Hike #710; Buckhorn Creek to Townsbury

 Hike #710; Buckhorn Creek to Townsbury

7/7/13 Buckhorn Creek WMA to Townsbury with Jillane Becker, Jamie Becker, Stephen Argentina, David "Captain Soup" Campbell, Lyz Hagenbuch, Ric Giantisco, Michelle McBriarty, Brandan Jermyn, Giusseppe De Caro, Cory Janusz, Gregg Hudis, Carol Van Giezen, Steve Levy, Ira Hays, Dan Lurie, Sue Olivar, Ted Wright, John Rose, Jennifer Berndt, and Doug DeGroff

Buckhorn Creek WMA

Our next hike would be a point to point trip between Buckhorn Creek Wildlife Management Area and my home in Townsbury NJ. I would soon be moving yet again, and so I wanted to do another hike ending at home like I did at White Lake. I could have easily done more hikes ending at this place, but I had to take more time to get stuff ready to go I thought, and I've already covered so much more of the area going back to the earliest days of Metrotrails. I didn't need to exhaust the area like I did the stuff around White Lake, of which I still haven't finished. Sure, there are plenty more places I still haven't touched on around Townsbury, but I can get to them in the near future easier.

After meeting in Townsbury, as well as the Pequest WMA lot a bit further up Pequest Road because there wasn't enough space, we headed to Buckhorn Creek WMA.

I had never led a hike through this preserve before. During the week, I made an on line friend in Doug DeGroff, who knew the preserve pretty well. I'd been to it before, but never explored it to a great degree. I wanted to start at the north end and follow to the south. A dirt drive leading to the parking lot breaks away from Buckhorn Drive a short distance from it's intersection with Brass Castle Road. Stephen was running late and met us all here, because he put in the meetup.com directions and somehow ended up in Freehold! It was amazing he made it as quickly as he did!

We started walking from the parking area, where we met Doug also. Doug led the way up the old farm road further into fields. We turned left in these fields and climbed a slope, skirting the left side. There was an awesome view of the countryside from the top which I'd never seen before or would have ever knew existed. It's still amazing to me that throughout the county where I'm serving as Chairman of the Board of Recreation there are still so many amazing hidden places like this.

The woods road took us along fields for a while, then Doug led us on one that took us into the woods and gradually down hill toward the Buckhorn Creek at an abandoned reservoir. It wasn't really good for swimming, but it was cool. The sides were concrete and stone, and it closely resembled the one at Roaring Rock Park to the south. From here, we followed the creek up stream. We literally walked in the creek, which was a lot of fun. I love doing these trips where we follow a creek as closely as we can.

I had fallen the week before on the creek to Hemlock Pond, and sprained my wrist. It was still hurting so I went a little bit slower. We followed the creek until we got to a ramshackle little woods road bridge over it. Doug explained that it went into private land and was in people's back yards ahead, so we'd have to make our way to the right on the woods road. We continued up hill and the woods roads led us on public land high above and parallel with the creek. It had a lot of blow downs on it, so we had to go off of it at one point to get through. We managed, and we continued to descend to Buckhorn Creek once more. I crawled through the long pipe that allowed for the creek to pass beneath. We took a break here before moving on along Buckhorn Drive.

The road was a pleasant one heading to the south, and we crossed the intersection in the hamlet of Summerfield, over Summerfield Road. After going over a hill, we descended a bit and made our way down hill and straight onto Spring Lane. A lady pulled over and asked what we were up to, and we told her about the hikes. She told us that a spring on the beginning of Spring Lane was still drinkable, and so a lot of us filled up our water bottles again. Stephen apparently had to go to the hospital on Tuesday following this because of something in it he things (Though I wonder if it might have been some crazy plant that he ate). I thought the water was good, and I finished a bottle I filled with it several days later at work with no problems at all.

Spring Lane soon became a dirt road, and we followed it down to Harmony Brass Castle Road. We turned left, and could see the abandoned former concrete road bridge in the woods. After a bit, we cut to the right to follow the Roaring Rock Brook down stream. We continued until we hit the first trail in Roaring Rock Park and followed it up hill to the right. It was in better shape than I thought it would be and rather clear. We headed up hill and entered the meadow section where we saw the uncommon Wood Lilies. Unfortunately, someone picked both of the two specimens of rare flowers. Note to everyone: DO NOT PICK THE FLOWERS! Many of the species we encounter are rare and endangered!

We continued down hill and soon reached the near parking lot of the park and took a side trip to the reservoir. I'd never swam in this reservoir until this time. It actually wasn't too bad when we went in at the right point. It was so refreshing.

After a good break here, we headed out the parking lot and bushwhacked on the other side of the road to the white trail that seems to have been forgotten by the township. I was able to find most of the blazes, but it was not easy to get through at most points. We followed this down until we got to the former abandoned route of Brass Castle Road where we turned left. This took us out and across the current alignment, then further onto another abandonment of the same road. We followed this north a little bit more and made a brief stop at Roaring Rock Inn. We went in and some got some beers. We then headed over toward Lake Marguerrite, another township park. The trail was nice and clear in to it. At this lake, once again I took a brief swim, though it was rather gross and too warm. Maybe Stephen got sick from this!

We then headed through Griffith Woods following the trail system. It was easy enough to follow, though there are no turn blazes or anything. We took the long route through the park and came out on Jonestown Road. We turned left and followed the road section on to Oxford Township property, the old mine area. During the previous board of recreation meeting, we voted to have the property assessed for purchase. It fit in with our Warren Highlands Trail plan, and contains some of the remnants of one of the only switch back railroads NJ had ever seen. Most of these are completely obliterated. We were able to walk a section of one of these switchback lines that's been kept open by ATVs on our way in to the property. The switch back line was abandoned early on in favor of a later, simpler route that brought trains around the hillside, eliminating the switch back.

From here, we checked out the abandoned buildings, which for some time were used as a storage space. We went all through all of them before moving on. We went under the high truss crane thing, then out behind the buildings onto what should have been more of the old switch back rail line. We continued from here on out along more woods roads trying to follow my GPS. I knew there was a section I had always done as an off trail in this area, and it was always easy, past the fenced in old mine shafts. I couldn't quite find the way, and opted to bushwhack a different route. We managed to reach one of the woods roads which took us down hill to Mine Hill Road. We pass three kids on the way down that were on their way up to look for a geocache. We turned left on Mine Hill Road and followed it into Oxford.

In Oxford, we visited the Oxford Furnace and Shippen Manor, then headed into town. From there, we headed to the old Warren Railroad bed and followed it to the Pequest Furnace Site. I brought everyone down to the old refuse slag piles and on to the Lehigh and Hudson River Railroad right of way beyond for a slightly different route. Some of the slag area was getting overgrown, and I actually had a tougher time trying to figure out where the path was that went on through to the other rail bed.

Once we were on the LHR line, it was an easy walk on back to Townsbury. When we got to the lot, we headed over to the Villa Venice restaurant to have some dinner. Some others went to get the cars and then come back. Usually Villa Venice is open much later, but they decided to close early this night, so some of the others that showed up late didn't get to have dinner with us unfortunately. Stephen sat down and simply ordered all of the remaining garlic knots! It was funny to watch him try to consume the mass of them he had been brought, not realizing there would be so many.

This was a nice and convenient hike for me, but also exciting because I got to showcase the potential future of the Warren Highlands Trail, and explore some areas new to me yet so close to home.