Hike #1414 5/15/21 Black Rock State Park to Waterbury CT with Kirk Rohn, Jennifer Berndt, Serious Sean Dougherty, Justin Gurbisz, Jennifer Tull, John DiFiore, Diane Reider, and Victor ?
This next one would be a point to point in Connecticut again, and it would involve the last little bit of the Mattatuck Trail I had never hiked before.
We had done a hike not so long ago where we hiked the Mattatuck Trail to the eastern terminus, and then an assumed route where it used to continue to the Tunxis Trail, but I was still missing the part to Black Rock itself, in Black Rock State Park.
For this hike, I came up with a pretty crazy route that included all sorts of different stuff. I was really excited for what it was looking like, with so many different trails.
I originally wanted the meeting to be in the Colonial Plaza in Waterbury, but unfortunately a lot of the group didn't want to leave cars there, so we moved them up to West Main Street to the west of town.
The walk up hill at the end would not be something I was a fan of, but it was alright.
We shuttled to the start point, which I decided on to be on Northfield Road along the west side of Black Rock State Park. I had hiked the Mattatuck Trail through this point backpacking, and when the trail started to ascend Black Rock itself, Jillane and I went for one of the lower trails to make it easier.
We had also skipped other stuff to the west on that way, but I had already been back to do that. So the first order of business was to finish Mattatuck Trail. I think I named the hike Mattatuck WTF Hike, just because I thought it looked funny.
There was limited parking at the start, where Northfield Road would have continued downhill, and the main through route now is Basset Road. We headed downhill on the abandoned paved road, which was a great way to start the trip.
When we got to the Mattatuck Trail crossing, we headed down to the right, then back up the other side of a little gorge and began climbing through woods.
We had some rugged terrain in this section, and then all of a sudden came to a plank road. This was built by people doing the power line upgrades. We walked the plank road to an improved gravel road following the blue Mattatuck Trail blazes, and then crossed the power line itself.
There were components of the new towers sitting on the right of way, ready to be put together. The trail went uphill from here along an escarpment to reach Black Rock.
This was an absolutely beautiful overlook that far exceeded my expectations. We could see Black Rock Pond and lots of land all around from there, so of course we took a nice break here.
From that point, the trail descended a lot over rocky terrain and past springs. It made it almost all the way down to Black Rock Pond and then went to the right.
We left the Mattatuck Trail here and walked along Black Rock Pond, and crossed it on a foot bridge. We then cut through the main part of Black Rock State Park heading to the east. We crossed over Rt 6, and then continued ahead on the Branch Brook Trail.
Branch Brook Trail for the most part follows a long abandoned trolley right of way that went to the state park from Waterbury, mostly following along the Naugatuck River. It turned to follow the Branch Brook toward the park.
We followed this trail, which I'd done before, to the east. It was much better than the last time I had followed it because it was almost dry that time. This time it was full of water and quite nice. I actually took a couple of opportunities to lay in it and cool off.
We continued along the trail until it joined with the Mattatuck Trail again. From there, we turned to the right and followed the westbound Mattatuck Trail uphill, and past some old quarried area remnants.
We continued on up and soon came to the openings of the Leatherman's Cave, natural rock formations with caves formed by the pile ups of all of the rocks, and the trail is routed directly through them. It's one of the most interesting things about Connecticut trails, in that they have all of these unique geological features on so many of the trails.
While hiking through the Leatherman's Cave, we found the "cave copy" of The Old Leather Man book! I was surprised to find this nice, although somewhat moist volume sitting inside the cave.
The Leather Man was a mysterious walking character who appeared in the areas of Connecticut and eastern New York around the time of the Civil War. During this time, around 1860, there were a lot of itinerant wanderers seeking work, a meal, or a place to sleep.
The Leather Man was one of these such people, although he did not ask for work or shelter, but would accept a meal.
His striking appearance included his signature home made leather outfit that included a jacket, a cap with a brim, and shoes that more resembled clogs. He did not speak, but rather mumbled incomprehensibly during his monthly visits to various farms and spring kitchens in NY and CT.
He would wander between Danbury, and Waterbury, Bridgeport, and Norwalk, CT, and head into Westchester and Putnam Counties, NY in a large circuit, just about every month.
His circuit, which took over a month to do, included about 240 miles in Connecticut and 125 miles in New York.
For shelter, he would stay in caves in different places. Another cave bears the name “Leatherman’s Cave” in Ward Pound Ridge, NY.
He would visit leather and saddle shops and accept donations of scraps, which he would sew together to make his long jacket, his pants which came up to his chest, and the tops of shoes.
The man sounds as though he might be terrifying, with sewn tanned flesh draped over him, mumbling incoherently, and lived in caves. However, his visits were looked forward to.
Ladies would even bake bread for him when they knew he was coming. His visits were amazingly well timed that they could be planned for.
Despite his size and appearance, the Leather Man never harmed anyone. Apart from infrequently being angered by children throwing rocks at him, he was gentle and not temperamental.
A newspaper once told a story of his life, naming him Jules Bourglay of Lyons, France, but retracted the story just days later. Today, still no one really knows his back story.
One theory is that he was a French Canadian, as he traveled as far north as Vermont and Montreal between 1860 and 1870.
The Leather Man may have indeed been a Frenchman, as upon his death, in the Winter of 1889, when his body was found in his cave in Briarcliff NY, a French prayer book was found in his limited possessions.
He was fond of smoking, and some say it was a form of cancer he finally succumbed to.
His body was buried in Sparta Cemetery, in Ossining NY, and for many years the incorrect French name was placed on a gravestone on the site.
Whoever he was, the Leatherman was an amazing character in local history.
The cave he stayed in, in what is now Mattatuck State Forest, is another typical Connecticut rock pile cave. Heaps of rocks all on top of one another create these kinds of caves the trail passes right through.
Another Leatherman's Cave is in Ward Pound Ridge Preserve in NY.
We passed through the Leatherman's Cave, then made it to the crest of the rise where we continued to the west just a bit. Here, we came to the intersection with the Jericho Trail. This would be our next turn, but before heading south on that, we headed just a bit further to Crane's Lookout.
This overlook is a great spot with a north facing view back toward Black Rock State Forest. I'd hit this spot previously, but with its proximity, I figured everyone would like to see it.
Jericho Trail passes through what is known as the "Cave Block" of Mattatuck State Forest. While we didn't go into too many caves or anything along the way, we passed some really cool rock outcroppings and such.
We passed through a section of really cool rocks, descended through nice woods, passed a giant Beech tree, and crossed a pleasant little brook.
I was really expecting this trail to be overall just easy. I figured it would take on a rather easy grade and just go south toward Waterbury and be mostly woods, but the trail exceeded my expectations in both difficulty and scenery.
We made our way south for a bit, and came rather close to the Jericho Brook. Most of the trail to this point had been a foot path, but there were ATV paths joining in. We could see that the trail used to continue straight on a prominent route, but that now it dipped down along the brook more closely.
This led us to a splendid waterfall with a little pool. An excellent place to stop for a break.
We continued south from here, and the trail didn't usually take on the obvious grade. It went up and down quite a lot, and passed by some awesome rocks with overhangs and some little cave type things formed by the piling of rocks.
Sometimes, it felt like the trail turned from ATV used path onto difficult escarpment footpath, simply for the purpose of creating a trail that the ATVs could not navigate.
As we got toward the southern end of the Jericho Trail, we started to descend over much steeper rocks that required more hand holds. Either that or we had to just sit down to get over the tough spots.
The trail zig zagged through the topography, which was slow going, and eventually came out at a woods road that was heading north through the property.
I had figured that might be the trail from here on, but there was no such luck. The trail turned right after a brief left and continued to meander through woods, on an even less used path.
Maybe the woods road was the Jericho Trail, I don't recall exactly, but we turned off in this area to get on the Jericho-Whitestone Trail, a connector trail that leads from the Jericho Trail to the Whitestone Cliffs on the east side of the Naugatuck River.
This trail was marked with blue paint blazes with yellow tips on the bottoms.
We passed by another rock overhang on the way down with random crap and such piled in it. Kirk commented that this was the "NOT Leatherman's Cave". Definitely someone much less interesting.
The trail meandered around a couple of corners, descended, and reached a really nice spot with a view from a power line.
The trail was a little sketchy from here. It wasn't too obvious.
The trail ended up going directly down over rocks in the middle of the power line clearing.
We climbed very steeply down and turned left along a series of almost vertical rocks, then turned to the right to continue to descend toward Echo Lake Road.
The trail turned left on Echo Lake Road to follow it to the east beneath Route 8. We could see the Whitestone Cliffs ahead from here on the other side of the Naugatuck River.
On the other side of the trail was a section of nice paved trail called the Naugatuck River Greenway. I'd love to do that one day as well, but not all of it is in place yet.
None of this trail was shown on google maps at the time, or on the Connecticut Walk Book's latest edition which I referred to while doing this hike.
We continued on past this trail and crossed over the Naugatuck River. On the other side, Jericho-Whitestone Trail dipped down along the river and started heading north. Pretty soon, it picked up the old right of way of athe trolley we had been following earlier. We followed the trolley bed a little ways to the north, and then the trail turned right up along a small brook, and used the brook's underpass below Waterbury Road to get over to the other side.
It was odd to see the blazes going directly beneath this highway underpass.
We went uphill from here along a small brook for a bit, until we got to the intersection with the Whitestone Cliffs Trail. The trail we were on followed a woods road uphill from the west, but the Whitestone Cliffs Trail turned to the north, our left, and east on the woods road. We turned left to begin our ascent of Whitestone Cliffs.
The trail went uphill over some really nice rocks, then reached the peak of the Whitestone Cliffs. The best view down the Naugatuck River valley was off a little unmarked side trail to the southern end of the rock outcroppings, so we went and sat there for a bit.
There was another view as we continued north on this trail a bit, further up the Naugatuck River valley.
We skirted some really pretty swamp lands and boulders, and passed over a tiny brook on a log bridge.
We meandered along the trail, which makes a loop from the north end of the Whitestone Cliffs down through these lowlands, but then it comes out very close to Mt Tobe Road, only to turn back in from Mt Tobe Road again to close a loop. Rather than do this, the trail was going to take us back to where we were, at which point we were going to have to walk out to Mt Tobe Road anyway. Instead, I figured it would be smarter to just turn onto the road and go a slight bit further with road walk.
We turned south on Mt Tobe Road, which becomes Spruce Brook Road further down. We then turned left on Greystone Road and started going slightly up hill again through some residential area. Hancock Brook Lake would be on the left, and we crossed the outflows of it. Greystone Pond was in plain view and very beautiful to our right.
Just ahead, we reached the former railroad crossing of the Hartford, Providence, and Fishkill Railroad, built in 1850. This section of the line was rerouted when Hancock Brook Lake was created.
I had followed some of this rail line in the past, the second to last time I did a hike on the Mattatuck Trail through the area. It passes through lands further up above Hancock Brook Lake, and some of the old right of way was rerouted up there as well. The entire group quit on my on that hike, and so I walked the Hanock Brook and the tracks to the south where I found more of this alignment that time. This time, I planned to see a bit more.
We turned right to follow the railroad bed south from Greystone Road, which was a nice, grassy, mowed path. It took us along a lovely section of Greystone Lake. I wasn't sure if we'd be able to make it through this section, but we had to try.
The section took us out to Old Greystone Road. Apparently the road used to go down and around the lower end of the lake, and when the Hancock Brook Lake was built upstream, the road was realigned. Now, old Greystone Road doesn't go through, and it is Greystone Road Extension on the west, and Old Greystone Court to the east.
I was worried about whether we could get through or not, but when we got to the old Greystone Road, we simply continued across, and it seemed like it was still public land. We just moved off away from the road as quickly as possible as not to cause any problem.
As we moved a bit further down, the sound of rushing water was very apparent. There was a passable slope down to the left, so I decided to investigate.
Just barely below the railroad bed was an incredible old mill foundation with a major drop to the one side, which tells me it must have been some sort of overshot wheel mill. I called everyone down to check this out, because even it was cool enough.
Hancock Brook had a cool rock outcropping across from where we were, and I stepped down into the stream to have a look around the corner of rock outcrops.
There, I found before me an amazing waterfall and dam that holds back Greystone Lake.
The dam must have been built at the head of the natural waterfall. A home was built to the left of the cascades which was perched splendidly with an overhanging porch. It was quite a sight to see.
Kirk followed me through the water from here, and exclaimed that this was "NOT Falling Water by Frank Lloyd WRONG". Hilarious!
We climbed back up to the railroad bed from the falls, and noted a few more old mill foundations through the area.
We started following the old railroad bed from there to the south some more, and pretty soon came to the active tracks.
I had walked this bit before, a couple of years ago when I did that past hike, so I was somewhat familiar from here how to get to the next leg of the hike.
We followed the tracks for just a little ways until after we crossed a power line clearing. A bit after that, we descended from the tracks to the right, down to Hancock Brook.
We had to wade across the brook to get to the Hancock Brook Trail on the other side, which is another that is part of the Connecticut Blue Blazed Trail system.
Once everyone was across, we turned left and followed the trail downstream.
This was a really beautiful section that had plenty of giant boulders and cliffs, little cascades in the stream, as well as views of the enormous retaining walls holding up the railroad on the other side that have probably been there since the original 1850 construction, built to last.
The trail led us out of the woods and into a quarry area, which is skirted to the left side for a bit.
This led us out to the trail head on Sheffield Street. Here, the road used to continue across Hancock Brook to the left, and the old truss bridge is still standing, but in horrible shape. The bridge was built in 1884 by the Berlin Iron Bridge Company.
We continued down Sheffield Street from here, but not for too long. While walking the road, there was a good foot path that went off to the left into the woods. It was not blazed in any way, but it led right back to the edge of the brook. It was wide and perfect for hiking.
We continued downstream along the brook, and came upon the remnants of an old stone dam in the woods.
The trail started to get a bit narrower and less used, but it was still discernible. This led us right into the northern end of Waterville Park. A perfect connection with barely any road walk.
A foot bridge took us over the brook in the park, and we continued south along the park, toward Boyden Street.
While we were walking, Sean was playing his guitar while tons of people were grilling and such. They gave him some sort of request, and he played whatever it was, and the guys offered to do a shot with him, and he graciously accepted. I think there was also a food truck or something that we patronized there along the ball fields as I recall.
The hike took on an entirely different feel from this point. We got to Boyden Street, continued south out to Homer Street,
From there, we turned left and went under the railroad tracks that we had been running parallel with, and then turned right on Waterville Street, which was a lesser used street heading gradually uphill.
After passing five or so houses on the right side of the road, we came to a turn in to an apartment complex. We walked in there, and then got to the south end of the parking lot where a woods road continued into the young, dense forest to the south.
The woods road sort of petered out a bit, and we were basically bushwhacking for a bit.
It was amazing to me that on the cusp of an urban center like Waterbury, people were not squatting here, or even doing any urban exploring.
I guess the youth of Waterbury are just lame.
Once we were done looking through the building, we bushwhacked around to the west side of it, and then started bushwhacking down the slope toward the same railroad tracks we followed earlier.
It was not an easy descent from there, but we pushed through it. When we reached the railroad, we turned to the left. There were good views of the Naugatuck River at this point as we continued south.
Below us, and across Thomaston Ave, was the former Naugatuck Railroad, originally built in 1849, which continues up along the Naugatuck River to the north.
We cut down to the right to switch to following the old Naugatuck line. We continued under a bridge and out to across Thomaston Ave from the Colonial Plaza where I was originally planning to park. This bothered me at this point, because we would have been done at a very nice spot. But we had to continue.
We headed down into the parking lot and walked through the Colonia Plaza, and then came out to Main Street on the south side of it. We turned right, crossed the Naugatuck on the street, and then made our way up hill and then west on street.
I am pretty sure we parked the cars at the park and ride on Chase Parkway and Interstate 84 because I seem to recall looking at the deli across the street in the morning but knowing it would be closed by the time we got back to the parking lot at the end of the day.
I definitely didn't love the last bit of road walk, but Justin bragged about how much he loved it. There really wasn't anything particularly interesting about it.
Overall, the hike was fantastic, and it covered so many different and interesting things. I always love filling in all of these gaps and connecting to new spots. This one was just outstanding with the mix of natural, urban, and suburban. It's not easy to come up with a hike as diverse as this one, and I think that everyone that didn't have the appreciation for Connecticut that I have found certainly had it after this adventure.
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