Swamp Thing

A quick glance at a Roxbury, CT roadmap gives you some clues about the town's topography. 

There aren't any high summits marked, but there are a bunch of "hill" road names (Good Hill, Sentry Hill, Painter Hill), and a couple short, dead-end "mountain" roads. 

At the north and south ends of the town, there are also "swamp" roads: Battle Swamp and Flag Swamp. 

Where I live (NJ), "swamp" means "flat." Think Meadowlands, or the Great Swamp. In the twisted world of Roxbury, however, even the swamps have an elevation profile like the stripe on Charlie Brown's shirt.


The town also has a bunch of roads with cool, unusual names: Bear Burrow Road, Hoop Hole Road. Transylvania Road is a nice mile-and-a-half of rocky hardpack. 
 
I thought Moosehorn Road must be so named because it goes up and down like an antler. Seriously.

(It actually crosses the Moosehorn Brook, which on the map looks kinda like an antler - not that you'd pick up on that as you blast down before hitting the gut-busting climb.)

My Thursday ride visited these and some other favorite spots in Litchfield County.

That bridge they're working on? The workers said they're almost done painting.

This time, I approached the bridge on dirt roads from both sides, but my route didn't require me to do the balance beam act again.



I checked out the length of Judd's Bridge Road, which descends precipitously to the Shepaug River from the west...


... then runs along the east bank of the river before climbing away.



I rode north and west to Mud Pond, near Gaylordsville: very peaceful in the fading afternoon light.


I got to Pawling with enough time before my train to pick up a sandwich at Vinny's Deli. 


Very happy about that. It's pretty low-key on the outside, but don't let that fool you: they do good, good stuff inside.