Patriot's Path: Sunrise Lake East

Patriot's Path: Sunrise Lake East (2/27/2010)

It snowed nearly two feet in the area this past week (through most of Thursday and Friday) so we weren't sure what to expect when we drove to one of the many entrance points to 35-mile long (and growing) Patriot's Path. We were very pleasantly surprised to find the small parking area across from Sunrise Lake (on Mendham Road) well plowed. Our next pleasant surprise was the condition of the trails. Clearly several others had walked the 2.1 mile stretch from the parking area to Washington Valley Road. They walked it with snow shoes, with cross country skis, with boots and with their dogs! So a good portion of our 4.2-mile out-and-back was at least partially packed snow. Very nice!

And the forest was magical, with the snow still sticking to the trees like sprinkled powdered sugar. Today's stretch is the last 2.1 miles of the 5.1-mile Hike #17 ("Patriot's Path") in the book 24 Great Rail-Trails of New Jersey. The first half covers the path from Speedwell Lake in Morristown to Washington Valley Road, which is where we turned around today.

Total distance hiked today was 4.2 miles in about 3 hours.

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