Little red dots and thread
January 10, 2012The Self-Portrait
January 29, 2012Kitchen Brook Trail begins in my backyard, zigzags through the woods and connects with the Old Adams Road. The trail is fairly unofficial. It’s not on the Mount Greylock map, even though I can easily get to many Greylock trails from my backyard. The AT is a half-mile up the road, or 3/4’s of a mile on trail through the woods. Doug and I hike back there regularly. I’ve gone up many a dead end in search of loops, coming up with a handful of adventures that vary from easy to difficult to strenuous.
The short walk: a quick two-miler that crosses a couple of streams and old stone walls. It eventually hooks up with the AT and returns via the road. The STEEP walk: a five-mile walk complete with a nice steep section, some little waterfalls in the spring time, a flat walk across a ridge to the AT and then back down to the road and home. The mountain bike loop/New Years Walk/Through the Water Source: goes out the back to the bridge, up the hill switching back a few times to the Old Adams Road. Turn left and head down to West Mountain Road and then home. OR, turn right and head for a few miles to the AT and back down to the road and home. OR, turn left and then left again at the secret turnoff that will take you down the other side of the valley that is Kitchen Brook to the Cheshire water source.The most important part of these last hikes is the bridge.
Yep, this bridge. Which is NEW, like in the past month. Those warm winter days certainly inspired someone out there. The old bridge got destroyed in the same violent weather act that inspired this post. And this isn’t a little whimpy bridge. The base of the bridge are felled trees at least 18 inches in diameter. So now, after like seven months, there is a new bridge. Joy for the snowmobilers and ATV’ers. For me and Doug and our mountain bikes and snowshoes. Whoever created this bridge is also responsible for clearing the trees that fall regularly on this path. It’s gotta be one of my neighbors, because this is not state land, it’s private land. So, number one goal this week is to contact the Town of Cheshire to see if I can find out who owns it, I need to make them a cake.
