Hike #1036; North Hunterdon Loop

Hike #1036; North Hunterdon Loop

5/10/17 North Hunterdon Spruce Run and Hampton Loop with Jason W. Briggs, Richard Kowal, Jessica M. Collins, Rob Gearheardt, Celeste Fondaco Martin, Ellie Zabeth, and Shayna Michaels.

Our next hike would be a big loop out of the Spruce Run area, this time meeting at the large 24 hour lot on Van Syckles Road next to Spruce Run Reservoir. I’d met there many times in the past for hikes, and done variations of this, but I had an idea to add a few different bits.

Vines on the HT in Spruce Run Rec Area

It’s extremely easy to just park right where I can get to out of work at 3:30, and so that’s what I did. Something simple.
We started out by following the Highlands Trail directly. I’d just done a good section of it the previous Saturday, so it’s sort of the same theme, but totally different area.
The trail headed into Union Furnace Nature Preserve, a Hunterdon County Park. We followed it along the old raceway which dates back to the days of the Union Ironworks in 1742, and continued to where it starts to climb up hill steeply above the creek. The leaves were mostly out by this time, but when we crested the hill, we could still see a bit of the reservoir view through the trees.

HT at Spruce Run

The trail emerges on Serpentine Drive, and follows it back down hill. It then turns left on Van Syckles Road and into the parking lot at the edge of the recreation area, then right into the woods.
That second parking lot coming from Rt 31 exists because that was the original route of Van Syckles Corner Road prior to the development of the reservoir. It used to go straight on into the water, but was rerouted and curved in the late 1960s to bypass the reservoir.
We took the trail into the lovely grove of White Pine, which was rerouted a couple of years ago away from the Autumn Olive thickets that were too hard to maintain.

Spruce Run

The trail weaved through the woods until it eventually came out on Boat Launch Road. We only walked that a short distance on the “official” trail route, across a small creek bridge, before turning left into woods. There is an informal path that leads to the wood dump area in the back of one of the lesser used recreation areas which eliminates the busy road route. We emerged on the cul de sac, and rather than walk the road we took to the shore line on the grass as close as we could.
The Highlands Trail guide says that the blazes area along the unused parking lot and maintenance only service road, but that visitors can walk in the grass closer to the waterfront to get to the same place. Of course, we did that.

Spruce Run

We returned to the service road near lower picnic area #3, then continued across to picnic area #2, where the trail now turns down to the beach complex. We followed it through there, along the paved walkway and nice views of the waterfront.
The odd buildings are antiquated now, falling apart and in need of some help. They were designed and built in the late sixties and early seventies, and the park opened to visitors in 1972 (the first full season was reportedly ‘73).
We continued on the pathway out to the tower area where we stopped so everyone could use the restrooms. We then continued along the trail route only around the corner, and turned past the administration building where the mowed path to a gas line right of way cuts off another road walk section.

Shot up trail marker

Highlands Trail crosses over Van Syckles Road and follows the access road to the Spruce Run well house, and then turns left through fields in a seldom mowed swath. We continued on that until it came back out to Van Syckles Road once more, crossed the bridge over Black Brook, then turned left on yet another abandoned former route of Van Syckles Road. I did another little history lesson on that for everyone there, and we continued further into Clinton Wildlife Management Area.
In this area, I noted that the HT blazes had been recently shot up by some hunter. It’s not just on the Warren Highlands Trail that we have these constant issues with people damaging stuff.
We continued weaving between fields, tree lines, and woods, and soon descended to the edge of a scenic pond within the fish and game lands.

Pond in Clinton WMA

Just above us in this area is the 1760 Joseph Turner House, now the Solitude Heritage Museum of the Union Forge Heritage Association. We didn’t have a tour of it this time, but hope to do another one in the near future.
We continued along the edge of the lovely pond through the lands, then made our way back up and along the edges of more fields, as well as through tree lines and such. I had to watch pretty closely this time for where the turns were. Some of the posts that have them marked were missing, but it was such a fine job marking that we barely lost the trail. Only at one point in the entire Clinton WMA stretch did we miss one of the turns and have to backtrack, which wasn’t too bad.

Pond in Clinton WMA

We emerged at the last field of the WMA lands, and headed along the top with a nice little view of the surrounding Union Township lands. We reached the edge parallel with Van Syckles Road and continued to follow it to the west.

View in Clinton WMA

Where we came out to the road itself, at a creek crossing, we passed the colonia Van Syckles Tavern, one of the few buildings still standing associated with the original Union Ironworks.
From here, we turned right to follow Charlestown Road, which has a nice wide shoulder, up the hill.
Elizabeth was having trouble with her dog, so she had someone come and pick him up for her and she could have a less stressful remainder of the hike.
We continued past the nice big tree and on up to Norton Church along Charlestown Road.

Big tree on Charlestown Road

At Norton Church Road, the Highlands Trail turns to the left and continues up hill. This section has always been a sour point for me. When I was working for Hunterdon County Parks, easements and such were put in place to route the Highlands Trail through this area.

Norton Church Cemetery

The trail used to go up hill from Clinton Wildlife Management Area, to a confluence of parts of the Black Brook, then onto an abandoned former section of Polktown Road. From there, a short road walk led to Charlestown Reservation, and a contiguous greenway existed all the way to Tower Hill Reserve. Unfortunately, someone who lived next to one of the easements placed a trampoline on top of it, and Hunterdon Parks said they weren’t going to ask them to move it, so they would just “give up the easement”. Through their spinelessness, they made necessary the longest single road walk on the entire Highlands Trail.

Old lime kiln

We continued up Norton Church Road, and I pointed out a decrepit old lime kiln, as well as a home on the corner of Mountainview Road and Norton Church designed in part by a woman named Carla who hikes with us.
We headed to the right up Mountainview Road, and continued until we got to the boundary with the Tower Hill Reserve. We cut into the corner there and followed the mowed perimeter path around the right hand side heading to the east, and then to the north.
Tower Hill is another place of horrible failure to me. The place was the home of Thomas Edison’s bookeeper, and his wife made the first movie screen and was voice of the first talking doll. The Tower Hill farm is totally connected to the Edison cement industry found just down the hill over the Warren County side.

Tower Hill House in 2008

Unfortunately, despite putting a fortune into the old Tower Hill Farm house, Hunterdon County decided to tear it down. When I asked why it was torn down, I was told “It’s had additions on it, it’s no longer historically accurate”. These two additions to the early 1800s farm house were made as I recall in 1890 and 1910 as I recall.
The inside of the house was very nice, with no mold, and new windows had been placed in it. Still, somehow they found a way to tear it down. It was an absolute disgrace.
Now only the spring house from the old farm remains, which is significant because it’s a rare two story one.
We continued around the outside of the park until we reached the power line clearing.

Tower Hill view

Here, we turned right, leaving Tower Hill. We had already left the Highlands Trail already at the point we entered the park, as it heads to the west toward Jugtown Mountain Nature Preserve.
There was a nice view from the power line near the edge of the park, and I posed it to the group that we could try something new and follow it for a while, because we just might be able to get into a Raritan Township municipal park land just a little further on and eliminate some of the road walking.
The power line was pretty clear, and we were able to follow it down hill with no problem. We crossed over a woods road that appears to connect to private lands, but just after that we stone hopped over a brook and climbed rather steeply to enter the township property beyond.

Township lands

We were able to follow the farm roads from here very easily to the east. I watched to the left to see if we could find a way to get out of the preserve and onto Mine Road, but I didn’t see anything really. We ended up having to go a bit further to the east to get out where I was sure we would be alright. Once out, we turned left on the road and made our way to the intersection with Iron Bridge Road, the steepest road in Hunterdon County.
We turned right on Iron Bridge Road, which went up slightly at first, but then rather steeply down. Hardly any cars passed us on our entire route down it. It’s really a pretty pleasant road to walk.

Iron Bridge Road

We continued until we got to it’s namesake iron bridge, which carries the road over the former Central Railroad of New Jersey, which came to this area about 1852-53. The main line below is now out of service to Glen Gardner, but kept clear. A bit of it to the west has been connected with former rival Lehigh Valley Railroad, and west of there it was severed by Interstate 78 in about 1986. We climbed down and began following the tracks heading to the east.
I’ve always gotten a kick out of this area. It’s quite odd and redneck, especially for posh Hunterdon. The rail bed acts as a driveway for a number of houses back there, which is certainly not really a legal thing. I can’t think of anywhere else there are tracks and driveway so close together.
We had a very simple walk to Hampton, and I told everyone some of the history there, how the town was simply named “Junction” Because of the Junction with the Central Railroad of NJ and the Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western.
After a while, with junctions appearing everywhere, the generic name was no longer good enough, and so when a more specific name was needed, they looked not farther than the nearby hamlet of New Hampton, a colonial village on the Musconetcong River also traversed by the railroad. The town became Hampton Junction.
By 1955, the junction itself was defunct, and at some point the town dropped “Junction” and just became “Hampton”. This is why the town of New Hampton is actually so much older than Hampton.

Hampton Junction and station historic view

Once we reached the old Hampton rail yard, Elizabeth was only a couple blocks from home and decided to call it quits. Shayna decided to go with her, and I believe Rob did as well. The rest of us continued on along the tracks past the junction site and under the new Rt 31 bridge.
As we neared Glen Gardner, the moon had risen and was shining on the tracks, delineating our path beautifully.

Mon and tracks

In Glen Gardner, we got to Celeste’s house, and we were going to go over for cheese, but everyone at that point just wanted to get done, so we powered on ahead.
Jess got really very far ahead, as she’s a super fast hiker. Fortunately we caught her before she overshot our turn to get back.
We turned when we got to the bridge for Buffalo Hollow Road, and then followed the road, which is also the Highlands Trail route, down hill to Rt 31. A quick walk left and right on Van Syckles put us back at the lot to finish the hike.
It was a nice consolation that people were still willing to continue to the end with me on this. I’ve not canceled any of the hikes due to no one showing up since early 2004, and with my work schedule changing drastically for the first time, I’ve had a fear that it might slip through the cracks somehow. It’s probably just me overthinking it, but the fear is there. So far, so good, and I am very thankful for everyone’s company in these crazy wanderings.