ABOUT THE PARK:
Union Transportation Trail - Monmouth County Parks
DIRECTIONS:
GPS Coordinates 40.20617, -74.53661
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| Sharon Station Road Parking Lot |
TRAIL MAP:
Crosswicks Park and UTT Brochure - Monmouth County Parks
HIKE DISTANCE: 7.7 miles (3.85 miles each way)
THE HIKE:
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| Heading south from the parking lot. |
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| It feels like walking in a power cut. |
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| Markers every half mile. |
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| Although new, the trail is already pretty beaten up by horse traffic. |
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| The bridges are all quite nice. |
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| The trail does sometimes go through countryside... |
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| ... but more often it's through loud, littered industrial areas. |
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| Road crossings with an option to push a button for caution lights for traffic but we were able to cross without using that. |
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| Going under I-195. |
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| Along with all of the horse traffic comes lots of horse poop. |
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| The trail passes by this area that has these monster lifts that are LOUD when in use. |
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| Oh but look .... |
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| ... a balloon for the collection! |
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| Towards the end of this section things quiet down and become a little more scenic although there is almost constant road noise from Route 539 that the trail runs parallel to. |
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| I was hoping this might be a bobcat... |
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| ... but no, it's a cat cat. |
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| Lahaway Creek |
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| The trail veers right in a bypass. |
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| This was actually the best part of the trail. |
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| A great blue heron taking off from the pond. |
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| Where the bypass turns left ... |
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| ... to follow along Route 539, we turned back. |
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| Sometimes it feels like walking through a dump. |
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| Mostly not scenic at all contrary to what I had read about it. |
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| Hunters - hence the orange flag on Shawnee's wheels. |
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| After dodging (sometimes unsuccessfully on both our parts) now melted horse poop on the way back, the very last stretch, which was not bad in the beginning, now had that white pickup on the left, apparently without a muffler, idling the entire time. |
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| Heading north, the trail will go into Assunpink WMA, which might be nicer than heading south but don't think I'll be back to find out. It's a shame because I can imagine construction of this trail cost a lot of money and it was done nicely but I had to ask myself "Why?" the entire time. |
