Hiking the New England Trail: A Unique

Trail Through Suburbia

Wednesday, March !
st
"!
#$ha%berlain Hwy #&t '!( Meriden, $T to Sunrise
&ock ) &agged Mountain New *ritain, $T( #+
%iles(
Ah - the unexpectedness that is the trail. My adventure began before I ever set foot on the trail.
First off, I had to start the adventure was trying to actually find the trail. My original thought, that
had looked great on paper, was to start at River Rd. in Meriden and begin the trail via the
Mattabesett instead of the other possible southern terini !the unfinished Menunkatuck trail
connecting the Mattabesett and M-M trail to the shoreline at "ong Island #ound$. My wonderful
car ride down at %a - turned into a weirdly hilarious attept at finding the trailhead at River Rd.
&he guidebook directions called for it to be across fro a 'ower 'lant -- and after asking
nuerous locals - without any success, I was forced to take the next best option, find another
starting point that I could actually locate.
(hile driving along ailessly looking for inspiration on how to actually find the trailhead, I saw
a 'ublic (ater (orks eployee carrying his lunch up to a building and thought, ) surely a town
eployee ust be in the know, let*s try hi). After explaining y predicaent he cally said, )
oh, you ust ean that old power plant that blew up years ago...yeah the parking lot is around
here soewhere, but I*ll +ust tell you where to pick up the trail at another spot). (ith a wry grin
plastered to y face, I asked for the alternate location of the trail, and I was at least happy to know
why I couldn*t find this assive power plant.
(ithout looking at y aps - I took the nice guys advice and ,uickly found the trail crossing at
the -haberlain .ighway. My next proble was figuring out which direction to take. After only
/ inutes or so of conteplation I took was seeed to be the ost southwesterly trending trail
!starts south, does a big horseshoe bend, and then continues north for ost of the trail$. After an
hour and a half of hiking I cae out at an intersection that I siply couldn*t find on any of y first
ten or so pages in y guidebook. At this point I was slightly worried that I was an idiot and didn*t
know where I was, so I went up to a nice older gentleen owing his lawn and asked for
directions. Interestingly enough, this gentleen*s son had also thru-hiked the A.& any years ago
and he recounted to e about all the ail drops he shipped hi down in the southern sections of
the trail.
After soe ,uick directions as to where he thought I should be able to pick up the trail !he
assured e that I was going in the right direction, and that the trail reconnected +ust a few houses
down in a field that started with red bla0es, but would turn into the blue bla0es that I was seeking.
1ndeterred fro y course, I set off once again. And after another hour and a half I sat down
across the street fro that sae nice gentleen*s house, having +ust gone in a three-ile loop that
was not even close to the trail I wanted !it was a local blue2red walking loop trail$.
I ate a snickers and laughed at yself a bit while flicking a tick off of yself in the 3/4 heat.
(ith it only being March, the weather is feeling ore like a ild 5uly.
A car stopped on the road near e and I was roused out of y conteplative stupor. A nice
local section-hiking guy that was finishing up part of the trail walked over and offered e soe
help in finding y way. &his kind act helped in furthering y sneaking suspicion that hikers are
ostly a helpful and kind group of individuals. .owever, helpful as he was, he kindly infored
e that the reason I couldn6t find this road crossing on y ap, was because I was pretty uch all
the way off of the ap entirely. 7ops.
In taking that short cut of a few iles by car to another trail crossing - I*d skipped the entire
eastern Mattabessett &rail, and had actually been hiking south on the Metacoet &rail for the last
couple hours. I*d ended up walking the first few iles of the Metacoet trail twice. (hat a
splendid thing hiking is. 8ouble oops.

I ate another snickers and had soe 9atorade and tried to figure out what to do. It seeed only
logical at this point to continue hiking :orth on the Metacoet, and then siply return to finish
the sall section down to the shore !It was only a fairly ,uick walk along roads, and not even
really finished yet$. .owever, this would ean that I6d have to skip ost of the western
Mattabesett &rail. In y ind a thru-hike can6t have two separate ending points, so considered
that trail as really +ust an alternate trail, and now that the official trail heads to the shoreline, I
wasn6t overly concerned.
#o, with not a whole lot of progress in the last few hours, I once ore headed off for a little
hiking. .aving been dropped off at around ;<=>a at the -haberlain .ighway, I once ore
arrived at it around ??a, and crossed the sae road I6d +ust been dropped off at. &his would have
been a great tie to own a 9'#, but it certainly would have ade e iss out on this little
adventure-within-an-adventure.
1ndaunted, at essentially taking a scenic detour for the last few hours, I started off once again.
&his tie actually knowing both what trail I was on, and where I was.
&he trail is coprised of a cobination of the following< a$ wandering along roads or through
peoples front yards and across their driveways !I* not kidding, that*s the actual arked trail
soeties$, b$ walking along old forest service roads, or c$ walking through scenic forest trails
that ostly follow trap-rock ridge-lines with extreely liited water sources. I was able to find
two water sources during y whole hike in this section of trail !we are a bit in draught right now,
but still it*s pretty scarce for good sources$.
I got soe aa0ing views after a steep clib up to -astle -raig and the @ast and (est 'eak
viewpoints along the ridgeline. -rossing a few roads, I descended ,uickly fro the ridgeline, and
the clibed over a fence near a golf course and headed into the Ragged Mountain 'reserve area. I
have been rock clibing at Ragged Mountain !what it is faous for$ and once again rewarded
with excellent views fro the top. It*s a very popular local
spot, and I was not surprised to coe across two different
pairs of rock clibers !at different routes$ and a few couples
out day hiking.
(ith the sun slowly setting behind the trees, and y
options being liited for good secluded cap spots, I set up
near the chiney that is all that reains of a building that
once stood on the ridge-line. I ust have +ust issed soe
day hikers using it - because there were still hot ebers and
soke in the fireplace !not very good fire safety guys$. As
the sunset, I was rewarded with a agnificent view of the
town below. &he failing evening light showed the house
lights coing alive and a artificial glow starting to eerge
fro the valley. I crawled into y tent at around Ap with
the teperature still reading %>4. It was a very war night,
but y gear did the trick and I was +ust fine and dandy.
Thursday, March
nd
"!
#Sunrise &ock ) &agged Mt,, New *ritain, $T to -ld Hart.ord &d,, Tari../ille, $T( #',
%iles today(
I awoke with the first signs that the sky was lightening up. :icely rested, I ostly slept through
a windy night, spent with a low of /;4. &he orning sun didn*t start to peak up over the
ountaintop until around %<=> a or so. #ince I was awake with y alar at %a, I was fully
packed and hiking by %<B/a after a nice breakfast of 'op-&arts and -liff-Cars. My cap was
about D inutes walk fro #unrise Rock, and on y way there in the orning, I passed by a
fellow caper that had set up at a scenic viewpoint facing east to get a nice view in the orning.
&he scenery was very nice and varied today. A good ix of feeling lost in the woods, and then
suddenly being thrust into the heart of suburbia, kept the hike always changing. I will say that the
route finding along soe of the lesser-used sections is a bit tricky - so following the guidebook
and using a copass !plus a lot of trial and error$ will likely coe in handy for any hikers looking
to do ultiple sections at a tie.

&he hike was filled with nice views of the surrounding valley, as well as excellent views of soe
ruins fro old houses in 'enwood #tate 'ark. &he view fro .eublein &ower on &alcott
Mountain is always worth the hike during the regular season when it is open to the public - I*ve
been to it any ties, so the fact that it was closed when I passed was not a great disappointent.
A few little hints of spring are in the air, and soe rhododendrons were already budding.

7verall today was a nice hike of ostly travelled trail, punctuated by rather frustrating and poorly
arked un-aintained sections that connected the ore coonly used areas. A lot of hiking
tie was lost due to y wandering in circles with a ap and copass, and even asking strangers
for directions on the infre,uently used sections of trail. &his trail has uch to offer in the way of
views - but so far has not been ,uite the )thru-hikable) trail that I considered it to be, now that it
has achieved the ):ew @ngland &rail) designation. I think with enough volunteer work over the
next /-?> years this could really be an awesoe local thru-hike trail. For now I think ost people
would en+oy it uch ore as a series of long day hikes.
"astly I*ve also noticed that water has been extreely scarce on the trail, and well nigh
ipossible to predict. It6s hard to hike a trail, when you don6t know where you6ll be able to find
water next. I a assuing that ost hikers will not want to do D> plus iles of hiking a day, and
not having an accurate idea of water sources is a frustrating dilea that I hope to see resolved in
the coing years.
After arriving at the 7ld .artford Rd. crossing at ;p, I had y brother drive D> inutes and
pick e up to stay at the house for the night, with the plan of doing toorrow*s hike as a long day-
hike.