Hike #716; Emmaus to Bethlehem

 Hike #716; Emmaus to Bethlehem March on Musikfest

8/4/13 Emmaus to Bethlehem March on Musikfest with Brandan Jermyn, Shelly Janes, Jack Lowry, Susie Duncan, Bobbi Landrock, Jim "Mr. Buckett" Mathews, Chris "Cupcake" Kroschinski, Darlene Perez, Ariel, Michele Valerio, Tamara Sapilak, Carol Van Giezen, Eric Pace, Gregg Hudis, Terri Allen, Carmen ?, Lenny ?, Marina Font, Sally ?, Daniel Stone, Colin ?, ?, ?, Haobo Lai, and Harry.

Group shot

It was time once again for the annual "March on Musikfest" hike. It's hard to believe I've been doing these hikes since 2005. This one would be one of the better routes we've ever done for that hike. I came up with a route a while back that would connect downtown Bethlehem with Emmaus PA, and put off doing it a couple of times due to weather and such. I was finally ready to put it together.

We met as we usually do at the Martin Tower, then shuttled in as few cars as we could on to Emmaus area, by way of a circuitous route. A lot of roads were closed. We started our hike at the Staples store, in front of the Starbucks. It was a good convenient place to begin for restrooms and such.

Once everyone was together, we started walking across the parking lot slightly south. It is always amazing to see such a big group following behind me. Metrotrails is doing so well these days to become what exactly I have wanted it to be. It was also great to see so many familiar faces from my years of these hikes intermingling with the newer ones. Particularly, Shelly and Mr. Buckett I hadn't seen in quite a bit, so it was good to have them back out.

We cut across a couple of little roads and entered Devonshire Park, a small ball field park, and skirted the right hand side. I had planned this hike using Google Earth aerial images, but really didn't know exactly what to expect. The park was built up high with fill, and we skirted along the bottom of a mowed slope. That must be a pain in the ass to get with a zero turn or groundsmaster.

I thought for sure it would end up being a little tougher, or I'd have to walk more of a road, but that wasn't the case. There was a small creek below the park to the right, and an enclave in the trees with a foot path passing through. We took this and rock hopped across the creek to reach an open field area with mowed perimeters. This was indeed a trail system apparently. We turned left along the fields and continued.

We walked out to a parking lot and a little bridge over the Little Lehigh Creek, called Keck's Bridge. We crossed and continued on the road shortly, then turned right into some of the Little Lehigh Parkway, which had a mowed buffer to the right closer to the creek. As we wandered through on the pleasant grass, I heard Jack coming behind me, playing "We Can Work It Out" on his carbon fiber guitar, with a chorus of singing hikers. It made me feel good to see everyone having such a nice time so early on.

The grassy swath ended and we had to get back on Keystone Road. We passed Devonshire Road on the right and the lovely old stone Rathburn Bridge, and continued across to the right up Devonshire Road. We passed a farmstead and climbed a hill, then turned left into what looked to be a park of some sort. There were hardcore bike jumps and such off to the right as we walked in, then the West Salisbury Elementary School a little further up the road. We cut through this bike area, then turned left through some somewhat overgrown areas to a field with mowed paths around it. We assumed this was part of the school property, but now it would seem more likely that this was part of a private equestrian center that has trails backing up to the Little Lehigh Parkway.

We continued along the left side of the fields, and there was a trail that went down hill to the left. In retrospect I really should have taken it because it would have taken us down to the creek as I had wanted to do, but we did not, and so we continued on the equestrian mowed trails to the north side of the fields, and then beyond to the east. This ended up setting us back a bit. We got to the east end, and the trails continued to the south again. We needed to find a way down to the main trails along the creek again, but we were separated by tons of weeds beyond which was development. I tried fighting through some and ended up at a back yard. I climbed back up to the trail and we backtracked a bit, then tried going down again. Once again we ended up almost into someone's yard, so back we went again. I watched my phone GPS closely, and we made our way to a better path, down to Rt 2010, Fish Hatchery Road. It was somewhat overgrown, but we managed this time and it was only a short distance.

We continued across the road and bushwhacked a tiny bit more onto the Little Lehigh Parkway. The trail here was beautiful. We turned right. The trail took us past Little Lehigh Fly Shop and the Fireman's Bridge. This was a well manicured area with wide path and mowed grass, and a lot of walkers and joggers. We strolled along the creek, keeping to the south side, though there were trails on both sides (which gives us a future March on Musikfest hike as well!).

We crossed under 24th Street and reached Bogert's Covered Bridge, a lovely covered bridge across the creek. We crossed it after getting a group shot, then turned right along the other side of the creek and turned right through an old farmstead. The trail continued close to the creek which was very lovely, with some overhanging branches. When we reached Klein's Foot Bridge, we crossed once more and walked along the south side for a while, singing to Jacks excellent guitar playing. We kept going past the Robin Hood foot bridge, and we stopped to take a swim in the creek which was nice.

The trail continued all the way to the Lehigh Parkway North bridge where Eric had left his car, and he and Mr. Buckett were going to cut out. Although there was no path, we were able to continue ahead on the grass. The others opted to stay with us for a little while longer. Soon, an informal path led over a berm. This berm was the old railroad right of way, and there was still an old trestle in place over the Little Lehigh Creek, and so we crossed it.

There was a really beat utility line path we ended up following. I didn't bother to look at my phone GPS assuming that we were going the correct way, but then when we got out to Martin Luthor King Drive, I knew we had gone the wrong way. It looked like a nice area, and I soon realized we had followed the wrong creek, a tributary to the Little Lehigh. I would later find out that this was part of the less developed Cedar Creek Greenway, which will make up part of a future hike in the area certainly. Very nice.

We had to turn back the way we came and make our way back across the beat up railroad trestle to get back to the Little Lehigh. From there, we turned left off of the tracks, then right on a dirt drive to Lehigh Parkway East. As we walked through the large green, three guys came walking along holding up this giant hookah that looked like an enormous lamp. I was like "really guys...here?". As it turns out, they were not smoking any control substances, but rather just mint! I took a hit of the mint, as did most everyone else, and we posed for pictures with the trio and their hookah. Eric and Mr. Buckett left us in this vicinity. Also, Haobo and his friend Harry I think it was left us early along the Little Lehigh Greenway.

We turned left on the road out to MLK Drive, then right along the creek once more which at times had a swath of grass along it to walk on. We got to some parking lot where there was some construction going on of a new bridge, and took a break. It must have been Ward Street. I found a drainage tunnel and decided to go back it. I climbed down and went pretty far into the thing until the entrance looked like a pin hole. I'd drank a whole lot of Peppermint Schnapps and was feeling pretty happy. I guess the group was getting a little agitated. I knew we were fine, and were on the right track, but I wanted to check out the pipe. Just before I went in, I suggested we wade across the creek to get to a better greenway, which NO ONE wanted to do. I was fine with that, but I guess they thought I was just being a lunatic. Michele was feeling motherly and apparently was trying to call me out of the big pipe, and told Jack to go in after me, to which he replied "yeah fuck that!" LOL.

When I emerged, we followed MLK further to Fountain Park on the right. I was told later that I overstepped again by wandering out onto a field where Puerto Ricans were playing soccar, and were supposedly none too happy with me. I WAS walking around the outside of the field just to stay closer to the creek. Still, everyone thought I was nuts walking there. They were all nice when I said hello and moved on through, so I didn't think there was a problem. When I got to the other side of the field, I had the problem: there was a giant concrete fence line that I would either have to go around or climb over. I of course opted to throw myself over the top, but didn't realize that it was a very abrasive concrete. I cut both of my elbows up pretty badly. The right one was very deep and keeps bleeding even three weeks later!

Another path began in Fountain Park along the creek, and we followed it down stream further. When the path came close to MLK Drive again, we came across an abandoned railroad trestle over the creek to the right. I decided that this was the best route for us to take to continue on to the Walking Purchase Preserve on the south side.

We walked the rail bed out through a rough disturbed area I had covered in past hikes. It keeps looking differently each time I pass through here, but always interesting. We had to go up and down where there used to be a bridge at one point, then continued on out to the active tracks across Basin Street.

We walked the tracks for a little bit from here. When we got to where we were closely parallel with Constitution Drive, the lovely dirt road along the south side of the river, we made our way up to walk it. Many stayed down on the tracks which was really hot. Can't believe they opted for that! We got to where the road split, and one turned left to cross the tracks and enter the lower part of the Walking Purchase Preserve. We followed this, and stopped for another nice swim in the Lehigh. Others went ahead and the rest of us had to catch back up. We wandered to the end of the active road and then headed further along the abandoned former road, and found a little camp site and tent with a nice swimming spot. We didn't go in this time, opting to save that one for next time.

Once the road reached the active road next to the railroad tracks again, most of us went up hill to the trails in the Walking Purchase Preserve, really the nicest back woods, groomed trails of the entire day through nice shady woods. Others opted not to follow us and stay down on the hot road and railroad tracks, which is overall pretty boring. I couldn't believe they skipped the awesome trails of that preserve, but oh well.

The trail took us out of the woods, and we messed around with some giant leaves. From there, we wandered Brighton Street out to Hill to Hill Bridge, then down to east 3rd Street where we stopped at Lehigh Pizza for lunch. I had some fantastic slices courtesy of our new friend Colin. Carol left us at the pizzeria, and the rest of us continued from there out to the Fahy Bridge and crossed into Bethlehem. We wandered into Musikfest. We did the loop around, watched "Cast in Bronze" play, then continued all around the area, up the main street, and back down. We also stood in the street and sang "Don't Fear The Reaper" with Jack on guitar again, which was fun. Susie unfortunately got in trouble for walking through with Zip Line, and so she had to bring him back to the car. The rest of us continued to wander until we caught up with Mr. Buckett, Shelly, Bobbie, and Eric at the Jimi Hendrix tribute, which was really good.

We were going to walk all the way back to the cars from there, but Shelly offered to drive us. Bonnie Peters showed up and said "hi", and I finally got to meet her husband. I tried convincing him to go on a hike, and he insisted on only the best ones, saying "give me the greatest hits!". I of course can't pick a greatest hits of hikes!

We wandered a few blocks to Shelly's car to finish off another great hike, perhaps one of the best March on Musikfest routes I've put together yet!