ABOUT THE PARK:
DIRECTIONS: GPS Coordinates 41.201500, -74.391610
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| Parking along Warwick Turnpike at the Appalachian Trail crossing. |
HIKE DISTANCE: 12.2 miles
THE HIKE:
This turned out to be the most annoying hike ever. I always check park web sites as part of hike planning to see if there are anything I need to be aware of. New Jersey State Parks just had the same outdated information online:
I did not know until I was 3.5 miles into the hike that I had run smack into this:
Not just a race, MANY races. Needless to say, it was not an enjoyable hike. I have no problem with organizations using trails for races but I fault New Jersey State Parks for not making this information available. I would have gladly gone elsewhere had I known.
At any rate, it started out pleasant enough.
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| Heading south on the Appalachian Trail. |
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| Just past Parker Lake ... |
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| ... left on the blue Hoeferlin Trail. |
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| Coming out at the park entrance, there are no signs but you turn right then ... |
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| ... just past the building turn left to ... |
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| ... continue on the blue trail. |
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| Picked up a couple of early arriving migrants (Black-and-white Warbler and Northern Waterthrush) on the Merlin Bird ID sound app. |
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| At the end of blue, right on yellow. |
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| Yellow has lots of swampy sections but there were always enough rocks to step on. |
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| The first sign of something going on. |
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| Oh no, a race. Little did I know there were several races taking place. |
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| Welcome back Yellow Warbler! |
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| We turned left in front of the furnace heading towards the orange Lake Loop Trail. |
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| And here they come! |
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| Coming up on the main parking lot, there was no crossing over to get to the trail. |
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| We had to go uphill and try to get around through sticker bushes at times. |
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| Taking a break at a picnic table to contemplate my next move. There was music, hooting and hollering, people and cars everywhere. |
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| Finally made it over to the perimeter of the parking lot and went around to ... |
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| ... the orange Lake Loop. |
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| Imagine my joy when the race went to the right and the trail went to the left. |
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| Peace and quiet along the entire western side of the pond. Except for the shooting range that we were getting closer and closer to causing Brodie's anxieties to kick in. I had hoped we would be far enough away and when in lower areas we could not hear gunfire but when higher up we could. |
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| There are no lake views along the western side. |
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| The trail turns left at the southern end of the lake. |
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| And turning left along the eastern side of the lake we were in the race again. |
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| This was the worst part because runners were coming up behind us. Sometimes I could hear them coming, other times I could not and very few announced that they were coming up on us so I would constantly have to look behind me and I would say I had to step off the trail a good 30 times along this route. |
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| Across the lake over at the main parking lot. |
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| I had seen this eagle nest when I hiked here a couple of years ago and could see the eagle sitting on the nest but this time they were either not nesting or laying low with all the noise and activity. |
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| Northern Waterthrush |
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| Yay! The trail goes left, the race straight. |
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| It was near the end of the loop but sooooo nice not to have to deal with being in the race even for a short time. |
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| It's over. Back into the race. |
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| Back to the iron furnace where we would be following this road straight ahead. |
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| But first a break at a bench to change into sneakers for the rest of the hike, the last two miles of which would be mostly road walking. |
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| White-throated Sparrow |
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| Yes, this was part of the race also but at least it was a wide road so I never had to step off. |
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| Right on the main park road. |
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| Then left on the gravel road which is normally gated but not today because of, you got it, the race. |
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| We encountered several bikes from the race along this route but they were coming towards us so I could see them coming and with the wide road it wasn't much of an issue. |
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| Right on the Appalachian Trail to finish the hike in peace. |
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| Parker Lake |
I share your frustration with the stale information on the state park web sites - even the hours never get updated. I'd suspect the issue is that these are official State of NJ sites and are centrally managed and updating them would be more of a technical and administrative challenge than adding a quick post to a park's specific social media account. The problem with using social media is that Facebook, Instagram, Twitter/X etc. pretty much now all require you to have an account on the platform and to sign in before being able to view posts. I don't use social media/data collection sites and really have an issue with having to sign up with a private company to view government information. Maybe the answer is to go old school with a phone call to the park office ahead of time.
ReplyDeleteIf you only knew how much I despise making phone calls. Even that is not old school any more.
DeleteThe other issue with these events is that the event organizer and participants seem to think that they have exclusive use of the trails and roadways due to the permit. Particularly annoying is the Hashathon that is held at Cheesequake, They block trail crossings with water tables and really have an attitude. Even worse, they flag the route with hundreds of survey flags - sometimes only 10 feet apart - and do a poor job removing them after the event. After the last one, I removed close to about 50 the weekend after the event. (I also fault the park managers for letting them get away with this.) I kept thinking about how clueless their participants must be to need flags so close together to mark a route.
DeleteThat is awful. They should have to leave a huge deposit that they do not get back if they leave a mess.
DeleteMany years ago we ran into this same misery here. We’d parked at P7 and come in on Old Coal, and miles in landed smack in the middle of a bike race. We kept bailing to different trails to avoid to no avail. Now before heading to Wawayanda I try to remember to check the races I know of, but I haven’t heard of this one.
ReplyDeleteRace organizers should at least be putting a sign at the few parking lots that lead into the park. There’re so many nearby hiking options you could easily pivot to last minute and have a nice day instead. And the racers probably don’t want to have to avoid us hikers either!
I totally remember that happening to you and was thinking about that the entire time wondering if I happened upon the same race as you - apparently not! What really stinks is I could have headed north on the AT and looped around Surprise Lake instead from the same place where I parked. That was my Plan B. So yes, had there at minimum been a sign when I drove past the main entrance, misery on all of our parts could have been avoided.
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