ABOUT THE PARK:
DIRECTIONS:
GPS Coordinates 40.33836, -74.64712
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| Delaware and Raritan Canal State Park parking on Washington Road. |
BIKE DISTANCE: 32.7 miles
The Lawrence Hopewell Trail without the D&R portion is about 22 miles.
THE BIKE:
As always, Weather.com can be counted on to give a stellar forecast. I always check the weather before I leave the house and the page is usually still up on my laptop when I get home so here it is:
So please pardon the blurry and spotty pictures from the first 10 miles. I had to put the camera in my backpack for most of it so there aren't many pictures early on.
Dawn from NJHiking.com had mentioned that the D&R Canal Trail along Lake Carnegie is in really rough shape to Harrison Street. When I checked my tracks I found I had already
hiked that section in 2018 so all I had to do was connect back to Harrison Street.
The Lawrence Hopewell Trail is still a work in progress but it has come a long way from when I first heard about it about 15 years ago. Some parts are so easy to follow, other parts not so much. I had planned out the route in Gaia GPS and that came in very handy when there was no signage and future trail sections needed to navigated around on roads. Regardless, it's a fun trail with lots of history and variety. It's not all flat, here are hills.
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| From the parking area, left on Washington Road then a right just before the bridge over the canal. |
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| This is a grassy path that was 1 mile of surprisingly easy riding. To make a case for wearing a helmet - as I was riding along there was a sudden THUD on my head. A branch had fallen out of a tree and hit me square on top of the head. The helmet absorbed all of the impact and no harm was done. Imagine if I had not had a helmet on. Yikes! |
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| Coming off that grassy path ... |
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| ... left on Harrison Road meeting up with where I left off in 2018, then ... |
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| Delaware and Raritan Canal |
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| ... left on the towpath. |
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| The end of Lake Carnegie on the right. |
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| Crossing Washington Road where I had parked over to the left. |
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| Crossing Alexander Road. |
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| Fast forward 3.5 miles through the rain (4 miles from Washington Road), the Lawrence Hopewell connector trail on the right. |
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| The connector trail comes out at the Brearly House along the treeline up ahead from left to right. I kept following the path and ended up in an apartment complex which was not right so I backtracked. Turns out there is no trail from the connector trail to the parking lot at the Brearly House. You have to cut across the grass by the picnic tables from the connector trail to the parking lot, then on out the gravel drive from the parking lot. |
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| That brings you to the Lawrence Hopewell Trail. I would be returning from straight ahead but for now, right over ... |
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| ... a gorgeous loooooong spanking new bridge. It's very nice and still smells like new wood. |
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| It goes on for a pretty long time. |
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| The signage in this area is awesome. Large signs that clearly direct where to go at each intersection. It's not like throughout the trail but a good amount is signed like this. |
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| Some parts go through very quiet residential neighborhoods. |
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| Busier streets have a bike path running parallel. |
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| Entering Bristol Meyers Squibb. |
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| The trail surface alternates between paved, gravel, crushed stone, packed dirt, concrete, you name it, it's in this trail. |
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| Entering ETS (Educational Testing Service). |
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| Poor robin looks wetter than I was. |
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| There are lots of bridges throughout. |
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| Stony Brook |
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| On Province Line Road the last marker that will be seen for a while indicates a left turn on Prettybrook Road. This is where things can get confusing. There is a long uphill and at the top the road curves to the right and becomes Cleveland Road. At the next curve to the left, the road goes downhill and at this point is where the future trail will be so this needs to be bypassed on roads but there are no signs. It involves staying downhill on Cleveland Road to the end ... |
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| ... then a right on Carter Road. |
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| Carter Road |
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| On the left is Mount Rose Preserve with an LHT sign but that is not where the trail is. You have to continue on Carter Road to the pedestrian crosswalk up ahead. |
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| While I was standing off to the side trying to figure all this out, a white pickup truck pulled over in front of me, threw something out the window and drove off. He refused to look at me as I give him the evil eye but I could see it was an older man. I retrieved what he threw out. If this is what he is drinking at 8:30 AM, he has problems far bigger than littering. Wish I would have gotten a picture of his license plate but unfortunately I did not. At least I packed out his trash. |
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| So, on to that crosswalk up ahead where it's a left turn. I could see pavement going to the right where the future trail would come out so I went that way to investigate first. |
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| There is a sign saying it will be a future trail, presumably to the left, because straight ahead is private property. |
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| Back over the crosswalk on a paved path. Still no LHT signs. |
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| Passing Mount Rose Distillery. |
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| Then there is a sign right before this intersection that brings you to another "future trail" portion. Cross over straight ahead then cross right ... |
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| ... and here it's a left on the road to bypass the future trail that does not yet exist. I continued straight just to check it out. The pavement continues a short distance then ends so I headed back. |
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| Since the sun had come out, it was a nice shady spot to take a break and apply sunscreen. |
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| Continuing on Pennington-Rocky Hill Road. Then it's a series of turns onto different quiet roads. |
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| After this one-lane bridge is where the signs pick up consistently again. |
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| After crossing this long bridge over Rocky Brook ... |
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| ...the signs change to those long, narrow, hard to read ones on the light post on the left. This looking back at that bridge. The signs point in confusing directions but coming off the bridge, it's a left turn. |
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| Passing by Rosedale Lake. |
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| Hunt House |
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| Pole Farm at Mercer Meadows |
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| I had to come to a complete stop and get right up on this sign to read which way to go. It's a left turn. |
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| The large signs start up again. |
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| A short stretch on the Johnson Trolley Line. |
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| After crossing Route 206 there are no more signs for a while. This is The Lawrenceville School. I continued straight. |
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| The trail appears to skirt along the southern side of the school property so I kept to the right. I found this path and took it but I was not sure at all that I was going the right way. |
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| Turns out I must have been because I ended up on this road that took me to a directional sign and from this point the signs are consistent again. |
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| Crossing Princeton Pike, which is the busiest road crossing. |
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| Following Princeton Pike on a bike path. |
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| This is that apartment complex I ended up in early on so I knew I was nearing the end of the loop. |
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| The concrete path turns into a narrow gravel path... |
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| ... then a wider gravel path ... |
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| ... then comes out on a gravel road for a short distance to ... |
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| ... that brand new bridge from the beginning. Keeping straight now ... |
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| ... to the Brearley House ... |
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| ... across the grass at the picnic tables ... |
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| ... then left on the connector trail. |
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| Left on the D&R towpath trail to retrace back. |
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| Delaware and Raritan Canal from the Washington Road bridge. |
