Hike #422 6/20-6/21/9
6/20-6/21/9 Sparta to Augusta to Sussex to Franklin and Ogdensburg Abandoned Rail with Kyle Zalinsky, Shelly Janes, "DJ Ray" Cordts, Carter Janes, Carol Creamer, Rob Creamer, Chris Herbig, Christina Manley, Fred Hafale, Amish Paul and Wyatt Hassler, Chris Kroschinski, Amanda Rosanblatt
Group shot at the old paper mill site near Hamburg NJ
This trip really defined the attitude of the Summer. It represented diversified fun and cooperative friendships. DJ Ray had wanted to do another campout, this time bigger and better than the previous year, and so I arranged the Sunday hike, Ray arranged most of the route for Saturday. Both days were full of constantly changing scenery and great memories. The party was an insane celebration among the best I've ever attended.
Cupcake and I were walking together near the end, and he commented that this was really an incredible weekend. It was almost impossible to have more fun than we'd had this weekend.
My next hike would be in part arranged by my good friend "DJ Ray" Cordts. The plan was to do sort of a backpacking trip that would be Saturday into Sunday, with a backyard campout party at DJ Ray's house Saturday night. With a little coaching from me, DJ Ray picked the route he wanted Saturday to take, and I planned the route for Sunday. For the most part, the hike was all places I'd been, with a couple different spots. We started meeting at DJ Ray's and then shuttled cars to Station Park in Sparta to begin. Joining DJ Ray and I would be Shelly Janes along with her sister Carter, DJ Ray's friends Carol and ? Creamer, and Chris Herbig. Beginning in Station Park, we all met. I was sipping really crummy old white wines given to me by Jason Straus At work, all from 1988-1990! We began walking from the farthest parking lot onto a path which led us out to an abandoned industrial area next to the old Sparta Railroad Station on the New York, Susquehanna, and Western Railroad. We of course had to explore the abandoned buildings and station before we could move on (1-21a). For once, DJ Ray was in a bigger hurry to get the group moving along than I was! We headed on down the tracks out of Sparta, through cuts and along some fills with nice ponds along the way.
We also found a turtle (21b-25). When we reached the first highway we walked down a little bit and got some food. Shelly gave me a half of a pork roll, egg and cheese sandwich, the first real egg I'd eaten in years. Surprisingly, I rather liked the sandwich with the egg and following this found myself buying them regularly! We soon continued along the tracks and came to where they went into a fence and ended. This was the former Sparta Junction where I'd hiked many times before. We walked around the outside of the fence and across the active former Lehigh and Hudson River Railroad to the abandoned section of the NYS&W line, now Paulins Kill Valley Trail (26) and proceeded to follow it northwest towards Warbasse Junction, crossing wetlands and over badly decked old bridges (26a-27g). From here, we turned right heading north on the former Lackawanna Railroad's Sussex Branch, now Sussex Branch Trail to Lafayette where we left the trail briefly (27h-28b). We then headed over to Lafayette Pond where there were no life guards on duty, but we went for a swim anyway. DJ Ray and I wrestled WWE style on the platform and I pummeled him into the water (28c-28jaaa).
From here, we headed onto the road north. We followed the road a short distance (28jaab-28l) to a liquor store were we got some more drinks (28m-28maaa). From here, we followed more roads (28maab) back to the Sussex Branch trail and followed it north (28maac028o) to Augusta. In Augusta we reached the former Lehigh and New England Railroad (1886-1962) and we turned right, or northeast. We followed this line to Armstrong Road I think it was (29-32aaaf) where Carol and ? waited for DJ Ray to come back and pick them up. The rest of us walked a short distance on roads to a yard where DJ Ray had permission to cut across, then through a field leading directly out to the fire pit in his back yard (33-34)! We all put our packs down and proceeded to have a lively party.
DJ Ray Camporee Extravaganza #2
Aside from the hikers, many other hikers including Brian Rapp, Kyle Zalinsky, Amanda Rosenblatt, Chris Kroschinski, Christina Manley, Iannis Garafalo, Cory Salveson, Eric Pace, Jim "Mr. Buckett" Mathews, and more attended (35-38c). I had been drinking all day, and was already quite tweaked, and so I passed out on DJ Ray's floor early on, only to awaken on the couch a while later after dark. We then mostly hung out around the camp fire, in the pool, and in the garage. Kyle and I jumped over the fire several times, being lunatics, and singed our skin a bit (38caaa-42z4). Overall, it was a fun time.
DJ Ray Extravaganza #2
Most of us had tents set up in the back yard, and Shelly had a large one so we all crashed to be ready to hike in the morning. When morning came, of course no one was ready. Shelly had to run home to spot some cars there, since we were finishing at her house. Fred Hafale and Amish Paul and Wyatt Hassler joined us but had to wait for everyone to get together (43-44). Eventually we made our way back through DJ Ray's back yard and headed down to the roads and back to the LNE right of way where we'd left off the previous day. DJ Ray had to stay back and spend time with his family (44a-44ab). As soon as we got on the right of way, we immediately crossed an old deck style girder bridge (there were many bridges on this stretch) over the Papackating Brook (45-45aa). We then continued through the pastoral settings of Sussex County on the sometimes unrecognizeable right of way, now the route of a gas line (45aaa-47ab). When we reached a location known as Roy's we heard a lot of meowing coming from the bushes. There was a small weak and skinny little kitten in the weeds meowing non stop. We all looked in for it, but it was far too scared to come out. We tried to get at it, but to no avail, so most moved on while I think it was Christina managed to get it to come out. It turned out to be very friendly and loved attention, and so it began following her. I went back, and indeed it was quite friendly and loving the attention, so we let it follow us and even waited up a bit for it to keep with us. Amazingly, it followed us for miles (47ac-52b).
Mike the cat on a rail trestle near Augusta
Even crossing the bridges with only rotten railroad ties was not too tough for it. One bridge in particular had begun to sink into the river since my previous visit, which was really interesting (53-58dc). Soon, we came upon a farm and Kyle decided to bring the kitten there to give it a home, but none of us realized it (58e-59e). We walked out to the next road and realized he was missing, so I jumped on Amish Paul's bike and rode back as quickly as I could. Sure enough, the cat did'nt stay at the farm and had returned to the right of way looking for us. I picked him up and rode back along the right of way to the others.
Shelly with her new kitty
The group in Sussex Co
Shelly carried him for a little bit, then we took a break at the road (60-63). No sooner did we return to the right of way, we came across a giant snapping turtle and had to keep the cat away from it. By this point Wyatt wanted to name the cat "Rape Whistle" (64-65c). We continued on along the rail bed and soon reached the trestle marking the entrance to the town of Sussex (65caaa-71). We passed under Rt 23 (71a-7d1bb) and then headed up a side path into Sussex passing by an abandoned road (72) and then reaching the A&P supermarket. Kyle and I ran and insanely jumped into the Junipers like idiots (72a). We took a long break here and got some food.
Shelly got food for the cat as well, and while he could'nt stop meowing before, he was now very quiet. After eating, he fell right asleep (73-77). From the A&P, we switched to follow the long abandoned Hanford Branch of the New York, Susquehanna, and Western Railroad in a section I had last followed almost exactly five years earlier.
Kyle and Wyatt...the sign read "Childred at Play".
We followed Rt 23 for a wee bit instead of bushwhacking (78). We descended from the road to where a small road was built on the right of way (78a-79) and followed it to the entrance to Duck Pond Trail, a trail utilizing the rail bed in Wallkill National Wildlife Refuge. DJ Ray joined us here, pulling up in his car and giving a couple a lift (79a-81b).
“The art of life is the art of avoiding pain; and he is the best pilot, who steers clearest of the rocks and shoals with which it is beset.” Thomas Jefferson
We followed the trail a couple miles to the south until we reached where the bridge was missing over the Wallkill River. The cat stayed in Chris backpack the entire time, calmly (81c-87). Once at the river, a few had to go out to Rt 23 while Kyle, Wyatt, DJ Ray, and I opted to swim across. I nearly drowned trying to carry my bag across the river because it was so heavy with wine and alchahol bottles (87a-87dc). The three of us got to the other side, then we bushwhacked through terrible stuff to reach Rt 23 and the others who reached it by way of a meadow (87e-87ia). From here, I had never followed the NYS&W right of way further. I'd thought I'd lost it the previous trip five years earlier, and so we walked the highway into Hamburg to pick up the LHR line. This time, I found out the right of way went beneath Rt 23 through a culvert, so we climbed down and followed it from here (87iaaa-89). Along the way from here we found a lot of giant spools (89a-89b). Chris also let the cat down to walk again, and it did very well, covering a lot more distance. The right of way led us through what must have been a bit more of Hamburg, then above the Wallkill River to the left (90-95). We soon came to some ruins which I found out was the "Gingerbread Castle" a sort of former children's theme park based on fairy tales. The place was in ruins and quite a mess, so we of course had to check it out (96-111). I realized the rail bed must have gone right through this place, and so I directed everyone to walk behind the buildings on their access road (112). Everyone took a while to catch up, and so Wyatt and I spent the wait time checking out more of the ruins and climbing around a bit (113-120aa). The rail bed was obvious on the other side, and so we began following it onward to soon reach some old paper mill ruins (121-124). Then, we walked beyond to a path leading to a large dam across the Wallkill where we took a long break (124aa-127k). From there, we continued along the rail bed parallel with the currently active former LHR line above us, and eventually had to climb up to it when a bridge was out on the Hanford Branch. We followed the active tracks into Franklin where we turned away where the Hanford Branch crossed over (128-129c). Christina and DJ Ray had Iannis pick them up as they were quite tired. We continued on along the Hanford Branch through Franklin (129d-130) and took a side trip to check out some Magnetite Mines Chris knew about (130a-130i). Kyle went down right next to one, which was freaky. We threw some stones in and it took a while to hear them hit bottom. After leaving the mines, when we got to the bottom the police showed up. Apparently someone reported us for being back there, but fortunitely they did'nt smell the alchahol on my breath and we did'nt match the descriptions of "two juvenile women and one male" which probably referred to Wyatt because of his long hair, Amanda, and Kyle. They let us go and we were on our way. We had to follow parallel roads for a bit because it was so overgrown. We checked out the giant kiln along the way as well (130j-130l). When we reached where we needed to turn off to get to Shelly's house, we took a side trip to a quarry. Shelly told me where to go, and so Kyle, Wyatt, and I climbed through a hole in a fence and made our way to a beautiful crystal clear quarry and took a dip (131-138). We then made our way back to the right of way and down the roads to the culver the rail line used to go over the road (and saw this sign 139, 139aa) and Wallkill River (140a-140faaa). We made our way down the road (140g,140h) to Shelly's house (140i) and then all went out to dinner at a fifties themed place at Ross Corner to finish a great weekend!
DJ Ray Camporee Extravaganza #2
DJ Ray Extravaganza #2
Mike the cat on a rail trestle near Augusta
Shelly with her new kitty
The group in Sussex Co
“The art of life is the art of avoiding pain; and he is the best pilot, who steers clearest of the rocks and shoals with which it is beset.” Thomas Jefferson
Group shot at the old paper mill site near Hamburg NJ
Kyle and Wyatt...the sign read "Childred at Play".
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