ABOUT THE PARK:
Delaware and Raritan Canal State Park - NJ Department of Environmental Protection
Six Mile Run Reservoir Site - Delaware and Raritan Canal State Park (scroll to bottom)
Six Mile Run Reservoir Site - JORBA
DIRECTIONS:
GPS Coordinates 40.45652, -74.51372
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| At 6:45 AM on Easter Sunday I was the only one in the lot. At 10:15 AM, lots of cars. |
TRAIL MAP:
Six Mile Run Reservoir - JORBA
HIKE DISTANCE: 6 miles
THE HIKE:
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| The hike starts at the kiosk at the far left corner of the lot (with your back to Route 27). |
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| This hike is pretty much the red trail out and back but we went on some unmarked trails on the return route. |
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| At 6:45 AM it was just getting light out and it was very cloudy and gloomy so the early pictures aren't very good at all. |
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| We were being watched. |
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| Six Mile Run off to the left. |
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| A wood duck in a tree! First time I have seen that. |
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| Hollow Tree |
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| The red trail crosses a power cut... |
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| ... then the squiggly orange trail starts to the right. |
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| Reentering the woods after crossing a pipeline cut. |
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| Oh look, a balloon! We haven't found one the last few hikes. |
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| Oh look, ANOTHER balloon! |
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| Now we have two! |
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| Spring is everywhere. |
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| Holy Helium! A THIRD balloon... |
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| ... and a fourth... |
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| ... and a fifth. OK, now I am going to keep you in suspense until the end to see just how many balloons we packed out. |
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| The Concrete Bridge |
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| Six Mile Run |
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| Shawnee does not understand the significance of these bumps in the trail so she avoids them. |
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| I made the mistake of having Shawnee take the high bridge over. She stumbled and fell going down the other side. It will be the low bridge for the return route. |
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| Crossing Middlebush Road. |
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| A huge abandoned house. |
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| This was our turnaround point since we had hiked the portion beyond in 2014. |
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| Heading back. |
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| Yellow-bellied Sapsucker |
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| Again avoiding those bumps in the trail. |
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| Skunk Cabbage |
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| I also found a plastic bag (hate them as much as Mylar balloons) to haul my balloons back in. |
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| Because the red trail was getting too busy for our liking (lots of Easter Day walkers in their Sunday best on the trail carrying paper Starbucks coffee cups...) we took the unmarked trails that we had all to ourselves. |
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| They are pretty straight, too! |
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| A blue jay taking off. |
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| Coming up on the power cut. |
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| And we meet back up with the red trail not to far from the end. |
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| On a Facebook dog hiking group they posted a chart that showed the equivalent dog/human years. Shawnee is the senior member of the group at 93 years old! |
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| Today's total balloon haul - EIGHT! I kid you not, 8 balloons in the woods. There were two more but they were too hard to get to so I left them. |
