Jersey Journal

On Tuesday I set off with the Red Bike on my first-ever New Jersey dirt road scouting/adventure ride. 

The day started with a trip through the Great Swamp in Morris County. Now this is a proper swamp - pancake flat - unlike that crazy stuff in Roxbury, CT. 



I was glad to see they take their traffic enforcement seriously... although I didn't notice any patrol cars out hunting speeders. Nor did I see any vehicles or people at all as I rode through the swamp: plenty of blue jays, though.

Next up was a cluster of dirt roads in Bedminster and Chester Townships, with names like Spook Hollow and Hacklebarney Road. Good stuff.

The surface of Hacklebarney Road alternates between lovely hardpack and sections of horrible patchwork asphalt. 

Why do they do this? Even the rockiest, most washboard-y dirt road is more fun to ride over than this crap. Fortunately, the paved bits were brief, and the road had other nice features, like this old grist mill.

My next destination was the valley formed by the South Branch of the Raritan River. More good stuff, with steep roads up the ridge to the west: Naughright Rd (not bad, actually) and Schooley's Mountain. 


Downstream, I passed lots of old stone works, and on Trimmer Road encountered some very friendly goats, llama and donkey. 



Wish I had some carrots in my jersey pockets.

(I did have a banana, but wasn't about to part with it; these guys looked well-fed!)

Trimmer Road led to Hollow Brook, a lovely climb alongside a rocky stream.

A little further up the road, I passed two gentlemen with leaf blowers, clearing the way.

This is New Jersey, after all.

I took the Columbia Trail down to Califon and grabbed lunch at Rambo's Country Store. 

Fantastic old-timey operation, and they make a mean ham sandwich... plus they had a whole row of bananas displayed on hooks in their produce section. My kinda place! 

After lunch I continued south on the trail to High Bridge, then headed east, up and down the ridges on lots of bumpy, rocky roads - many with a distinctive red tint.


Out of the hills, I cut through Trump National golf course on Copperthwaite Rd (didn't see The Donald, alas) and finished my ride at the Far Hills NJ Transit station. 

89 miles in all, with 25 miles of unpaved roads and 8 miles of crushed rock & hardpack on the Columbia Trail... the Red Bike and I were ready for a bath!

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.

Tour de Taconics

Saturday, a friend and I took Metro North's Harlem line to the last stop - Wassaic, NY - and set off on a route that would feature a double ascent of the Taconics: east-to-west, then west-to-east. Unpaved both ways. Plus a formidable hardpack climb in Columbia County on the ride back to the train.

The route was a combination of roads I'd scouted earlier this fall, with about 16 miles of dirt over the 81-mile ride. We kept a good pace and didn't stop much... not many photos from this ride. But topo maps provide apt illustration.

Mt. Riga Road - mile 16

The start of this climb in Salisbury, CT is punctuated by a large stone water fountain - top off those bottles! The road starts paved but soon turns to dirt, rising moderately alongside the Wachocastinook Creek. After a while the grade tips up; a one-mile segment mid-climb averages about 9%.

After 3.5 miles you've gained 1000', and turn onto Mt. Washington Rd heading north into Massachusetts. This rocky dirt road gains another 300' before turning to rollers along the top of the ridge. 

Part of the road is closed to car traffic in winter. They don't mess around up here:


After the twisty descent past Bash Bish Falls back into New York, we started the next climb.

Sunset Rock Road - mile 31

This west-to-east beast starts out tame, with a mild incline up North Mountain Rd from Copake Falls. After a mile and a half, you make a right on Sunset Rock Rd: unpaved from the start, it socks you immediately.

This road doesn't have the good sense to follow a creek up a valley in the ridge - it just goes straight up: 12% average for 1.2 miles - with some pitches in the high teens. The road surface is in great shape - almost groomed; that's the one one break you catch on this climb.

We looped around to lunch in West Copake... then on to the last big climb of the day.

Over Mountain Road - mile 55

Seven miles of fabulous rolling Columbia County back roads allowed lunch to settle before we tackled this last monster. When the pavement ends, the grade tips up: around 10% for a little under a mile; the total gain for the climb is about 600'. 

The dirt continues a couple miles past the crest. Back on pavement, you come out of the woods onto the crown of a high, pastured ridge with fantastic views: the Taconics just a few miles to the east, and the massive Catskill Escarpment looming on the horizon 25 miles due west.

We hammered the last 20 miles to Dover Plains; a cold beer on the train capped off the day.

Exploring Litchfield

I'm on a Litchfield County kick.

The northwest corner of Connecticut has loads of dirt roads. Loads. I've poked around a bunch of them in western Litchfield towns - the ones most easily reached from Metro North's Harlem line - New Milford, Kent, Sharon, Salisbury.

On Wednesday, I took my first stab at the towns further east - Roxbury, Washington, Morris, and the town of Litchfield. Much goodness.

I started out in Brewster, NY. 8:15 am, 25F... coldest day of the fall so far! Headed east into CT. Eventually... East Flag Swamp Rd - yeah! Transylvania Rd - double yeah! Old Mt Tom Rd... need I say more?

I made my way north to the first possible folly of the day: Old Forge Hollow Rd, in Litchfield town. My paper map showed a dotted line (ie unimproved road) connecting through - to more unimproved roads, of course! Google Maps showed a dead end. Should be interesting...

Lo and behold, Old Forge Hollow Rd does continue north, but in truly unimproved fashion!

I was riding the Red Bike with 'cross tires, but didn't have time budgeted to see this adventure through.

I headed south to explore my next potential folly: Tunnel Rd in Roxbury... through the Steep Rock Reservation. Same result: lovely dirt road that gets wild after a couple miles. Back I went.

Last folly of the ride was unforeseen. I bounced down Battle Swamp Rd to Judd's Bridge, which crosses the Shepaug River... or used to.

Uh oh. 

I peeked through the construction gear - it didn't look good. As I was taking out my map to find a detour, a construction worker appeared.

"Can you balance?" he asked. "Sure!"

He threw my bike over his shoulder & proceeded across one of the beams spanning the river. I put on my cleat covers & followed. 

Balancing was not hard. The tricky part was, you got a little bounce with each step. The beams were not bolted down.

Back on the bike, it was 20 more glorious hilly (mostly paved - boo!) miles to my train ride home from Pawling, NY.

Roxbury & Washington are my new favorite towns. I'll be back!