Hike #441 9/7/9
9/7/9 Morris Canal; Belleville to Jersey City with Shelly Janes, Chris Jones, Mark "Bobo" Godfrey Jr., Joe Tag, Jean Fletcher, Craig Nunn, Ron Rice, and John Drennan.
Leaving Belleville along the former Morris Canal
It's a big deal when I do a series of hikes and actually complete that series. Not many have tried to walk the entire Morris Canal across NJ, but after this trip I had done it. It was nicer than I thought it would be. It was a good thing to end the Summer with since I had actively done the series for so long and then sort of stopped.
It was also really cool to see my old friend Chris Jones again as well.
My next hike would be the last in my series to complete the former Morris Canal across the state of NJ. We would begin where we left off near the border of Belleville and walk to Jersey City. Joining me for this one would be Shelly Janes (on her bike), my brother Mark "Bobo" Godfrey, Jean Fletcher, Craig Nunn, Chris Jones (who had not been on one of my hikes since December of 2004!), Ron Rice, and John Drennan (a Morris Canal expert). We began at the small park just west of Mill Street where we were on the previous canal hike, then hiked Mill Street southeast to the Bellevile border at Harrison Street (0a-0c). We turned right on Harrison then immediately left on Brighton Ave which was in part built on the canal. I was surprised to see a small canal trail park go between yards, left preserved! We walked through it and came out (0d-2) on a dead end street. Shelly and Joe checked out some old cars that a neighbor had on his property (2a-2f). We had to walk around on side roads to pick up the canal site again, so we stopped by the old bridge and dam site we did the previous time, and I took a swim in the second River (2g-20)!
After taking a swim in the Second River
We continued south and passed by a Roche facility (2o-3a)which had a piece of the former canal on the property (4). We then paralleled Franklin Ave where the canal paralleled Branch Brook Park (5). Soon, we passed under the Newark Light Rail, which to the north followed an older rail right of way, but to the south was built in the former canal prism. We of course could'nt walk this section, and we'd already hiked parallel through Branch Brook Park on other hikes, so we took the train south inside the canal for a short distance (5a-7). When we got out of the underground station area, there were all sorts of murals depicting canal days which was neat (7a-7d). We continued following the canal site above ground where the rail line went under (7e) and soon reached the site of Inclined Plane 12 east I think it was (8,8a). I think it was Raymond Blvd. We went down into another Newark subway station to see more of the canal murals (9-10) and then continued back above ground (10a-10b). We walked from here to Penn Station where the canal passed by and used the restrooms (11). We then wandered to the riverfront and checked out the railroad bridges. We also spent a while trying to get a crate to stay on top of a pole (12-17e). Ron and John left us here, and we continued from here on Raymond Blvd as close as we could get to the former canal site (18-19d). We also stopped along the way to get some food. We soon reached the Pulaski Skyway and walked beneath to get to the Truck Rt 1 and 9/Lincoln Highway Bridge (20-21). We walked the south side of the bridge to be closest to the canal, and the walkway was quite overgrown and unused, but views from the bridge were good (22-28). When we got across the first bridge we found an overpass that was made significantly wider than the road on the one side. I assumed that could have been for the canal (20-30). There was a business on the right/south side of the highway that had a retention pond in front that could have been, if not just resembled the old canal. Could this be the last watered section in the east (31-31b)? We soon crossed the next bridge and looked for signs of where the canal would have crossed. We were able to see where the railroad bridge used to be, so we knew it was alongside it because it was said trains used to pull the canal boats across. Also, the Pulaski Skyway had just gotten a paint job (32-37). At the far end of the bridge we turned right/south on Rt 440 which was built over the canal, and I found a George W Bush picture (37a-38).
Along the Morris Canal in Jersey City
We followed 440 and turned left where County Rt 602 turned. The canal went directly between through a parking lot (39,40). Next, we came to a surprising greenway in Jersey City, where a swath of the canal was saved parallel with Sullivan Drive (41-46).
The Morris Canal in Jersey City
This took us to a small ballfield park where we walked along the back end (47). The others went around the park to the next road, while Chris and I tried scaling some crazy fences thinking we could get through.
Chris climbing through a fenced off section of the Morris Canal in Jersey City
We had no such luck and had to turn back to climb them all over again (48). We took Sycamore Road to 63rd street which took us back to the canal and another piece of nice greenway across JFK Blvd (49-52). When we reached Ruby Brown Terrace there was still an underpass below the railroad tracks, possibly for the canal in the weeds opposite (53). We had to turn left though to get under the NJ Turnpike on Avenue C. On the opposite side the canal was recognizeable where it crossed from someone's back yard (54) to a parking lot across (55). The canal's route took us through parking lots and such and I tried to limbo under a sign (55a,55b), then headed way down Avenue E too far. I tried crossing over the railroad and highways to find a way of going north closer to the canal with no luck (56-57a). Because most of the canal in this section was either under the NJ Turnpike or the railroad, and because we'd walked this section before, we again got on the Jersey City light rail and took it north ot Richard Street where the canal turned away again (58-60a). We walked up Garfield Ave parallel with the canal, and could only see where it crossed some roads barely (61). Most of it for a while was behind fences and in inaccessable places. We walked up to Grand Street and turned right paralleling it. Much of it went into communities, but we remained a couple blocks away because it went right back into fenced areas and then came close to Grand Street. I took a shopping cart we'd found and pushed it for quite a ways (61a-61g). We ended up taking Jersey Ave across into Liberty State Park to parallel the Morris Canal Big Basin out to the CNJ Railroad station. Bobo was quite tired and falling way behind. We watched the sun set and kept Bobo moving along. Finally we left him behind and I rode back to him on Shelly's bike and made him take it to get back to us faster on the south side of Liberty State Park/Black Tom area (61h-73a).
On the train in Jersey City
No comments:
Post a Comment