Me on the Highlands Trail in Byram Twp.
11/28/4
For this next hike, I had planned on meeting Bob Moss again to re-do the section of the Highlands Trail we had done with him on hike #117, 11/30/3. Some new trail sections existed as well as some moved trail sections. I planned on meeting my crew at the grassy parking area just off Waterloo Road, but Bob cancelled to due weather forecast and the only one to show up was newcomer George DeLarche. I was surprised to see him show, but I was happy to have a participant. This time, I opted to change the trip a bit. Rather than hiking from Rt 181 south to Allamuchy Mt and Waterloo. Instead, I planned to hike between Lake Lackawanna and Mt Olive, slightly more familiar to me than the other section. We spotted George’s car in Lake Lackawanna and mine at Mt. Olive, though it could be wrong and it could have been vice-versa. George and I had an interesting chat about his background in France and all the problems going on with our country. At this time, I was particularly annoyed with our nationwide boycott of the French name; calling French Fries “Freedom Fries” (French Toast was “Freedom Toast”) and we had an interesting discussion on this topic.
Along Rt 46 in Mt. Olive
Off trail waterfall, Mt. Olive
Crossing a creek in Mt. Olive
Highlands Trail, Stephens State Park
Highlands Trail, Stephens State Park
Highlands Trail, Stephens State Park
Ditmar House along the Highlands Trail
We began walking at the Mt Olive A&P, and it was raining heavily. I was impressed that George was so willing to go on. We walked into the woods behind the billboard off Rt 46 to the stream, which was far too overflowed to walk through without getting feet wet. I crossed it anyway, but I could’nt expect George to get his feet wet as I did. We made our way back around, and along the adjacent farm fields and around a pond where a farm access road, somewhat overgrown, led out to the HT. Barely recognizeable as a former road, the HT followed it for a short distance before making it’s way into a pine grove. Officially, this section of the HT was closed after 9/11/1 citing it as a terrorist target, but the blazes were still in place. We continued on soon reaching the large creek crossing, now quite overflowing. We obviously could not cross here, and decided to head downstream for a more suitable place. I was glad we did, as we came across a lovely waterfall we would otherwide not have seen! Just below the falls was a large log across the creek we were able to use to get across. We continued through the resevoir property (this is the property the trail was closed through), across a power line, a woods road, and Mine Hill road heading into Stephens State Park. When we reached the part near the Musconetcong we saw many small tributaries flowing very strong down the hillside. We continued past the park office and along the river on the wide trail out to Waterloo Valley Road, turning left to Waterloo Road. We followed the road for a short distance, as the trail had not yet been blazed through here, then climbed an embankment to the Morris Canal towpath east to Saxton Falls. We crossed Waterloo Road and continued on the towpath along Saxton Lake passing the abandoned buildings. I went in one to have a look. By this time, it had finally stopped raining. We broke away from the towpath at the Ditmar House, one of the abandoned houses Tea Biscuit, Ken Rasheed, and I explored on the Morris Canal hike we did through here on hike #92 on 6/1/3. In the days to come I would recommend to Bob Moss that the Highlands Trail be routed across this yard and use the towpath in more sections than it did within this area; advise he would take, and that is why this became part of the Highlands Trail. We followed the development road out to Waterloo Road, walking to the next section of the co aligned towpath and Highlands Trail.
Highlands Trail seasonal view on Allamuchy Mountain
Seasonal view from the Highlands Trail on Allamuchy Mountain
View, Highlands Trail on Allamuchy Mountain
The HT broke off the towpath where the canal turned right away from Waterloo Road near Rt 80. The trail took us along the road a short distance to the parking area where we had originally met in the morning. We turned left and began the ascend of East Allamuchy Mountain. On the way up, there were nice seasonal views. We were fortunite that the view was clear enough when we got to the nice view over Waterloo Valley. We soon continued along the trail to the abandoned Sussex Railroad. We were faced with another stream crossing issue here, as the stream was extra wide and very swift. George was not comfortable with crossing, we we began heading south looking for alternatives. We finally decided on using the old railroad bridge from the ice house spur on Jefferson Lake, trespassing a bit in camp property, then cutting through woods to the HT. No one saw us and we headed back upstream to the trail, crossing the hillside and descending to the Shop Rite in Byram Twp. I believe I got some McDonalds for lunch here. We continued out to Mansfield Drive where we picked up the woods road leading to the HT, and walked parallel to the Lackawanna Cutoff out to Lake Drive. Some of the trail looked a bit disturbed, first of all due to ATV use, and second because it seemed some clearing was being done. We reached the end just before dark, as there was a beautiful sunset. A perfect ending to a hike that almost did’nt happen!
Sunset over Lake Lackawanna, Highlands Trail
No comments:
Post a Comment