Hike #1631; Peapack to Liberty Corner

Hike #1631: 11/3/24 Peapack to Liberty Corner with Jenny Tull, Tom Vorrius, Diane Reider, Kirk Rohn, Steve Sanbeg, Robin Deitz, Carolyn Gockel Gordon, and Everen

This next hike would be another point to point, this time returning to the Bedminster area again in a route very similar to what we had recently done between Hacklebarney and Pluckemin.

That hike had been such a great time, relaxing and interesting, and I had actually looked over various routes that could have been used for that hike before I settled on the one we did.

In fact, there was anothe similar one that covered some of this ground all the way back in the fall of 2012, which Matt Davis concocted to pass through traditional British hound hunting areas.

I looked back at some of that stuff and a couple of the roads we followed on that, as well as a lot of stuff we have never walked before. It would be a hike that crisscrossed some of the last hike, but was otherwise mostly new.

The bulk of these hikes are always easy to figure out. It is the beginning and end that make it tough and require some adjustments to keep it right around fifteen miles.

I looked at a lot of the land to the east of Pluckemin, where we had ended the previous one, and realized I had only ever hiked that stuff as night hikes, and there was still stuff worth seeing. 

I originally planned to have the hike start down near Far Hills and retrace some steps I'd done on the hike in 2012 including Natirar, but when I decided on Dunham Park at Liberty Corner as the end point, I had to subtract from the start. I instead settled on a starting point at Peapack Station.

I decided on the south side of Dunham Park. There is parking at the north side, but the way I figured out the mileage, I needed that bit of extra, plus I wanted to see more of the park, which I'd barely gone through in the past.

I left too early for this one, because I was planning on traffic when I looked up the driving time the days before. I ended up getting there really fast, and so I spent the time cleaning out my car a bit and letting Ev run around some. It was pretty nice out, but a little bit chilly.

While I was going through stuff, I was very happy to see my old friend Joe Tag show up. He came bearing gifts, an old map and a very nice beige blazer. Since it was a bit cooler, and when I tried it on it was like it was tailored for me, I decided to wear that. 

Joe can't do the mileage now, but he can still do some. I offered to give him a late join in if he needed, but he ended up not joining us this time.

I was also happy to see Tom Vorrius for the first time in what seemed like forever.

Once everyone had arrived, we all shuttled in my van to our starting point at Peapack.

Gladstone feels like a real depot area, but Peapack is sort of a step back in time with a rather informal looking gravel lot, and even the historic old raiload station looks like it could use a bit of a facelift.

The station building was constructed in 1891, on the Peapack Gladstone Branch, which was then a pat of the Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western system.

This line was originally to be part of the New Jersey West Line Railroad, which built some of the branch, but was stalled in 1873. 

The Passaic and Delaware Railroad took over with connection to the Morris and Essex line in Summit, and the Lackawanna started operations on it in 1878. It connected to Gladstone rather than points west as originally intended. 

There was grading and even a tunnel started to the east of Summit, but tracks were never laid as I understand, and it never got anywhere. The line was shifted northward to the Gladstone terminus rather than points west. I understand that this was in part because of deals with the other lines out there to get a through route. When the Lehigh Valley Railroad got the Easton and Amboy I think it was, the dealings with the New Jersey West Line were no longer necessary.

It is still actively used by New Jersey Transit. The site was established as a station stop in 1890, probably just a flag stop at the time. Most of the old wooden stations were eliminated in the very early 1900s in favor of more modern structures, but this one is a nice step back in time.

We stated walking along Holland Avenue to the east, across Peapack Brook, and then to parking lots on the left. We cut into these and headed north behind buildings parallel with Main Street.

When the lot ended, we turned right out to Main Street, and then left to head to the north.

In just a little bit, we came to the historic lime kilns that stand out so much on the street. We crossed over when there was less traffic to have a better look at these giant kilns.

The historic Moses Craig Limekilns of Peapack were built in the mid 1800s. Craig's limestone operation was among the largest in the state.

These kilns were among the last industrial limekilns to be operated in the State of New Jersey, as late as possibly the 1950s.

We continued ahead from here a bit, climbed down off of the stone wall along the road, and then crossed back over to the other side of Main Street.

In a short while, we came to the entrance to the lot for St. Brigid Roman Catholic Church, so we turned to the left to walk through that closer to the Peapack Brook in back of it. I recall an NJ Transit train went by while we were back there looking as well.

It was a pretty spot, and there was a statue overlooking the natural setting of the brook there.

When we got to the end of the lot, we had to turn right and start heading back up to the Main Street. As we were doing this, I peered off to the left, maybe thinking of ways we might be able to get through fo a quicker route.

In doing this, I spotted something in the weeds. There were a couple of tomb stones.

They very well could be human tombstones since they are just outside of a church property. I wondered if maybe they were stones of pets that belonged to the neighbors on the other side of the property line, or were they early cemetery burials that have since been forgotten. I'm not sure.

We headed back out to Main Street and headed north a bit more. Then soon, we turned left and descended into Liberty Park, which has a lovely pond with fountain sprays in it. We walked to the far west end of it and then turned right, parallel with Peapack Brook and the railroad line.

This was a particularly beautiful spot with all of the fall foliage.

The Park dates back to May 1919 when a group of residents met and formed the Liberty Park Association with the goal of developing a park to honor area men who had served their country in the Great War. They proposed to raise the funds necessary to acquire the property, then known as Riker’s Meadow, to develop it as a memorial to local World War I veterans.

In April, 1927, Liberty Park was deeded to the Borough by the Association. The care and upkeep of the property had exceeded the means of the Association. In the late 1930s, swimming in the pond was discontinued due to encroaching pollutants.

In 1948, a second memorial honoring the veterans of World War II was erected. The white swans made their appearance around 1955, the gift of Mrs. Edgar Rosenblatt, who pictured them as the finishing touch to an idyllic setting.

Subsequent memorials to other wars were erected in subsequent years with a new Vietnam Memorial erected Memorial Day, 2015.

Liberty Park is the venue for many Borough events such as Community Day, Art in the Park, The Fire Department’s Classic Car show and Christmas with Santa. Most significant of these have been the annual Memorial Day services, which are in keeping with the intent of the founders of the Liberty Park Association. Plans are afoot to rehabilitate some of the older features of the Park in time for its Centennial.

We continued north a bit, and there was an access road that led to the left over a grade crossing of the tracks, where Lackawanna Ave went straight parallel with them.

I had seen that there was supposedly a park to the left, but I wasn't sure what we would find. I was hoping to make some sort of connection.

We crossed the tracks, and the road continues uphill for a bit to access a solar panel field. 

At the track crossing, there was a mostly buried siding that also came out to the road, but I'm not sure what its purpose had been.

Ahead on the road, there was a wooden post that read "trail" on it, with green paint, pointing ahead. I was happy to see this. We followed the gravel road ahead.

Soon, the trail had a turn to the right, into some young woods.

The trail was well mowed, and good and clear. It led us through woods to the north for a bit, and then cut to the left with a gradual ascent.

Soon, we emerged at the edge of a large mowed field, part of Komline Park. We followed the left side of this to the edge of the tree line, then went slightly right to a large stand of bamboo.

Located at the end of Apgar Road (off of Pottersville Road), Komline Park, formerly a farm, was acquired by the Borough using Open Space Preservation Funds through a generous agreement with long-time residents of the Borough, the Komline family. The park features a gazebo, walking paths, and recreational facilities. In 2015, a new set of regulation tennis courts and hitting wall were completed.

There were at least two varieties of the bamboo headed into this stand, and we followed a prominent trail right into the thicket. 

This was unlike other trails I'd been on. It was a very bright day, and the bamboo almost shut out all light. It was quite amazing.

Bamboo is not nearly as bad an invasive species as people like to claim. It is actually native in some form to every continent other than Antarctica. It is also pretty easily contained.

The trail took us through the thicket and out the west end of it, then continued through the woods to the west.

There was only a very narrow swath of woods that this passed through, near a sort of business downhill from us and a clearing uphill from us. We continued across an access road, and then to the north. The trail skirted a bit of a hillside and had a couple of fallen trees over it, but was mostly pretty easy to follow.

I was very impressed that this went through for this far. I was not expecting to be on trail nearly this much time.

The trail eventually brought us out to Pottersville Road, and it does continue across to the other side. 

I understand there is an initiative to create a trail that encircles Gladstone completely, and some of it is in place, but unfortunately, the municipal website link to the trail map goes to a dead link. I will have to get out there to explore it again in the near future.

We turned left on Pottersville Road, which soon took us to Rt 206. At this point, the former Rockaway Valley Raiload used to come down to the closest point to Gladstone it reached, and then weaved to the north again over a long wooden trestle over a brook. 

I assume that this trail must at least cross that right of way, or maybe follows it. I'm very curious on this. I have no idea where the trail might come out after passing through those woods across.

The Rockaway Valley Railroad was built in 1888 mainly to haul peaches, when the north central part of New Jersey was the peach capital of the world.

Unfortunately, all of the peaches were killed in the blight in 1890. The railroad, which stretched from White House station to Watong near Morristown struggled to get by. 

The railroad was still in place when the tubs Brothers purchased this property, a former peach orchard itself, in 1908. They used the property to further their interests in horticulture.

The railroad was pretty much done by 1913, although it was upgraded with high hopes shortly after that. Work was done to extend it to Morristown, but then abandoned again in 1916. It was ripped up and sold for World War I scrap.

We carefully and quickly crossed over Rt 206 and continued on Pottersville Road only a short distance. I think the old railroad bed is partially built over by Rt 206 for a little bit of time here.

Fowler Road turned left very near the intersection, and we turned. The road us unpaved, which makes it a great walking route. The start of the road had an old stone estate entrance gate at it.

The properties along the road are all very well posted. This is all of the very rich locals, who have the big equestrian association and trails. I did not have any permission to cross those lands this time, like we'd done with the one in 2012, but it was fine. The road was nice enough.

We crossed under something called Brady Drive, a private road that goes over Fowler Road. It was interesting that they had to have their own overpass as not to have an inviting entrance to the estate.

The pastoral views along the way were amazing. Tom was telling me that his brother had lived down here until recently, or maybe brother's in laws or something, but that he'd been through a split. The homes are huge, and well far off of the road.

There were beautiful pastoral views all along the way, and we also crossed over one of those nice little stone arch bridges, of which there are more in this part of New Jersey than anywhere in America. This one was outfitted with ornamental "dragon tooth" stone tops.

There is a lot of golf course property to the west of where we were. If I were still doing the night hikes, I'd be wandering through on those, although maybe not with the heightened sense of security through this area. We were not far from Trump's Bedminster golf course, and that was the location of another recent assassination attempt.

We passed above the Spook Hollow Farm, and then came out to Holland Road, another unpaved road, where we turned right.

This was a really nice road, and I noted that Spook Hollow Road, the next one we passed, was also unpaved and very pleasant looking. I may have to do a third variation of this hike!

We continued down Hollow Road and passed Old Dutch Road on the left, another very nice backroad.

We continued past more farms and estates to the south, parallel with a stream called the Middle Brook (not to be confused with the more prominent stream of the same name over in the western Watchungs), and soon reached Larger Cross Road.

This was on the same route we had followed on the previous hike like this one. We turned left here and began following Larger Cross Road to the south.

It was only a short distance before we came to the small community of Greater Cross Roads.

This little Bedminster Township community is where Lamington Road crosses the Larger Cross Road, which remains unpaved for its entire 4.6-mile length. 

At the time of the 1873 Beers Atlas of Somerset County, the one home on the corner was that of D. Dunham. Next door to that, on the southwest corner, was a shoe shop, and next to that, a tannery.

Earlier, it was the John Phoenix Tavern, where George Washington dined in 1777. It was built in the 1770s, and added to in 1830 and 1967.

I made a goof up when we got to this point. I had related some of the history of the spot to the group, but I was so deep in conversation with Tom that we just continued to the south on Larger Cross Road, the same way we had done on the previous hike.

My intention had been that we would go a short distance to the east on Lamington Road, and then turn right on Cedar Ridge Road, another very nice unpaved road. But I forgot.

In fact, we made it all the way just about to River Road to the south before I even realized that I'd missed this intended turn!

We turned left on River Road, which was also unpaved, and then reached the pedestrian bridge across the North Branch of the Raritan River to the right, which sits where the Kline's Mill Road bridge used to be. We didn't walk it to the south at this point, and instead remained on River Road heading to the east, but we did enjoy a short and nice break on the bridge with good views of the river.

We continued on River Road past an old root cellar built into the slope on the north side of the road, and then passed the end of Cedar Ridge Road, where I had intended to come down.

Just beyond here, River Road became paved, but still little used.

Soon, we reached River Road Park, where we had entered this property on the previous hike. That time, we continued to the left around he outside of the fields, but this time we would go right on the section that was a little closer to the road. I wanted to try to cover as many of the trails here as we could, which we didn't do last time.

This segment started to move a little further away from the road, and then we happened upon an old farm site.

There was the frame of a block building, and a silo remaining. This is apparently known as the Robert J. Stahl Natural Area, and someone said it was once the Welsh Farm, which had cattle and such.

The block building had no roof, and it was sort of repurposed as a bird and wildlife blind. I'd seen something like this before, where an old building was used, in Coplay PA area.

We continued sort of to the north from here and weaved between some trees, to a tree line between two fields. We followed the edge to the north, to reach the north side of these fields, and the route we had followed the previous time.

My plan from here was to find a trail that breaks off of the field edges to the north, into the woods.

As we were headed east along the north side of the fields, we found the trail branching off into the woods to the north. Ev and I waited for the others to catch up, and we all headed into the woods.

We made our way north, weaving around a little bit, and passed a little meadow with a bench. There were several memorial benches in these woods with people's names on them, and then one that simply read "never lose you sense of wonder.

We made our way along the very pleasant trail, which came out at the very end of a dead end road, Thosmor Road. We turned right on this road and passed a few houses, and then pretty soon reached where the trail broke off to the right, back into the woods heading sort of to the south.

This section of trail was easy and paved. We weaved around through the woods some more, and eventually came out to a gravel road.

Here, we could see an old house to the right. This was the Jacobus Vanderveer House, and we walked over to check it out.

I'd walked through this area before, but never really had a good look at the historic home.

The original section was built in the 1770s, and is believed to have served as military headquarters to General Henry Knox during the Continental Army's Winter encampment in 1778-79. It is the only surviving building associated with the Pluckemin Military Cantonment, which was America's first military academy.

The building had one addition in the 1800s, and has been restored to its circa 1813 look, and serves as an interpretive museum of Dutch-Colonial life.

Although some dispute the claim that Knox headquartered here, it is generally accepted that this home still had a major role in the Pluckemin ordeal. 

There is reportedly another colonial home that was on a farm nearby, which was demolished for a new development, which might have been to Knox headquarters.

We walked around the rear of the building, and then around the front, and paused for a bit because Carolyn was going to join us here for the remainder of the trip.

It didn't take her very long to show up, and we all continued to the south through a line of trees and onto an access road heading south.

It was only a short distance from here before we reached the first of the interesting pedestrian bridges that are a part of the Bedminster Hike and Bike Trail system.

I thought Ev would want to stay out of the stroller from the historic house, but he was getting lazy again. Usually, he's happy to run across the bridges as well, but he wasn't feeling it with these either. Steve helped with that and we got him across.

We went up and over Rt 202/206 exit on this first bridge, then descended to beside the AT&T access road, and followed along that beneath the main lanes of 202 and 206. 

On the other side, we reached the North Brach of the Raritan River, at a T intersection on the trail. To the left, the trail leads north to Far Hills, and to the right, it continues down to Pluckemin. 

We turned to the right and followed the North Branch to the south a bit, with some nice views. We passed beneath one of the AT&T access roads, and then weaved away from the river into a segment of woods.

Soon, the trail, paved here, came around to the River Road jughandle and followed beside it to the bridge that carries 202 and 206 over the North Branch.

We crossed the North Branch beside the highway, and then weaved hard to the left for a bit. The trail began to climb, and soon reached yet another pedestrian bridge, this time over the exit between I-287 and Rts 202 and 206.

Once across that, we descended and passed beneath Rt 297 along Rts 202 and 206 again. 

We weaved though some woods inside another jughandle, and then crossed a final big pedestrian bridge up and over Schley Mountain Road. The trail descended to its end on Robertson Drive.

I immediately cut through trees on the north side of Robertson Drive, and then into a development called Hills Village, part of a larger development known simply as "The Hills".

We meandered along sidewalks and such associated with the homes in this development, and out to small streets to the north, to Birchwood Road access, out to Long Meadow Road.

We turned right briefly on Long Meadow Road to the south, and then cut to the left into Hills Village Park.

We walked diagonally through the grassy undeveloped pieces out to another bit of Long Meadow Road, where we had left Robin's car so she could cut out early.

This would be Robin's last hike with us until close to Christmas because she was going away from an extended vacation, so we gave her hugs and said our goodbyes for now, and continued along Long Meadow Road, which shifted to the north.

To the east of where we were, there is a great deal of land called "The Hills Open Space", but I don't know about any trails in it. One would think there should be something, but I didn't know enough to make a judgement.

At this point in the day, and with the mileage we had already done, I made the judgement call to just walk north on Schley Mountain Road. 

I had walked much of this road once before as part of a night hike, where we were passing through a golf course much of the time. We couldn't do that this time because it was a nice day and we would be far too visible. At night, no one really cares, or would even notice us to care.

Schley Mountain Road was rather steep and continued uphill for a bit. 

This road had a separation in the middle between east and westbound lanes, and no real sidewalk, but there was a pretty good shoulder on the left side for the most part.

We pushed on through this bit of it to the very top, where we turned off to the left on Douglas Road.

At the entrance to this intersection, there were some old stone gate posts that went along with some sot of old estate at one time. I'm not sure what it was, but they were rather impressive, although overgrown almost completely with weeds. In the Summer, they would be easy to miss.

These roads were the kinds that don't have lines in them that lend themselves well to walking, but Douglas did have a reasonable amount of traffic.

We continued along to the east for a bit, and I spotted another round stone thing in the woods to the left. I don't know what this might have been, but it seems too large to be a property corner.

We could see the USGA golf courses off to the right as we walked, and came to the intersection with Layton Road. We turned right here.

One day, I'd like to walk areas to the north, because Leonard J. Buck Gardens and Moggy Hollow are located over there, and I want to see those spots. That could be a future one.

Soon, we reached a hard ninety degree bend in the road to the left, where the road name changes to Mt. Prospect Road.

This road used to go all the way through before The Hills were built, and before the USGA came in and closed off the middle section of it. It was part of one of my plans for this hike that we didn't end up doing because it would have put us over by a lot.

Still, I'd like to try to follow the route in the future. It would be easy to do as a night hike, but during the day would be a bit of a problem.

We continued on the open part of Mt Prospect to the east. The ladies had to step off into a narrow swath of woods along the way because they didn't take advantage of the good woods earlier on along the road and there wasn't going to be much woods left for the rest of the trip.

We reached Liberty Corner Road and turned to the right. There wasn't really a good shoulder to follow on this, but we didn't have to be on it for all that long.

Soon, we crossed over the Dead River, which flows to the south into the Dunham Park area. 

After crossing the stream, just ahead was the parking and vehicle access to Harry Dunham Park.

Once in, we turned to the right on paved trails that went around the outsides of ball fields and such.

Only Tom, Steve, and I even took this route. The rest of them were making the most straight route they could back to the cars at the south side.

When we got to the west side of this paved trail, an upaved trail broke off into the woods and closer to the Dead River. Of course, I wanted to check this out.

The trail was really nice. It weaved around closer to the Dead River, and kept in a more natural wetland section. It was quite pleasant.

The trail emerged back on the paved trails that go all the way across north to south, and we were soon back at the cars and finished with the hike.

Ev napped for the entire very last portion of this, having stayed awake most of the day.

While I could have done without some of the sections in The Hills development, it was still really interesting, and the overall hike was a great and relaxing day. It certainly won't be the last I put together featuring the trails, roads, and fields around Bedminster.