Hike #648; Spruce Run Reservoir

 Hike #648; Spruce Run Reservoir Perimeter

8/31/12 Spruce Run Reservoir Perimeter with John Spiridon, Jason Itell, "Naaron" Young, and Geoff Foschetti

The group on the wide, dry shore, Spruce Run.

My next hike would be another evening jaunt, this time hiking the entire perimeter of Spruce Run Reservoir after work. I'd been wanting to do this for some time, when the water was low enough, but just never got around to it. If I didn't do it now, while working at Spruce Run Recreation Area, it would be pitiful!

I thought I'd had a good number of people going, but when I got out of work at 3:30 only John Spiridon was ready to go. No matter, we headed from the 24 hour fishing lot at the corner of Van Syckles Road and Rt 31 onto the reservoir. A guy stopped us at first asking if he could hunt on the reservoir with the water down since it was not technically on the safety zone map. I didn't have an answer for him and directed him to fish, game and wildlife office. He wanted to shoot canada geese, a huge problem bird, and I doubt many would have a problem with him for doing so.

Another guy was there bird watching anyway, so better not to pester. We continued down along Spruce Run Creek, finding it's original channel back on the normally flooded reservoir floor. The original highway bridge, part of the Spruce Run Turnpike was off to the left, now out of the water again. When the reservoir was drained in the 1980s, I walked across it with my grandfather. I would do it again later on this night.

I was looking around for the remains of the Union Furnace, but I could not find it. I was told the footings of the old thing were visible when the water was low, but I could see nothing. Bruce, my co worker, told me it was over by the cattail plants. I didn't see anything there either.

We made our way back along the shore heading west, which could be a bit squishy, but easy enough to walk on. The shore soon became stony and we just followed it. I had been planning to hike the Highlands Trail for a section, but the water was so low that we opted to just stay on the shore the entire time.

We passed by the wildlife observation blind, which was now far inland, and then followed the abandoned roadway that went across near Area 4. My co worker Geoff showed me this when I first started, and I wanted to see more of it. I could see that it must have come from the boat launch area maybe, or maybe it was from further up. Back where we started, I noticed another road once crossed over Spruce Run Creek from near the old highway bridge over Willoughby Brook's entrance. I didn't notice this one before, or I didn't remember it. It must have been just under the reservoir side, or maybe it was taken over by the boat launch area.

Once beyond the boat launch, it was paved, right on the shore from area 4. When we walked by boat concession we could see it again, with pavement protruding. The pavement was a tar and chip material, and it was decaying to where not much of it was still exposed.

We continued down past area 5, then walked the paved path from across the beach complex to the tower area. In the 1930s, this was supposedly a dog training area. There was an old club house and tower building. While John was changing into shorts in the tower, I climbed up the tower, where the ladder had been removed.

We continued from here on the much rockier shore out past the ranger dock, behind the maintenance building where I work, and took a swim. We then continued along the rocky shore further. Naaron was nearby, and headed to meet up with us at another fishing lot further down. John and I continued to the black brook inlet, and crossed on the mucky stuff to more dry land. Geoff also called me a bit earlier and decided to meet up at least for a little bit. He showed up at that same point, as well as Jason Itell. Together, the four of us continued along the shore heading west. This entire first section before the rest of the group joined had a few foundations below water level, and after we found one foundaction area that had a round spot. I guessed that was a barn and silo.

When we got to the west end of the reservoir, there was a spot where we could either go way out and around or cut through muck. Jason and I cut through the muck. Somehow he managed not to get his feet wet. The toughest part was when we got to a more reasonable sized stream going across. I was able to jump it, as was Jason, but others were not so lucky and either got their feet wet, or took shoes off to cross.

It was starting to get dark, and the sun was setting to the west. by this point we had gotten to the southwest side of the reservoir, with still many more inlet areas to go. We saw more of the Jellyfish like Colonia Bryozoans like we had seen the previous week in Beltzville State Park washed up on shore, and Jason found what he believed may have been an actual freshwater Jellyfish, because it appeared so different.

Geoff decided to cut out in this area before it got too dark. He made his way back around, and we thought we'd be able to see him from the shore, but it was too dark and we made our way around to the next inlet too fast. He did make it back okay, as I recieved confirmation via text message later, just when I was about to call him.

The rest of us continued on, and the moon rose on the Clinton side of the lake. It case a lovely, eerie light over the water, and we were already getting the shadow from it as the last bit of sun disappeared over the western horizon.

I stopped for one more swim where there were larger rocks, and a rather obvious deep drop off. The rocks required some hand hold climbing to get over at one point, but we all managed with ease. We then continued along, past an island in the water, then toward a small dike on the southwest side.

I was watching the GPS, and we would have a long, roundabout trip to do the next peninsula, and it would be behind chain link fences, so we figured it best to head out here. We would need to get into Clinton anyway, to bypass the dam which we could not walk across, and this was the only way to get down I could see. We walked the reservoir bed and climbed the dike, which appeared to be used as a trail of some kind, then turned left. A farm lane led through a line of trees and into a field, and we crossed the field directly. Near the other end, closer to homes now closely in sight, we found three kids smoking weed. I asked them if they knew how to get out to the nearest road. Two guys there looked freaked out and paranoid, and didn't say a word. After a moment of silence, the young girl there said "yeah, I'll show you". She walked into the woods a bit and pointed us to the right on another farm lane, and gave us the names of the streets we were looking for. We wandered out and found our way to a wooden gate at the quarry road which loops back to the old red mill. This would probably be closed off, so we turned left briefly to Ruppells Road and turned left again. This took us right down into Main Street, Clinton, Rt 173. We turned left here and just walked down the lovely main street with it's Victorian houses. Once we got to the Clinton House, a former stage coach hotel, we headed out and back to stop at the Krauszers Food Store for snacks and drinks. I argued with the owner, who had just renovated, about how he should sell breakfast sandwiches, and how he didn't have Arizona RX Energy drinks in stock. He was laughing and got a kick out of me, and proved to be a very nice guy.

I headed back to the Clinton House and turned right to cross the old main bridge over the South Branch of the Raritan, at the Old Red Mill, the most photographed building in NJ other than Liberty State Park. The historic mill has been on postcards, in movies, on tv, and in countless magazines, often gracing the cover.

After crossing the bridge, we continued out along back streets; the main street, although it was around 10 pm, was still quite alive on this Friday night. We followed Rt 513 across the South Branch again, then up hill toward Rt 31. We then turned left and walked along the paved parallel road closer to the reservoir. At this point, a water authority guy drove up to us asking what was going on. I told him we were hiking the perimeter of the reservoir, but he told us we couldn't be on that lane. Since Aaron and I were both in our park uniforms, he said "oh, you guys work there? Do you know the guy who owns the red camper". Naaron said, "yeah, that's me"."Oh, you're the vet?" the man asked. Naaron had recently been discharged from the US Army, and I got  him the job at SRRA working with me as a seasonal, and he was staying in the park in his camper.

Naaron replied that it was him."You have the bow on your front seat...?" the man asked."Yup" Naaron said. I figured he was getting in trouble. The guy said something about having a license, but Naaron wasn't hunting with it. The man went on to say that he had been in the Marines years ago.

He asked me for my license, which I gladly gave him."Wow...32 years old..." the man said as he handed my license back to me. I didn't know what to think of this statement, but I took it as though he was referring to my youth, although 32 to me doesn't seem so young to make such a comment. Jason later commented that the guy was probably expecting to see a group of kids wandering the road, not some thirty somethings and one 61 year old. He probably was right about that!The guy asked where we were going, and I replied that we were parked at the 24 hour lot. He said "Hop in, I'll give you a ride". I thanked him, but told him we were trying to walk the whole perimeter, and that we could just walk 31 since it's so close.

The seemed to think about it for a second, then said, that we could walk that road he told us not to, beyond where we would have turned off, and into the restricted area beyond the chain link fence. He said it would take us back up near the administrative offices for the water authority.

We thanked him, and laughed happily at our good fortune for meeting the guy. We'd now walk more of the reservoir perimeter closely, and with official permission!

We followed the road as it headed out onto another open area. We somehow lost where it turned back out, so we headed back down to the shore and followed it north. We were soon able to see the lights from cars on Van Syckles. The end was in sight, but still far away.

We stayed on the shore, which was pretty rocky, until we came to a jetti sticking out into the water. There were a couple guys on what appeared to be a pontoon boat, flashing lights at us. We weren't stopped again though. Jason and I went to climb around the jetti, but in the dark it was going to be far too tough to make our way around to continue. We instead climbed up to the edge of a grassy lawn area. It seemed like it was just someone's private house. We skirted the yard, and figured it must be a resident care taker. We followed the grass to the driveway, which came out at the water authority place. We then cut through more grass to a line of trees on the north side of the yard. We followed this up to Rt 31 and turned left.

We were only on 31 a bit and then turned left through woods onto the abandoned old highway route, the former Spruce Run Turnpike which ran from the mills in Clinton to Oxford Furnace. My grandfather taught me all about this road when I was little, in several hikes we did the entire thing. I'd like to lead a group on it as well one day.

The old road was overgrown, but once under the forest canopy it got easier. We followed it to where it would normally go under water, and turned left to the bridge over Willoughby Brook, which also is usually under water. I could see the old bridge site we saw earlier, with crumbling abutments and pavement of the former intersection. This was probably the road that went out through Area 4 as well. We crossed the bridge, and continued out to the lot. I turned left and just walked across Spruce Run Creek, but some of the others went out to cross the regular bridge.

I scaled that we did 15.8 miles to hike the entire reservoir perimeter as closely as possible. We had achieved a goal that I had been wanting to do for many years. I took a photo of the reservoir map at a kiosk that Geoff and I had recently repaired, and felt a great sense of accomplishment. It was more than just another 15+ mile hike, it was a life changing thing. I would never look at that body of water, which I see every day, in the same way. We had "conquered" it, and it would now seem more tangible.

John and I discussed "Conquering" Round Valley Reservoir next. I think it sounds like a great idea.