Hike #666; Lackawanna Heritage

 Hike #666; Lackawanna Heritage

11/25/12 Lackawanna Heritage/Minooka-Scranton to Archbald with Jason Kumpas, Tim Kovich, Michele Valerio, Doug Bradley, Brad Baesic, and Allie Aniska

The group having dinner in Archbald PA

This next hike would be a point to point connecting a hike Jillane and I had done between Dickson City and Archbald Pa, mostly following the rout of the Lackawanna Heritage Trail, and along the Lackawanna River.

We met in the morning in a town park along the river in Archbald, and then headed southbound to a Big K Mart where we'd started off a Wilkes Barre and Eastern Railroad hike a year earlier, in Minooka. The site we started at was the site of the former Greenwood Breaker and other things where the Wilkes Barre and Eastern spur ended. Below the site was the former Delaware and Hudson Railroad Pennsylvania branch. We headed down hill behind the store through overgrown open fields, across a probably retention basin and to an access lane beside the active former D&H tracks. We followed them to the right. There wasn't much to show of what would have been the breaker where coal was handled. The open fields were now only a haven for ATVs.We followed the access drive on to Davis Street, climbed up, and used it to cross the Lackawanna River. We could see the former junction site below where the former Central Railroad of NJ Scranton Branch would have joined with the Lackawanna Railroad line. This CNJ line was now the Lackawanna Heritage Trail a bit further on, but it was not accessible from this point. We had to head up into the little town of Taylor and turn right on Main Street. The town was interesting enough, with a nice mural painted on the wall, that Allie's former classmates had painted. When we got to the road where it seemed we should descend to the trail, it looked to be just the rail yard drive, and we didn't know that we could legitimately get through. There was a train right there, so we continued a little bit. There was a nice abandoned building off to the left, to the north, which Jas pointed out to us. Maps show that this was the historic site of the Taylor Shaft and Moffat Breaker, now large open fields. Jason said that it was left standing with hopes that someone might one day put a restaurant or something in there. It is rather cool looking, and nice that something was preserved.I spotted a dry wash below the road, and began heading down. Sure enough, it had a nice old culvert under the DL&W tracks, so we went on through and walked the dry wash downstream to the Lackawanna Heritage Trail/CNJ grade. There was a bridge still in the process of being completed with redecking. One middle span was pretty much done, but needed fill on either side, and two other spans on the left and right were only I-beams remaining.We crossed, and there were side paths going off to the right, closer to the Lackawanna River. The trail in this section had unfortunately been paved, and seemed more like a road. We saw people jogging it on this section, which justified that we were going the correct way, but it all seemed so overdone.

We followed the paved path, and the lesser paths to the right rejoined after a bit. There was little trace of rail bed, and the route we walked was not graded so much like one, but the area had been so torn up that I suppose the line might not retain it's former grade. The trail remained paved and easy to hike, with one former spur line spot and bridge across the river along the way, all the way to Elm Street. There, there was a lot of large equipment sat around (no keys left in any) for the trail construction. Beyond Elm Street, the trail was much nicer. Simple gravel surface trail closer to the river on the former CNJ rail bed.We continued on and passed ball fields that are now on the site of the Scranton Round house for the CNJ, and then crossed Broadway Street.We continued along the trail, but took a detour as per Jason's recommendation to head up to Lackawanna Ave north. In Scranton, near Steamtown, we turned left and headed to North Main Ave, turned left, and then visited his favorite hot dog place. He treated everyone to hot dogs, which was fantastic. They were pretty good! I almost ordered mine without mustard or chili, but Jason recommended against that, so I changed it. It was messy, but tasty!

On the main street, there was one curious building that was slowly dipping into the ground, probably from some underground mine collapse. It looked so strange to see the very front perfectly straight, but the rest of the building on such a crazy angle. The building ironically housed a business for building adornments like framing and draperies. I joked that they wouldn't keep anything level.

After scarfing down some dogs, we headed back to the trail, which turned away from the CNJ grade where the Lackawanna Railroad trestle overpass was, to head closer to the river. There was a lovely old CNJ station at the grade above us, sitting vacant. We talked about how it would make a great restaurant in such a good location.

The CNJ line ended at the station, and beyond it was a branch of the New York, Ontario, and Western. I'd hiked many sections of these lines, but never this piece. I actually wouldn't be on it this time yet either, because the trail stayed below it. When we got to Olive Street, the trail ended. Fortunately, the flood protection berm continued along the Lackawanna River, and we walked it on the north/west side.Before Poplar Street, the path on top of the berm became a fenced in line on grey gravel, which was a change in scenery. The rail bed of the O&W line was farther over to the left in areas that were now turning to retail stores. We did see one old trolley shop still standing. There was also an abandoned soda place, a company that Jason and Tim talked about that they used to like.On the other side of Poplar, the trail continued on a grass berm up stream. Shortly after crossing Albright Ave, the O&W rail bed came to the edge of the river, though we could see no remnants of it. It must have been covered over by the flood retention berm. When we got to Green Ridge Street, the pathway had pretty much ended, and we had to walk by someone's private shed, and on a messed up old rail bed that now was obviously just that. However, under Green Ridge Street bridge over the river, the rail bed seemed to abruptly end. We assumed this must have simply been a spur or something that ended there. We climbed up to the bridge and used it to cross over the river. On the other side, we turned to follow another flood control berm adjacent to retail areas. From there, we could see that a grade resumed after a short distance on the shore we had just been on. I assumed that maybe the original rail bed on that side had been washed away by a flood, or maybe the hillside had collapsed on it. After seeing maps later on, my suspicion was correct. That former line was covered over with dirt, or if it protruded, it has since washed away completely. We watched the grade become more like a rail bed until we reached Market Street where we crossed the river once more, and resumed our walk on the railroad, at what is called something Reach, I forget what exactly. This section of the trail was nice, below a steep slope with the river close by. There was a skinny guy dressed rather formally along the way, doing something we couldn't figure out before reaching the end of this trail section.

Depot Street to Dean Street in an area called The Huts or something was clear and easy, but then we had to walk parallel to the east to continue. The old railroad's fill was pretty much completely gone, but the abutments to bridges where it would have crossed the roads were still in place and higher up. There was some sort of substantial coal trestle or something a bit further on, but not much of it remained to positively identify it.Ahead, the O&W would have crossed the Lackawanna River toward the Marvine Breaker site, but there was no longer a bridge across, just the remains of an abutment. We turned left and continued along the river atop more flood retention berms. Unfortunately, the berm did not last for long. We got down along the river briefly, and then had to walk the former D&H RR active tracks. We were hidden, with the river to our right and the steep hillside to the left. We soon were reaching areas I was more familiar with from exploring in the past.Overhead, we soon reached some interested trussed bridges over the rails and Lackawanna River. Jason pointed out that this must be all that remains of the former Marvine Breaker. He was correct. The breaker was situated mostly across the river in an area that now appears to be some sort of sand quarry or something. There's a recycling center beyond. Before the previous hike in Dickson City, I did a hike by myself where I wandered to the Lackawanna River, and followed it down stream. I passed beneath Rt 6 and found ATV paths toward the breaker site, then crossed a trestle to get back on the roads on the other side. I figured I might one day use some of that route I'd found as part of a hike, and I was right.I looked at my GPS, and figured if we tried to cross these old Marvine Breaker bridges, we could skirt the quarry area and pick up the ATV trails I had followed previously. I climbed up to check out the surface of the more sturdy looking truss bridge. It was totally fine! There were even some old narrow gauge rails in the decking of it for moving coal cars. I called out to everyone that it was okay to cross, and I continued on myself. On the other side, the edge of it had been plowed away, assuming to keep ATV riders off of it. I did a running jump off, and the coal dust piles was soft enough to brace a landing. No one else wanted to pull a jump unfortunately! I scouted a bit ahead with Doug, and found the path I remembered coming out on during my solo trip, at a former D&H spur line bridge. Once everyone caught up, we entered paths along the river on the other side.We wandered through, and some paths disappeared, but then we found another which led us out the way I though it would. We hit a power line access road which took us out the same place I'd explored recently, on Boulevard Ave, which took us under Rt 6 into the town of Throop.

We soon reached the bridge over the river, and entered Dickson City. We turned right to follow the flood retention berm once more, and continued to where I'd started off my previous hike up there with Jillane, connecting the two. I was happy to reach that goal. We then continued along to see the rest of the route as I'd done it in the past. We followed along the retention berm, and cut away when we got to a ball field. Brad was hollering inspirational words to kids playing foot ball, and one of them even came over to chat with us.We turned right on Enterprise Street, and I found a shopping cart, which I pushed until we turned 90 degrees to the left to the active former D&H tracks again. We followed the tracks, and passed the site where a spur line used to cross Lackawanna River. We then continued on the tracks a short distance until we got to an ATV path off to the right. This took us into a disturbed area riddled with ATV paths on the historic site of the Olyphant Breaker. There was a beat up old iron rail bridge still standing, spanning the river. It's metal trusses were warping all out of shape, and one would wonder how this ever held locomotives.We continued on to the nice double through style truss bridge entering the town of Olyphant. Brad was having leg trouble, so we slowed up a little bit. On the other side of the bridge, we turned left and followed the riverside berm once again around a dramatic turn.Once we reached Lackawanna Ave, the berm becomes private land, and so we had to parallel it instead. Brad and Allie waited behind at a bar rather than finish the hike because Brad's leg was getting really bad. He was okay after stopping.The rest of us continued until I think it was Jackson Street where we could return to the berm as a trail. The trail continued as part of a parcourse circuit, and we stopped to do some of the exercise stations. We then continued on across a foot bridge over Lackawanna River into Mellow Park, where the trail parallelled closely the former O&W Railroad once again. Once at the other end of Mellow Park, we cut across the library grounds and had to follow some back streets until we reached Depot Street. There, the trail continued on the rail bed more or less into Blakely.We made a pit stop at a convenience store to use the restrooms and get some junk food, and then continued on closely parallel to Main Street. The rail trail then turned away from the road, closer to the river. There was a nice beaver swamp off to the right, and we could see the billowy sulfer staining to the water. The trail had to divert from the rail bed a couple times because it had been developed over, and the second time offered a nice river view at a rock outcropping.We passed another former bridge site, with only abutments remaining, then came to Winton Road. We continued straight across on a dead end street, as Jillane and I had done previously, but as we got out there, a guy asked us where we were going. I'd thought there'd be a bridge over the river ahead, because my map sort of showed that would happen, but an old guy stopped his car and told us we were going the wrong way, nothing goes through yet. I told him I'd heard about the bridge and he said "Well, you're not gonna find it!". I didn't want to believe him at first, but then we turned around to Winton Road and used it to cross the river. I'm glad we did, because we never saw a sign of a bridge.Across the road bridge, we turned left and then came to the active railroad crossing. There was an abandoned right of way at a lower level parallel with it, and it continued ahead as the trail at a gate. It was rather nice, through a big cut and on a shelf above the river. Most of this entire trail was overdone with fences and such, but we could deal with it. We passed some more ruins and a station stop as we entered the town of Archbald.The trail came out at Laurel Street after the foundations, and we wandered it just a little bit to the north, and reached our vehicles. Since mine was at the beginning and Jas was going back to pick up Brad and Allie for dinner, I decided to keep walking by myself to see what else there was. It wasn't totally dark yet, but it was getting there.The trail led along the edge of a park, then turned along Lackawanna River. There was an abutment, only one, left from where the O&W railroad once crossed the river. No sign of a fill on my side. There was also apparently a gravity reailroad of the D&H that once crossed the river here, but I didn't notice any remnants.  I continued along the trail which led me out to Monroe Street. I turned left on it, across the river, and walked left for a bit. The town was rather quaint, small but substantial. I eventually reached Barret's Pub. I wasn't sure if that was the place Jas had mentioned going to eat, but when I saw NJ plates on a car, I assumed that must've been Doug's so I wandered on in. Sure enough, I found he and Michele sitting in the far end of the room.Jason, Brad, and Allie returned soon, and we all had a very nice dinner together with good pizza and amazing wings. Everyone insisted on treating me to my dinner, which was so appreciated, though not necessary. I've got fantastic friends. I really enjoyed this hike quite a lot. It opened a lot of doors to do other hikes all over the area, continually connecting them and making them a part of our hiking world. I can't wait to do the next one up in that area. We talked all day about the different places we have to get to. It makes me very excited about the future.