I had previously hiked Wharton State Forest from Batsto so I hiked from Atsion this time. I found the main differences to be that the trails from Batsto follow sand roads too much for my liking but there are a lot of water views. The Atsion trails are virtually all packed sand and pine needle trails through pine forests with minimal sand road but also minimal water views. The 10 mile Atsion hike was… Continue
Added by Daniela Wagstaff on March 6, 2010 at 12:30pm —
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When I checked the snow depth maps it looked like there should be 1 inch of snow along the shore where the rest of the state was buried in snow. Sure enough, I found there to be no snow to 1 inch and rarely maybe 3 inches deep for very short distances at
Cattus Island County Park. There has been a lot of melting but there is a great network of boardwalks and trails raised with wood chips so for the most part your feet stay dry. There were…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on February 28, 2010 at 7:00pm —
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Hiked the green and red trails at
Michael Huber Prairie Warbler Preserve for a total of 9.5 miles. The kiosk had a supply of maps. It is the exact same map (even same size) as what is available online. Parking is probably along the road as there did not seem to be any space at the entrance but everything was snow covered, especially deep from plowing, so I parked across the street where there was some cleared space at…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on February 21, 2010 at 8:56pm —
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There was more snow than I thought there would be at
Mahlon Dickerson Reservation so I figured it would be a very short hike since the snow was not very trampled down but I did end up hiking 5.9 miles.
There were maybe a half dozen maps in the kiosk. The
online map is good. I took the teal Highlands trail, which starts by the porta-potty in the Saffin Pond…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on February 14, 2010 at 7:47pm —
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Hiked around 7 miles at
High Mountain Preserve Park in Wayne, NJ. There are two different maps online but I liked
this one the best. I ended up giving my copy to a couple of guys who were lost going in the opposite direction when I was near the end. There is supposed to be a kiosk at the end of the parking lot (Lot 6 William Patterson College) but I did not…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on February 7, 2010 at 5:06pm —
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Hiked mostly all of the trails at
Apshawa Preserve with only about 1/2 mile overlap for a total of 7.7 miles. This is a no hunting park. The online map is very good but differs slightly from the paper map, a huge supply of which were in the kiosk in the parking lot. The paper map is the more accurate one. The differences are the online map shows the white trail continuing north out of the preserve to a scenic…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on January 24, 2010 at 10:00am —
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Had the day off and wanted to stay close since I hiked Walkway Over the Hudson/Franny Reese State Park on Saturday. (Didn't write that up since it is NY but if anyone is interested, let me know and I will.)
Lewis Morris County Park is listed as having no hunting at all so I went there. Turns out they do now have some hunting days scheduled:
Nothing spectacular at…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on January 18, 2010 at 6:37pm —
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When I arrived at
Ramapo Valley County Reservation at 9 am there were already about a dozen cars in the parking lot. (Parking lot is HUGE with plenty of parking.) The snow, which was fresh from the day before, was pretty heavily trampled. About 2 miles out the snow was untouched for several miles so my dog and I were the first to walk on it. That is when you know you are alone and the only…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on January 1, 2010 at 5:00pm —
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South Mountain Reservation (Millburn/South Orange/Maplewood) does not allow hunting (
except starting 1/19/2010 on Tuesdays and Thursdays for three weeks) so with Sunday having freezing rain and sleet forecast, this was a good option to get in a weekend hike on a Saturday. The terrain is very…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on December 13, 2009 at 10:53am —
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Wells Mills County Park is an absolutely delightful park. According to the signs posted no hunting ever in this park. Surprisingly, there are plenty of hills to climb and even ridges to walk along, something you don't generally find in the Pinelands.
It is very easy to get to. Exit 69 off the Garden State Parkway going either direction, left on Wells Mills Road (route 532) for 2.5 miles, park entrance on the…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on December 6, 2009 at 5:01pm —
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I received the
Wharton State Forest maps I had requested from the State Park Service this week. They sent some very nice, detailed maps. So we headed south. It's been a while since I hiked in southern NJ and my memory of that was being attacked by biting flies the entire time. None of that this time of year! The park has many tick warning signs posted but I didn't see a single one so hopefully they are…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on November 22, 2009 at 9:30pm —
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I did the
Mount Tammany/Sunfish Pond/Dunnfield Creek hike and it was fabulous! Got there at 8 am and there were already many cars in the parking lot but only passed one couple on the red dot trail going up Mt. Tammany. The only problem with being there that early is the clouds were very low and obstructed the views but it's still neat to look down on…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on November 16, 2009 at 12:45pm —
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We went over to PA to hike
The Pinnacle. It is normally an 8.6 mile hike but since it is so hugely popular, we decided to take the back way and park near
Hawk Mountain which made our hike 12.8 miles, but a little less crowded than the AT going to and from the Reservoir parking lot in Hamburg where most people park. It took 1 1/2 hours to get there from Central Jersey. The…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on November 9, 2009 at 6:33pm —
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Decided to hike Sandy Hook figuring it should be pretty deserted this time of year. For the most part it was, just a lot of people fishing. Parked right at the fee plaza (no fee after Labor Day), got on the multi-use trail briefly and turned right at the first beach access. Walked the entire beach heading north. There is nothing like the sound of crashing waves but the garbage and litter on the beach was quite depressing.…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on November 1, 2009 at 8:41am —
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We did the High Point hike as outlined here
http://www.njhiking.com/best-hikes-in-nj-high-point-monument-trail.php
The trail didn't seem too affected by the heavy rains the day before, just a little water trickling across here and there. We started shortly after 8 am and it was incredibly windy and overcast but on the way back the wind had died down and skies were blue. Foliage was somewhat…
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Added by Daniela Wagstaff on October 27, 2009 at 2:59pm —
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