the right for a short bit. Then, there was an informal trail on a grassy swath between homes to the south.
I planned the hike to continue to the south along this route, which continues for nine blocks and then turns into Oak Avenue.
We continued south and crossed Adams Avenue, then over Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe Avenues.
After Monroe, the route became an official trail into Brookside Park. A branch of the Van Saun Mill Brook apparently begins in this area.
The official trail section ended at Concord Drive, and we continued south another block to Manning Avenue. We couldn't walk the last two blocks of the informal trail because it was blocked off for construction. Instead, we turned left on Manning, and then followed it steeply downhill to Kinderkamack Road again.
At the road, there were two turret style entrance posts on either side of the road, which the sidewalk passed through.
We followed Kinderkamack to the right for a while, and walked through some of the adjacent parking lots and behind buildings along the way to the south.
I think we walked down behind New Bridge Crossing apartments to see if there was a way onto the next side street, but we were high up on a wall above that, so we had to go back up to Kinderkamack again.
Soon enough, we reached Main Street and turned right. When the main traffic was routed left on New Bridge Road, we simply continued straight ahead into Historic New Bridge Landing again.
We passed by all of the historic buildings we saw, described earlier, and then headed back out across the historic "new bridge" over the Hackensack River. Justin climbed up and walked across the tops of the trusses.
We were reaching the home stretch, and I'd already done the majority of what we had left, but it was a really very pleasant section. I was quite happy we chose to re-do this section, because I loved it so much.
Just before getting there, I popped a can of Four Loco, which I hadn't drank in quite a while up to this point, and figured I'd have some fun for some of the later stretch. I shared it with Sean, and we laughed quite a lot through to the end.
We were poised to get done with the hike a bit early, and I was ready to do a little bonus mileage.
The last time we came through here, I missed the part of the trail closest to the waterfront, so part of my plan was to cover that bit of it that I'd not seen yet.
It was pretty easy to push the stroller through it, and we were afforded some really excellent river views. We meandered to the east along this wide river section, and passed a memorial Frank M Chapman, who helped to establish some of the nation's earliest bird sanctuaries.
We continued around a large cove, with some old dock remnants occasionally visible. This was once a major area of commerce because it was near the head of tidal navigation on the river.
We continued east and then south through Clarence W Brett Park, and then emerged onto part of River Road. There is no public land in between to continue on, so going out to the road is necessary at this bit.
On the road walk, we passed by the Lutheran Van Buskirk Cemetery, which has only one marker on the road noting that it was there. The Van Buskirk Church also used to stand on the knoll next to the road there. The site was established in 1719.
Soon, we reached Andreas Park, where the next bit of the Hackensack Greenway goes in.
When we hiked this before, we missed the actual greenway section next to the river slope, so this time we did that. It was easy at first, but then got a little rougher on the slope next to a fence. We soon came over a knoll and down to the Indian Pond Tennis Court.
The trail just beyond went along the edge of Indian Pond, which we had walked on the previous hike in this series. It's a beautiful spot where the pond is to the left, and the river is to the right.
The previous time, I had intended to stay along a trail beside the river, but we couldn't find it. It was either unofficial or had completely grown in.
This time, it had been well cleared! We simply continued to the right when we got to the end of Indian Pond, and it brought us to the next bit of the greenway, where we emerged behind the Fairleigh Dickinson Soccer Fields.
We continued along the waterfront, and the sun was starting to go down a bit. We came out alongside Northumberland Road, and then passed beneath Rt 4. The rest of the way back to the cars was along the river, beside the parking lot where we had met in the morning.
When we got back to the cars, I mentioned that I wanted to walk a bit further if anyone wanted to join in for a bit. A few did, and we went right back to where we had gone at the start, across the FDU Bridge Park.
We went back across the to the flower beds that had fruits growing in it, and we ate some grape tomatoes off of the vine. Ev had a couple of them as I recall and liked them.
We then went back onto the bridge and sat down there for a bit, while Ev ran around, back and forth, and got on and off of the seats.
The views of the waterfront were quite excellent as the sun was going down. I had thought Serious Sean was coming with us, but he went and passed out in his car, and didn't wake up there until after 10 pm or something I think he told us. He then swore off Four Loco and said he'd not drink it again, but we've heard that before!
This was really a pretty fantastic day in areas we would never consider meandering through otherwise. It was exactly the kind of thing I hoped to get out of planning this.
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