Hike #684; Clark's Landing to Oceanville

 Hike #684; Clark's Landing to Oceanville

2/24/13 Clarks Landing to Oceanville with David "Captain Soup" Campbell, Jaque Melo, Brandan Jermyn, Michele Valerio, Rob Creamer, Teun Ott, Oscar Alvaredo, Stephen Argentina, Dave Schreier, and Jerry G.

The group in Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge; Brigantine Division

Our next hike would be the next in the Perimeter of NJ series. Last time, we'd left off at Clark's Landing in the south; or we actually hiked north from there, but this time we'd begin at that point and walk south. We met at the end point, at the strip mall where the post office is in Oceanville, then shuttled north.

We had a nice sized group, not too big like some of the recent ones, and one newcomer, Jerry, who handled the hike quite well.

We shuttled to the north to Clarks Landing, and Stephen parked his Toyota way up into the dunes where it'd be difficult to get out. We began walking nearly right away, and followed Hay Road from the parking area back out to Clarks Landing Road and turned left, heading south.

This was probably the crappiest road walk of the hike. It's too bad there's not a better way to get around the section. There in fact might be, because there's NJ Natural Lands Trust property in there, but I don't know that there's a way to get through to the next public tract. It'd probably have to be an out and back walk.

We just followed the road nearly to the Garden State Parkway underpass, to a utility right of way near Port Republic that runs parallel where we planned to walk. As we waited there, an older man in a pickup pulled over to talk to us. He asked us what we were up to. Teun and Jerry had already wandered out onto the right of way to answer nature's call, and so I thought we were in trouble.

I told the man how this was part of a series to hike the entire perimeter of the state of NJ, and how we'd hiked about 2/3 of it. He was genuinely interested. I told him how we'd begun at Clarks Landing, and we were headed to Chestnut Neck. He shook my hand and said "Well, you just met the Mayor of Port Republic!". I was honored to meet the man, and furthermore it's nice to see such a good representative of his town, acting as an ambassador to these strangers gathered along his streets. Gary Giberson was his name, and he is a descendant of the original settlers of the area from the 1600s.

Mr. Giberson was good enough to give us an history talk on the area, and pose for a photo with the group. He told us about Atlantic White Cedar, and the giant stumps of the huge trees that can still be found in the water. I looked the man up on line, and he's quite a talented wood carver, who makes decoy birds. He's had many famous customers including George W. Bush.

When he said goodbye, we continued to walk along the utility right of way to reach a sand access road that follows that right of way, and serves as access to Port Republic Wildlife Management Area. Stephen and I jumped along the tops of wooden posts and continued down the road past the parking area. Eventually, the roadway turned off to the left toward the Mullica River, but we continued on the right of way. Rob went ahead to scout it out, to be sure we could get through. We had to go over a GS Parkway bridge to get past a creek outlet, and then come back to the right of way. There were about two lanes worth of construction going on along the Parkway, which made it safe to walk on.

Just a bit down the right of way, Rob went down to his knees in the phragmites. We ended up having to head back out to the Parkway and follow the construction lanes the short remaining distance east to the exit ramp. We followed that up to the bridges, with great views up the Mullica and it's associated wetlands. The bridge was in the process of being replaced. In fact, the new one was up and open, but the old one was still standing. It'd be nice if they left it as a pedestrian route. It doesn't look like there will be any pedestrian access to the area in the near future, and so it will be necessary for people to walk the route we'd walked to get around the perimeter of the state.

On the other side of the bridge. Rt 9 broke away from the Parkway, and we followed it south to the Chestnut Neck Battle Monument. It was a nice spot for a break. There was apparently a skirmish there where the Loyalists and British attacked an American fort that was near to the site at Chestnut Neck. There was a wooden rib of a boat that appeared during a low tide that was believed to have been from one of the boats that was sunk during the battle.

After our break, we continued along Rt 9 southbound, with a few views of the estuarine wetlands of Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge to the left. We'd often border more of Forsythe as we walked the roads. We continued to a bridge over the Nacote Creek, which offered views out toward Long Beach Island and the Barnegat Bay, as well as up the creek. It was quite nice. We then continued on 9 south until a left turn onto old King's Highway, the predescessor to Rt 9 here. Old New York Road I guess was a bit to the west through Port Republic proper.

The dirt road was a welcome change from the long road walk. Still, this hike was better than the previous one in this series because it had stuff to break up the monotony of the road walking.

Old Kings Highway came out to Rt 9 again where there was a giant old Pin Oak. Amazing tree. We took some photos and headed south. There were also abutments to the left, which looked almost like a railroad bed, but all the old maps I could find did not show any having been in the area.

We followed the road, and before reaching Smithville, turned left onto a paved trail that paralleled the road around a pond in a development. We came back to Rt 9 at the intersection of Smith Bowen Road. We opted not to follow this road, although it would be the true perimeter of NJ. It's a development and really boring, and just ahead was historic Smithville that is very much for tourists. We headed there, a short distance along 9. We turned right on Old New York Road, then left along the edge of the Smithville pond, where everyone was amazed by Muscovy Ducks. Muscovy are extremely ugly ducks, and I didn't see anything but the geese, so that's all I thought they were till Oscar and Steve showed me pictures.

We had to climb over a fence to get to the board walks at Smithville, which went out along the lake. It was a nice spot with a pizza place, chocolate store, winery, restaurants, and crafts. A few of us had the pizza, which were large slices and quite good. Then Captain Soup and I went in for a wine tasting. It was quite excellent in my opinion. Soup bought a good bottle of wine as well. I think the winery, tomasello, is near to Carol and Rob's house in Hammonton. We'll have to do a tour there in the future.

Stephen gave me some fudge he bought, and Jerry gave me some other great chocolate. This was a really nice stop. We left the village happy, and passed the old Smithville Church and Cemetery on our way out to Moss Mill Road. We followed this to the intersection with Bowen, where we would have come out (our route was a much better choice than the development), and soon reached the village of Leeds Point, legendary birthplace of the Jersey Devil. The house site is on private land near to the water, so we didn't go near it. We followed Blackman Road past the Leeds Point Cemetery and church, and past another lovely large oak tree, then followed Leeds Point Road to Stony Point Road and turned left. We passed through a gate, turned right on a woods path and soon reached Jen's Trail in Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge.

Oscar, Brandan, and Stephen had me laughing hysterically for a while here. They were relentlessly teasing Steve, and I joined in a bit. Steve, being the good sport that he is, would form his rebuttals in funny ways too. For all of Steve's pictures, Oscar and Brandan made immature gestures to mess with him more. The camaraderie of the group, especially with the energetic, happy go lucky newcomers like Oscar, Steve, Dave, and Brandan is really breathing new life into the group.

We reached a high knoll where we could barely see the tall buildings in Atlantic City. These hills are very uncharacteristic of shore areas, and it made it a more interesting hike. We followed Jen's Trail down hill along the edge of a good sized pond, which was quite lovely. The trail came out to their famous wildlife drive, which was about 70% finished with repairs following Hurricane Sandy. We turned right on this, where people are allowed to walk, and continued to a connector trail which leads up to Songbird Trail. We turned left on that and followed it through the refuge woods.

This was another really nice trail, although not standard blazed. There were a lot of blue blobs, big ones, and some arrows on posts when there were turns. At least it was understandable. We reached the sand roads at the end of the trail and followed them out across a causeway. We followed Great Creek Road just north of Lily Lake back into Oceanville. When we reached Rt 9, it was a turn to the right not far back to the cars where we'd met in the morning.

We had some dinner together at a bar and grill called Fred and Ethel's Lantern Light in Smithville, which was quite good.

The day was the positive experience I really needed, and really the right size group for this. Some of the huge groups I'd been getting were really not nearly as enjoyable for me as ones like this. Overall, the hike was really nothing spectacular in comparison with stuff like the Allamuchy one we'd done recently, but the group was pretty close, and they had me laughing a lot. The overall feeling of the hike was better, and more the kind of experience I want my Metrotrails trips to be. It's just necessary to do large group hikes in order to recruit more core members when that part of the group begins to dwindle.

I think things are really starting to work out and mold back into the sort of thing I want it to be overall!