mosses

Walking the Pike Preserve Trails

by taohobo

A preview of the April Pancake Breakfast Walk.

Don’t let the moving time dismay you. When I’m on the Pike Preserve trails I constantly stop look, listen… It’s a nature walk and the nature, regardless of the season grabs me.

While there are few hikers or walkers on these trails there are several stables that take advantage of the contingent trails. It does help to keep the inner trails well trodden and identifiable year round. The entry and exit trails for walkers and hikers are well blazed but you need to keep a check on them since these trails meander frequently.

Two unique features that keep children of all ages interested are the ‘Castle Rocks’ at the Northwest turn around and the spring pool at the Northeast side trail.

Castle Rocks…

An Easy Farm Trail

by taohobo

The background is not the type of terrain you’ll be walking at Haley Farm State Park in Groton Connecticut. Although there are a variety of trails the main ones are wide and easy walking. There are some amazing stone walls and foundations from the old farm buildings.

AllTrails has over 200 photos, 50 comments, and 55 recorded walks of the trails to help you decide which of several options you have for walking here. These trails also link to trails in Bluff Point State Park.

Enjoy your walk, see you on the trail.

Past and upcoming…

by taohobo

Saturday was a perfect day to walk the Pike-Marshall preserve in Ledyard… Except no one showed up. If you’d like to see what you missed you can check out an earlier hike that I recorded in AllTrails (R) (click here). Check the sidebar for walks coming up on New Year’s Day & a short Pancake Breakfast on Saturday the 4th of January 2020.

Anemome quinquefolia

Oh no…

by taohobo

As is my habit I pre-walked, or tried to pre-walk, the Berwick preserve for tomorrow’s Pancake Breakfast walk. It seems that either a tract of land has been sold, or there’s been a change in an access easement that allows access to that Avalonia Land Conservancy preserve. A “Private Property” sign is posted at the start of the access road.

I tried to contact the Conservancy and left a voice mail on their office phone requesting clarification. As of now (7:00 p.m.) I’ve had no clarification.

Regretfully, I need to cancel tomorrow’s walk and I apologize for the short notice.

Colonel Ledyard Park Success…

by taohobo

After two postponements we finally got the Colonel Ledyard Park Loop Trail walked yesterday. The dusting of snow that we had Friday night was essentially melted away before we started the walk.

Some of the wheel ruts were wet enough that we had to go off trail to get around them. Several of the springs along the trail were flowing pretty strongly, also creating pools of water in the downstream low spots on the trail.

One of the points of interest on the hike were the remains of the Randall Holdridge (1808-1885) house. There’s still the dug well and three stone walls that possibly formed the foundation for the house. A Girl Scout project to mark and provide information help make this trail more interesting.

The next scheduled hike will be the Pancake Breakfast Hike on April 6th. We’ll leave from Ledyard Congregational Church, come early if you want a free, or good will donation, breakfast before we leave at 9:30. We’ll need to carpool since there will be limited parking at the hike site.