Hike #664; Long Pond Ironworks/Ringwood Loop

 Hike #664; Long Pond Ironworks/Ringwood Loop

11/18/12 Long Pond Ironworks/Ringwood Loop with Matt Davis, Brad Anesi, Shelly Janes, Bobbi Landrock, Tom Straus, Jack Lowry, Jaque Melo, Frank Meloi, Jitka Malkova, Chris D., Susie Duncan, Diane ?, Cristina Zicaro, Andrew Van Houten, and Ted Wright.

The group on Hasenclever Iron Trail

Our next hike would be a great loop between Long Pond Ironworks and Ringwood State Parks. I planned to meet everyone at LP Ironworks at the corner of Greenwood Lake Turnpike and East Shore Road. When I arrived with Matt, many had already arrived.I had begun posting my hikes through another meetup group. A man named Dennis Lee was running a NJ/PA/NY hiking group with a few thousand members, and I suggested my trips, and was surprised to see he posted them. I was already getting newcomers through the Metrotrails group, but this meetup was already established and was helping to pull more people in to my hikes. We ended up with a total of sixteen participants, a really diverse group of new and old friends from different times of my life.It was great because Matt, Shelly, and I were all together, the heart of Metrotrails really because we do everything. Then we had Brad, who knows the area better than everyone else, Frank who was involved with abandonedmines.net and knew the mines we were passing quite well, and many other regulars. It was good to see my old friend Tom Strauss again, who had last hiked with me in November 2004, and hadn't seen since Spring 2005. It was also nice to finally drag Cristina Zicaro out, who I'd pestered to come out hiking probably since 2006 or so. It all made for a good group.We started our hike by taking the northbound Highlands Trail to the old Long Pond Ironworks road, and turned right back out to Greenwood Lake Turnpike, passing by abandoned houses along the way. Some of them as I understand were to be destroyed during the flooding of the land that is now Monksville Reservoir. We checked out the buildings, and then came to Greenwood Lake Turnpike and the visitor center building, where we met with David Epstein of the Land Conservancy of NJ. I told Corey Tierney of the Dept. of Land Preservation in Warren Co. (who used to be employed by him) that I seem to run into him out in parks randomly, and so it was another coincidence that we ended up in the same spot again. Epstein seemed somewhat intrigued to see so many people crawling out of the woodwork to this tiny spot.We crossed the highway here to pick up the yellow blazed Writenour Trail. The trail blazes were probably done with spray paint and a template, because they were faded and really hard to follow. There were also blow downs over it at the beginning. Brad and I went ahead and figured out the route we were supposed to take. We headed over the hillside with a seasonal view of Monksville Reservoir, and then descended to the first Writenour Mine shaft area. It was just a depressed pit area full of water. A couple pits were visible in the area, and one mine was visible but mostly submerged beneath the waters of the reservoir. We descended to it, unsure of where exactly the trail went, and then turned left to follow the shore line back out to Greenwood Lake Turnpike. We soon found the blazes area and got to the road. We turned right at this point and walked the road across the causeway over the reservoir and then turned right onto the boat launch road. We continued from here along the white blazed Monks Trail. This took us along an abandoned road, and then steeply up to the top of Monks Mountain where there were seasonal views. There was also a side trail with different blazes that led to a year round nice view of Monksville Reservoir and the Wyanokie Mountains. Diane was doing really well except on the up hills when she slowed down, but I was proud of her for coming back out and trying another time after the first one.

Brad, Jitka, and I think Chris got way ahead with Cristina and her boyfriend. The rest of us descended a bit slower, and had to figure out where the trail turned when we came close to another parking lot. Another trail with Passaic River emblems on it joined and was coaligned for a bit, but it wasn't shown on the 2009 Trail Conference Map. We continued along the trail, and made a wrong turn on a woods road briefly, but soon found the correct way. We then started passing the former sites of the Winston Mines. The first we saw were just open areas and pits, but we came to one good one that was a shaft with a pier in it. I decided to head on down into it and see how far I could get. It was full of water, but I could get in to past the pillar, which looked really neat.

We could see pretty clearly that the Tennessee Gas company right of way and it's proposed expansion was bound to disturb these former iron mines, and certainly run the risk of contaminating drinking water supply with sulfur. This would be a valid argument against the expansion if anyone will go for it.We continued along the trail from here, and then down to the boat launch road to close in this short loop, from which we followed a green blazed trail across Greenwood Lake Turnpike, the Monks Connector Trail. The trail paralleled a paved dead end road, and then came down to it at it's end, in Tranquility Ridge County Park. We turned onto the old road, following the trail route, but first met a man with his giant black Newfoundland, a large dog that we at first thought was a bear. A very friendly and well mannered dog (save for the drool).We got back on the trail and soon turned right on the Hasenclever Iron Trail. This trail followed mostly old woods roads on it's way east, and was mostly on relatively easy terrain. This trail went by pretty fast. I had good conversations with so many people. Tom told me it was good to see some things don't change, regarding how my hikes are run. We talked about the past, where we've been, about state jobs, and more. Tom had originally wrote a letter of recommendation regarding me, in an effort to get me in at the state. He was really happy to here I was there, though maybe not in as good a position he'd have liked to see me in.

Cristina and her boyfriend cut out early because she was getting really hungry and hadn't brought food. The rest of us continued on the trail ahead. I was expecting it to be closed, but it was not. We headed on through, around chain link fences on the old road, and past some really cool looking ruins I would love to explore further when I revisit. The trail followed a short distance of the spur railroad line that serviced the Peters Mine. Peters Mine was the most productive of all of them in the entire Ramapo region, having been mined on and off for over 200 years. It was last opened I believe in the 1940s when all of the original buildings were demolished and the current structures were erected.We continued on, and the trail turned left on the abandoned portion of Peters Mine Road. Some of the group were nervous about the people who live in the area; often referred to as the "Jackson Whites", they are actually the remaining Ramapo (or Ramapough) indian nation. As the story goes, the remaining native americans joined with a group of runaway slaves and british women shortly after the American Revolution, and had lived in this untouched enclave ever since. I assured everyone that they were actually nice people, and that some of them had worked with me in the state parks. A lot of the myths were nothing more than just that.The trail turned right off of the road onto a foot path over a power line where we decided to break for lunch. I climbed to the highest rock outcrop on the utility line crossing, and was followed up by Frank. Soon, Matt and Shelly both had to climb it as well.After the nice break, we moved on along Hasenclever Iron Trail until it joined Manor Trail. Here, we all turned right to follow the Manor Trail south. When this trail got close to Margaret King Ave, Susie and Diane cut out and followed the road back to their cars. The remaining 11 of us continued on Manor Trail north, and came to Ringwood Mill Pond where we had another little break. I decided to walk across the dam (in the water), which was slippery but pretty cool. After this, we checked out the old cemetery where such famous area names like Robert Erskine graced the tomb stones. Erskine was an iron master, and there were many other names I'd read about on other stones as well.We continued on Manor Trail north, then followed White Trail for a ways. We turned off of White onto an umarked woods road for a bit, and followed it to a power line that closely followed the NY/NY state line. We then turned left and kept with the pathway parallel with the power line for a while. When we finally left the power line for good, the path on the power line split in two (I took the higher one) and we left the power line when they rejoined.

We headed down hill on what becomes Peters Mine Road again, but then made a right turn slightly up hill through a narrow valley following an old woods road on the north side of Hope Mountain. After This, we hit another intersection where we were to go right toward the NJ/NY state line again. There were several woods roads that broke off of this route that were not located. The road skirted the north side of Hope Mountain, then came to an intersection that went right and left. We went right heading for the state line further, and got confused about which roads were shown on the map. Newcomer Chris and I went over the maps and were trying to figure out some sense out of them. In most cases the maps are really good. Trails are totally accurate, but there was something wrong about the woods roads shown. I had my GPS open to compare to the map, but it didn't make much sense. We saw a woods road to the left just before the state line, so we took the fork heading west. This road went over a slight incline, then descended to more woods roads, in deeper trenches. We headed right and then left on a more prominent road, and figured this must be shown on the map due to it's width. It was shown, but we couldn't figure out which one of two it was. Soon, since we did not cross a stream as the one did, we figured it was the one further to the east. We passed by stone foundation ruins just before the woods road intersected with Hasenclever Iron Trail again.

We turned right on the trail and retraced our steps down to where we first turned onto it, then continued on it to the west along an abandoned road. We crossed a creek on a long abandoned road bridge, washed out around the sides, then turned left to skirt the edge of a hill. We went behind a home, then continued up hill through a saddle in the mountain, and descended the other side. We were singing silly songs as we climbed, and headed down.I was able to see the trail okay, but when we got to the Wanaque River, we had a problem. The bridge for the Hasenclever Iron and Highlands Trails had been washed out during Hurricane Irene, and was not replaced. The river is usually not so deep, and easy to cross via stone hops or fallen logs, but that was not the case this time. The water was deep, and the current strong. We went up and down the river searching for a good way, but there was none. I decided the best thing to do was to wade across. I instructed everyone on how to hold onto each other and to make a chain, locking wrists. I had already waded across and back twice looking for a good route, and was getting cold. I carried Bobbi on my back with two others holding my arms on either side as not to fall, then went back and repeated with Shelly on my back. Once everyone was across, we had to climb a stone wall and make our way past Long Pond Furnace. Buildings had been erected since my last visit to house the water wheels at the site.We hurried down the road onto the  Highlands Trail where we came in. I had a couple pairs of pants I passed out to others in the group, and everyone dispersed rather fast. It was a tiring way to finish off the day, and rather stressful. Frank told me it was always an adventure.

Getting in the car with the heat was great. Matt and I dropped off a disc to one of his clients on the way back and stopped for some pizza. We talked about what a great group we'd had. It was good to reflect on. Matt had told me recently how it felt when Kyle was still alive, with our core group and tromping around in the Farney Highlands or other places, how he felt like "nothing could stop us". I told him that we'd have that back. It would be different, but we'd have it back. This hike was a big step in the right direction I think. A great, diverse group, a little danger, excitement, diversity, and positive attitudes. Maybe we're already there and we don't realize it yet.