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8/21/19 Raven Rock and Kingwood Loop with Sue Bennett, Annika Krystyna, Jennifer Berndt, Cupcake (Chris Kroschinski), Shane Blische, and Celeste Fondaco Martin
This next one would be another variation of other hikes I’d done, with some new stuff added as well. I wanted to have something that would have good swim spots but also see more stuff.
Start of White Oak Trail
I also had some then and now historic photos I wanted to set up. That’s starting to become a thing for me too. I will plan a hike out around a place simply because I might have a single photo I want to take of a place.
In this case, I had a couple I wanted to do of the Raven Rock Station on the old Bel Del Railroad, which was our meeting place, as well as one I’d wanted to do of the Raven Rock-Rosemont Road bridge over the Lockatong Creek. I had realized more recently that the parking area there along Route 29 was 24 hours for access to the foot bridge and businesses over the Delaware, and so we could get away with parking there after dark with no issues.
Overgrown White Oak Trail
Had I realized that was an option, I probably would have done more hikes out of this point earlier on.
This time, my route was to head up on the joint trail systems between the Delaware River Bluffs state park land/White Oak Trail, Zega-Lockatong Preserve of Hunterdon Land Trust, Wescott Nature Center of Hunterdon County Parks, and the Lockatong Wildlife Management Area a little further up.
After taking several photos of the former station site, Annika arrived and we were ready to head out.
The first order of business was to get on the White Oak Trail heading across the street near former quarry property to a magnificent giant White Oak tree.
Overgrown White Oak Trail
Unfortunately, this was not possible. Even for me, this trail was a nightmare. We went to the information board where the trail was supposed to start, and there was literally no trail there. It was beyond grown in. The trail was GONE. No one was maintaining it at all. It was obvious that we were going to have to walk up Quarry Road parallel with it instead, and hopefully get on the upper section of it. Shane had run a hike on that only a couple of months before and had said that the part was okay.
Missing bridge
Only Sue, Annika, and I started out this hike. The others were all running late. Cupcake was to pick up Shane, Jen was working late, and I think Celeste was working on something as well.
We continued up hill to where White Oak Trail was supposed to cross. It didn’t look great to the left of the road, but it looked good enough to follow, so we turned here.
It was only reasonably good for a short distance, then started growing in badly. Multi flora rose was coming in and scraping us up like crazy, and the trail was full of stinging nettles, which are awful.
Foot bridge
One of the gullies along the way was missing it’s bridge. It probably washed down stream somewhere. Before too long we were wading in weeds as high as our hips. Then, there was a giant ash tree fallen over the trail where we had to either find a way around it or climb through it. I tried to go around, but that was a fresh new hell compared to the tree climbing, so I went back through there.
Most of the foot bridges on this section of trail were still in place, but the trails leading up to them were not at all. There were brief moments of relief under canopies.
Lockatong bridge
It got particularly confusing at one time when there seemed to be two trails going two different ways. One went to the left, up hill a bit, and the other to the right. The one to the left looked like some logs were cut off of it. To the right, they weren’t, but we tried it anyway.
Lockatong bridge
The other trail eventually came back in from the left. I’m not sure if it was an intended loop, or an intention to make another trail around the tree as not to have to clean it up at all.
As we got closer to the top of the hill, the trail started looking a lot better. As we got close to Federal Twist Road, the trail paralleled it briefly, and then emerged at the intersection of Federal Twist and Raven Rock-Rosemont Road. The connection from here is to head down Raven Rock-Rosemont to the Zega-Lockatong Preserve of Hunterdon Land Trust. It was a nice and pleasant walk down hill from here a bit.
Lockatong Bridge
We passed an old farm house and then came to the parking lot for Zega-Lockatong and the trailhead for Mimi’s Trail. The trails are named for former owners of the property as I am told, and they meet in the middle. Mimi’s Trail is red blazed out along the Lockatong to the border with the county park property, and Peters Trail is orange blazed, coming from the other direction to meet.
Just ahead of the parking area is the through truss bridge over the Lockatong Creek, built in 1878 by Lambertville Iron Works Builders. It looked like it was coming down for a while, but the county actually restored it.
American Chestnut at Zega Lockatong
We backtracked from here to the start of the trail, which took us up hill from the parking area and into a field where they had experimentally planted some American Chestnut, or rather American/Chinese Chestnut hybrids I believe. They were all pretty much alive when I was there in the past, but only a couple of them were still living this time walking through.
Another difference was that there was a picnic table where the trail met the woodland line. Now, that table was pretty much gone. I remember it was breaking even the last time I was up there.
Mimi's Trail
The trail made it’s way down hill onto the flood plain and had sme nice little foot bridges on the way.
This was a point I tried to make when I worked for Hunterdon, that everyone seemed to be able to put these little structures in, but they wouldn’t let us do any because it required some sort of permit they would say.
Some of my co workers also would give me a hard time for cutting a tree off of the trail on the land that wasn’t ours 100%, even though we had to walk that trail to get to the land we managed.
The trail meandered a bit and then came right up along the edge of the creek for a good while.
We soon came to a nice deeper spot on the Lockatong. We decided to take a break and go for a dip. It was pretty hot out, so this felt really great.
We moved on from here along the trail, which was lined with handsome old stone walls, until we hit the Hunterdon County park line. For whatever reason, when the trail gets to the Hunterdon side, it leaves the lovely creekside and meanders off into the woods farther away from it on a more inferior route. The only good thing about it is that in the Winter, you can see an old farmstead site out that way.
Wescott Nature Center
Another thing that drives me nuts about the Hunterdon blazing is that they use these plastic markers with arrows. When they ran out of the ones with no arrows, or without arrows facing the proper direction, they put up the ones with the wrong arrows. For every single marker in the Hunterdon property heading eastbound, they had a left arrow on them, and only once does the trail ever go left. Of course, that was the only spot that did NOT have the left arrow marker. Much of the trail had no markers left on it at all, and the only way to find our way through was the paint blazes I put on the trees in 2008.
Wrong arrow marker
When I worked out there, I tried painting orange paint over the wrong arrow markers on the length of the trail, and it was amusing to me to still see some of those markers with my faded orange paint over top of the arrows. At least I tried.
It’s for reasons like this that Hunterdon would get such a bad reputation. Some of the decisions made were absolutely asinine.
The trail weaved through the woods and returned to the creek at a nice bend, where there was a steep rock outcrop.
Cardinal Flowers on the Lockatong
Some lovely Cardinal Flowers were growing on the edge of the stream, and the trail ent out around the rocks, and then began to climb the slope up and away from the Lockatong.
There used to be a red blazed side trail up the hill in this area to a nice little cascade, but all of the markers to it have disappeared and it doesn’t seem to exist any more.
We climbed up among more lovely stone rows, and almost lost the trail at a spot where a giant tree had fallen over.
Along the Lockatong
Most all of the markers in the sparse woods at the top have been removed. Fortunately, I remembered where the trail went, and a swath of trees led us out to a field section where I was surprised to see they had it mowed down enough to recognize.
Shane said when he was there last, it was nearly impossible to see where to go because none of the trails were mowed down.
We headedout across the field field diagonally to reach an intersection of three fields. There, the trail turned to the left and went out and around a wet area at the corner of the next field.
Peters Trail
I had put trail marker posts in at these corners years ago to keep people from getting lost, but this one I noted was totally gone.
Just ahead on the right of the trail, there is a giant hunting stand made of old sections of scaffold and wood. I used to climb up on it years ago, but it has since almost completely collapsed with it’s wooden material, though the scaffold sections remain standing.
I tried to set up some of my then and now compilation stuff here using some of the photos from my 2008 hike to this point.
My then and now
Cupcake and Shane had backtracked along the trail from the parking area to meet up with us at this point, and we soon reached one of my turn posts that was surprisingly still in place.
My then and now
It’s always interesting to see when something I’d done on a trail lasts more than a decade. It really goes to show how important it is to have some simple markings. So many different places could benefit by some simple marking techniques, and parks would be more well used.
Wescott Nature Center
We turned to the right at the post and headed to the south a little bit again, along a tree line, and then the trail cut into the woods to the left. It followed this swath for a bit, hit yet another field, and then turned left, back toward the north.
Old walls in Wescott Nature Center
Jen was waiting in the parking lot when we got there, and we were all ready to continue to our next section.
We exited the park and turned to the right on Strimples Mill Road heading down hill.
Wescott Nature Center
It’s really a very pleasant section of road, with high stone walls lining either side of it heading down hill.
We soon reached the Strimples Mill Road bridge over the Lockatong Creek.
This bridge was similar to the other one we had visited, a through truss structure built in 1897 by the Wrought Iron Bridge Company of Canton Ohio.
In the past when I’d hiked this, we would head further on Strimples Mill Road and then climb either off trail into Lockatong Wildlife Management Area, or we would go all the way out to Kingwood-Stockton Road.
Wescott Nature Center
A short walk up that road, also Rt 519, leads to a long driveway entrance to Lockatong Wildlife Management Area.
I opted not to do that this time and try something new instead.
We got down under the bridge, and simply started going directly up the creek. There weren’t that many of us, so I figured we might be able to continue the entire way without having a problem to the state land.
There was only one house kind of close to the creek on the left side as we walked up, so I think it was okay. No one came out and we quietly moved on.
Strimples Mill
Strimples Mill was on the east side of the creek; a historic sawmill that remains in service to this day in it’s picturesque setting. It even has rails and such inside for moving timbers.
Purdy clouds
This section of creek was absolutely incredible. The rock formations were in sort of shelves, similar to what we had seen in the past on Wickecheoke Creek.
My marker post still in place 11 years later
The little cascades were beautiful, but the rocks were very slippery. This section was very slow going.
After we were far enough away from houses and development, I moved off of the creek rocks and up to the right side to follow up stream.
I noticed as soon as I got out that a very long and substantial mill race was on the edge. It must have once gone all the way back to Strimples Mill to power the place.
We followed along the edge of this, and it ended when we came to a natural rock formation that spanned the length of the creek. I’m sure they must have at one time had some kind of dam, but it appeared that they must have also utilized some of the nature topography.
Strimples Mill and old bridge
The edge of the creek also had some very interesting erosion holes, like those we’ve seen on Dunnfield Creek or in Seven Tubs Natural Area in PA. I didn’t know that type was here.
Strimples Mill bridge
We continued on the shore just a bit more, and the flood plain opened up a bit.
Just then, we came upon a partially completed but abandoned old cabin up above the ground level on sticks or stump bases of what appeard to be cut off Beech trees.
There was a sign on the front of the structure reading “B + K Cabin”. Quite an interesting little site. They never got a roof on the place, or maybe they had it set up so that the roof was a tarp. Whatever the case, it was a cool little spot. We continued walking up stream from here, and found a good spot for a dip.
Strimples Mill
The cabin was in fact on state land, but only just barely. We saw the state WMA signs on the trees just before we got to it, so it was a good spot to stop for a swim.
Strimples Mill bridge
We spent a good while in the water here. A fantastic spot. We then moved on down stream just a little bit further and wished we’d not stopped so soon.
Lockatong
There was an enormous deep pool below a rocky spot that none of us could touch bottom on. A natural pool like this is something uncommon and quite special. I can’t wait to go back to this place, because it’s down stream from the falls and far less known.
Despite having just gotten into the water before, we could not pass up the opportunity to get into this amazing spot. I would say it’s probably the best swimming spot in all of Hunterdon County, and hardly anyone knows about it. We only found it because I decided to explore the creek heading up stream. What a great place.
Cascades on the Lockatong
We made our way up stream a little further from here, and a faint foot path started up. It wasn’t far from there before we got to the High Falls of the Lockatong.
Lockatong
Shane had already hurried ahead at this point and was already swimming in the high falls when we got there. The substantial drop in the creek is quite dramatic compared to anything else on the creek or in this part of Hunterdon.
We stopped here for a little bit, and Shane and I both jumped off of the top of the falls into the creek below. The others had crossed over to the other side to th rocks there.
One of my odd plans on this one was to try to make our way out of the Lockatong gorge to Federal Twist Road without having to go out and walk around on roads.
Lockatong
I figured that this would be quite an undertaking, because there might be a lot of weeds or something.
When we got to that other side of the falls, where I had never explored before, I was surprised to see a faint trail making it’s way up hill on the other side.
We decided to start following it up as best we could.
It was easy enough to do, and it was far less grown in than the state’s garbage White Oak Trail. We paused when the land started to level off near a clearing so everyone could catch up. We then proceeded into a clearing with a small building.
Erosion tubs on the Lockatong
Just a little beyond the building, we emerged on Federal Twist Road. This was a private piece of land, but we were probably only fifty feet from the state owned land that reached the same road. In the future, we can just pass through that, because the woods have a sparse understory, and then get to the same path we had followed down.
At the top, we turned to the right on Federal Twist Road to continue north.
We passed the intersection with Milltown Road on the right, which was my other planned route originally. It crosses the Lockatong at a particularly beautiful spot.
We continued on Federal Twist up to Route 651, Byram Kingwood Road. We turned to the left for a bit and then turned right on Barbertown Idell Road, a smaller route heading to the north again.
Lockatong
As we reached the intersection with Tumble Idell Road, to the right was the Hunterdon Land Trust’s Idell Preserve, a piece of land that just has a loop trail out on it that I’ve been wanting to do. By this time, it was getting pretty dark, and we wouldn’t be able to see anything anyway. I decided instead that we would have to visit that preserve as part of a different hike and just continue along the planned route to the west.
We turned to the left on Tumble Idell Road, where there was a nice view of the sunset.
Lockatong
The road started gradually going down hill as it was getting darker. A young girl walking the same way as us started talking to us on the way down.
B + K Cabin
Somehow we got talking about the giant rock wall or fences that Department of Transportation wants to put up in the Delaware Water Gap, and she was saying we need to get up and see Devil’s Tea Table before they ruin it, because a similar fencing project was proposed for there.
This was the first I had heard about this, and it’s probably equally as unneeded.
My plan originally had been that if we had the time, we would hit Devil’s Tea Table, maybe as the sun was setting, but of course we did not, because we were having too much a good time swimming.
The girl seemed interested in the hikes we were doing, and someone invited her to join us, but I started talking about diarrhea or something and probably scared her off. Or not. Who knows. But anyway, we continued walking down Tumble Idell Road and the girl turned off on one of the side dead end streets.
The amazing swimming hole
The road soon reached a very serious switchback. It turned hard to the right, and then descended more steeply down toward Warsaw Road below.
High Falls of the Lockatong
During this time, Celeste had been calling me to meet up. Usually I can find a meet up place pretty easily, and I didn’t know how parking would be for the Idell Preserve.
The old mill race on the Lockatong
I directed her to I think it must have been the Kingwood Boat Launch area, which should be open later hours, to park there.
She managed to get there and was heading south, so when we got to the bottom of the hill off of Warsaw Road, at the access to the former Belvidere Delaware Railroad we waited up for her to catch us.
Once we were all together, we continued walking down the Bel Del to the south. Shane pointed out where the Tumble Falls shanty station used to be on the way. There were several little stations like this on the Bel Del in the early days.
Historic Tumble Falls station area from Shane's collection
We next headed toward teh Byram area, which is one of the few areas where there are actually houses between the Delaware River and the old Bel Del grade.
High Falls
It was in this area that the Byram-Point Pleasant Bridge used to span the Delaware River. It was another victim of the Flood of 1955, and one of the ones they surprisingly never rebuilt.
Byram Station from Shane's collection
Near the former bridge site is the Byram Boat Launch, and those are always great swimming spots. Cupcake, Shane, Jen, and I all went down to take a dip, while Celeste, Sue, and Annika decided they would head back to the cars and get there earlier.
Below Devil's Tea Table
This was pretty close to the end anyway. Just beyond that point, the Delaware and Raritan Canal’s feeder broke away from the river along the edge of Bulls Island.
We made our way back up to the railroad bed and it seemed like no time before we were back to the cars and on our way out.
There are still several other preserve areas I want to look into from this hike, to the point where I can do an entirely different version of the same thing maybe in the opposite direction. Idell Preserve and also Kugler Woods Preserve right along the Delaware remain things I want to do.
There’s never a shortage of new things to see, and the areas along the Delaware are always great pretty much during any season.
HAM
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