Today we returned to High Bridge, New Jersey. We last visited back in July of 2009 when we hiked through the Ken
Lockwood Gorge starting at the western end of the Columbia Trail in High Bridge. This time we returned to hike the Taylor Steelworkers Historic Greenway, which begins
not far from the Columbia Trail trail head. But the town must have been celebrating something because we couldn't find a single parking spot in the large municipal lot.
So we headed for Lake Solitude and parked there, in a gorgeous spot overlooking the lake.
From there, we first headed south, visiting the Solitude House, then continued south along the historical greenway, passing the Bloomery Forge ruins, walking along a narrow easement between two large lots of huge metal parts and pipes manufactured by the privately-owned Custom Alloy which is still operating on that spot today. After crossing the 100-year-old truss bridge (recently restored), we continued through the TISCO complex, which includes the oldest office building in America and headed for the trail head at the Columbia Trail (which we would have gotten to first had there been parking in town). We then visited the magnificent falls at the Lake Solitude Dam (we took an unblazed trail straight down to the bank, the red-blazed spur has two small benches but no view). After the falls, we headed back through the TISCO complex, crossed the bridge and then continued on the Historical Greenway east, crossing River Road, and continued east on Nassau Street for about 0.1 miles before entering the lovely woods at one of the trail heads for the Nassau Trail. We followed the Nassau trail through gorgeous woods, including a beautiful pine plantation, before spilling back onto Nassau Road east of the woods. We headed north along the road to a farm field, the edge of which we took east to the ruins of the historical Springside Farm, now in disrepair. We would have continued further, but the path wasn't mowed and not obvious. So we headed back to Nassau Road which we took all the way back to River Road (not a single car passed us, it's a beautiful mostly unused road). We crossed River Road and then headed back north to Lake Solitude, where we had lunch overlooking the falls where we watched an amazing Great Blue Heron fishing (you can see a series of photos at the end). Total distance hiked today was just over 4 miles in 2 and 3/4 hours, much of this time spent reading informational signs and exploring.
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Lake Solitude |
Solitude House south |
Heading to the house |
Old stone storage house |
Inside the storage |
Solitude House |
From inside another storage house |
Solitude House |
Sun dial [photo by Laura] |
View inside Solitude House |
Bloomery Forge ruins |
Historical Greenway [photo by Laura] |
Kyle Zalinsky memorial marker |
Close-up |
View of Custom Alloy |
Easement through Custom Alloy property |
100-year-old truss bridge |
View of Raritan River South Branch |
Old truss bridge |
TISCO office building |
Reading information sign |
Behind TISCO offices |
Railroad tracks through complex |
Front of TISCO office building |
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Trail head at Columbia Trail |
Garter snake |
At the falls [photo by Laura] |
Lake Solitude Falls |
Zoom |
View downstream behind falls |
Ruins behind TISCO building |
Huge tree roots |
Nearly petrified |
Ore on river bank |
View to RR bridge |
Taylor Wharton RR bridge |
Close-up of factory windows |
Back through Custom Alloy property |
About to cross River Road |
Nassau Trail trail head |
Mighty pines |
Gorgeous woods |
Pine plantation |
Creek [photo by Laura] |
Giant mushroom |
Laura at creek |
JORBA bike obstacle |
Trail head on eastern side (Nassau Road) |
Catbird |
Heading into... |
...Springside Farm |
Damaged window |
Barn |
Farmhouse |
View inside barn |
Buttercups |
Another barn |
Silo and barn |
View inside barn |
It's getting overgrown... |
...at this point |
Pool behind house |
Beautiful Nassau Road |
Mourning dove |
Remains of shovel? |
Beautiful house and flowers on River Road |
Mushrooms at ruins |
Strange building |
Heading back to Solitude House |
Another building at complex |
Buildings from high ground |
Walking to the dam |
Great Blue Heron in tree |
View of falls |
Making is way down |
Our lunch spot |
He sees something |
False alarm |
Gear mechanism on dam |
Changing his fishing spot |
Closer to the water... |
...lunch at last! |
Lake Solitude from our lunch spot |
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