M&M Section 4

September 3, 2012:  second Labor Day weekend hike!  The day after Section 3, my lovely wife again dropped Peanut and I off for Section 4, agreeing to pick us up at the end and save us the return hike.  Twice, how nice!

Section 4 keeps along the Metacomet ridge, going 4 miles up along the crest of East Mountain.  The initial climb up from forgotten Old Holyoke Road was a wake up, and rewarded us with a rare eastward view, though through trees, to downtown Springfield.  An abandoned tower on the summit probably affords a better view, though its state of disrepair and the need to climb a vertical ladder prevented me from attempting the climb.  The sun was struggling to burn through the clouds and again the mosquitoes were out in force anytime we approached deep woods.  Thankfully, today's hike hugs the ridge's western cliff edge where the air stirred enough to keep them away.  The frequent views west were a great plus.

Snake Pond, hidden beneath the western cliffs, with the Westfield Airport in the distance and the Berkshires beyond.  "Pane! Pane!" my accomplice frequently noted as we saw small commuter and personal aircraft coming in for landings.

The beauty of the M&M is that it is a continuous footpath that lies within a relatively densely developed valley.  It dates from the great era of long-distance trail building that followed the creation of Vermont's Long Trail in 1918, which also saw the creation of the Appalachian Trail (completed in 1937), the John Muir Trail in California, parts of NY's Long Path, and several others.  By the 1950s Connecticut had already developed several of it's long distance "blue blaze trails", including the Metacomet Trail running on this same ridge further south, when UMass Professor Walter M. Banfield designed the M&M as a logical extension northward.  Of course most of these trails used existing trails and old forest roads where available and the M&M is no exception - some of its pieces have been hiked for over a century and a half as we will find in later sections.

The idea behind all of these long-distance trails is to allow regular people a way of accessing wilderness and making contact with the natural world using their own powers and senses - a chance to spend significant time away from working life and the machine-and-technology-driven 'real' world.  Which is why it is very frustrating to find this:

Hey look - I've mountain biked, I've off-roaded in jeeps, and I get the attraction.  I'm not saying riding machines is wrong or whatever, I'm just upset that instead of building their own trails in the millions of acres available for those uses, the lazy motorheads have taken over and destroyed existing footpaths that have been hand-built and maintained for three generations, by and for hikers.  At the top of this rise, Vivi and I had to stand aside (thankfully we heard them coming well in advance) as nearly two dozen dirtbikers roared by us, pursuing their Xtreme adrenalin rush, spinning up the soil and polluting the air with fumes and noise. 

After this experience, I quickened the pace, trying to get through this section as soon as possible.  We stopped briefly at the last vista for a goldfish snack, enjoying a view over Hampton Ponds State Park.  I was determined to get there and wash away the sweat and stress with a dip:

And we did!

 Today: 4.0 trail miles.  M&M completed: 13.6 out of 114 mi.

M&M Section 3

September 2, 2012: more M&M!  For this section we persuaded my lovely wife/peanut-mama to drop us off on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend and pick us up later so we can avoid walking the section twice.  Doubly nice since the weather was quite warm and humid, having rained earlier that day - the mosquitoes were out in force!

We started on the north bank of the Westfield River, in a parking lot across from where we would've forded from the last section. A little road walk across busy Route 20 and up to the Pioneer Valley Sportsman's Club property, and suddenly we were in the woods.

Judging from the amount of spiderwebs hitting my face and arms, few hikers had been through this section recently.  This probably has something to do with the fact that a massive quarry operation is eating away this portion of the ridge, here known as East Mountain.  The trail has been recently been relocated down the east side of the ridge, away from the quarry - as such there are no vistas, and lots of small ups and downs along the waving hillside.

Not to say the experience isn't beautiful - the lack of visitors makes for a refreshingly remote feel, and the quiet marshes of the Paucatuck Brook are pleasantly lush this time of year. Which makes for some muddy bushwacking as this crappy cellphone pic tries to show (forgot my camera).

Adding to the loneliness of the section is an old shelter - the first we've seen - built by boy scouts long ago, now with a caved-in roof and the floor rotted away.  If you were thru-hiking the M&M, this would be a natural stopping place from the MA/CT border - better bring your tent.

The trail does gain the ridgetop eventually and a view of the quarry can be had with some bushwacking through nettles and prickers at its edge.  Quite an operation:

In the distance to the south is the television relay station from Section 2.

There are quarries up and down the Metacomet Ridge, with its accessible basalt - often called "traprock."  Basalt is a pretty hard rock, formed from molten lava, but when the lava cools slowly, it often cracks into hexagonal vertical columns.  (These columns sometimes erode to look like staircases - the name "traprock" comes from the Swedish word for stairs "trappa.")  The natural breaks in the basalt allows for easy harvesting and also make it easier to further break the rock into smaller pieces - as such, it is useful for railroad and highway bedding material.

 Past the quarry, the trail meanders through a recently-logged area that the guidebook describes as an "almost forest primeval of stately hemlock and oak."  Needs a rewrite.  The good number of blown-down trees that lay across the trail here required careful navigation so as not to knock my passenger's head.  Last fall saw a tropical storm come through, which went on to devastate Vermont, followed by an early snowstorm while the trees still had leaves.  Lots of blowdowns everywhere in the region, but this section will need a couple maintainers with chainsaws soon.

The section finishes at the Mass Turnpike, crossing beneath it via a gratified tunnel.  However, Peanut and I still had a surprise mile and a half walk out the Old Holyoke Road, which is closed because of an unrepaired bridge.  Guidebook needs updating on that too.

Today: 3.9 trail miles, 5.4ish hiked miles.  M&M completed: 9.6 out of 114 mi.

M&M Trail 2

August 30, 2012:  onto section 2 of the Metacomet-Monadnock Trail - a very interestingly diverse section that sees a lot in 3.4 miles.  I would describe it as "things you might see on a mountain:"  quarry, gun range, woods roads, mountain biking and ATV trails, fire lookout tower, television studio, reservoir, farm, some nice vistas.  Also some significant climbing today too, as we went up Provin Mountain to about 650ft (from 110ft at today's low point).  The former quarry was our first stop, and the view south into Connecticut shows the narrow Metacomet ridge:

You can also sense in this photo how the underlying basalt is tilted, with a gentle slope on the east side (left in this photo) and sharper drops, often with cliffs, to the west (right side here).  As a result, most of the views from the Metacomet ridge are to the west toward the Berkshires.

One of these looks out over a small gun range.  Thought this was a fun sign, especially when coupled by the many handgun pops:

The M&M Trail is extraordinarily well-blazed and the caretakers should be commended.  However, it is still easy to lose the trail, as we did on more than one occasion - mountain bikers, dirtbikers, and ATVers have carved a vast network of wide paths all over Provin Mtn.  To try and maintain a safe and more remote footpath, the M&M caretakers move pieces of the M&M away from these paths, and you have to keep a lookout for quick lefts and rights.  Sadly, and somewhat inevitably, the motor people and bikers then start using the new footpaths and the erosion continues to spread. 

Once atop Provin, the trail winds around the former WWLP television station - the local NBC affiliate - now used just as a relay station.  A climb up a nearby firetower gave us a rare view eastward and southward, with the towers of Hartford clear on the horizon about 30 miles to the south.  Here is the view east, to downtown Springfield's mighty skyline, which at about 5.5 miles away is the closest the M&M will get to downtown:

The highlands in the background frame the Pioneer Valley on the east and host the vast Quabbin Reservoir.

We stopped for a break at a nearby vista - my fellow traveler was happy to get out of the pack and move about.















From this height, the ridge sweeps downward and the trail emerges from the woods at a capped reservoir owned by Springfield, with unexpectedly wide views north and west.  The Berkshire plateau which forms the western edge of the Pioneer Valley in the background, the church spires of little Westfield in the middle ground, and a lovely pastoral scene in the foreground - the kind of landscape that people love about this area of Massachusetts, (just try to ignore the grey/white gash of sprawling big box stores along Route 20):

  The sun felt lovely on our skin as we crossed the pastureland and re-entered the woods.  A PUD (pointless up-and-down) over a rocky outcrop aside , we moved downhill, ending the section at the Westfield River, as it flows through Robinson State Park.  The trail to the riverbank is much less used and hard to follow since most hikers end at the park road before it, but we pressed on, bushwacking and navigating downed trees to reach the river.  Our reward took the form of a huge beaver, who passed within 20 feet of us as he wandered from the woods to the water:

 
The river looked very peaceful in the late-afternoon suunlight, and despite the roar of traffic from Route 20 on the other side, the scene had a very remote feel to it.  Were I without the Peanut, I would've loved to attempt a ford of the Westfield River, since it doesn't look too deep where the guidebook suggests crossing, but not today.  Instead, we'll have to pick up the trail from the other side.  (After we hike all the way back to the car.)

Today: 3.4 trail miles, 6.8 hiked miles.  M&M miles: 5.7 out of 114 mi.

M&M Trail 1

August 22, 2012:  SO IT BEGINS.

First blaze!  August 22, 2012.

- ed. note - I didn't start this blog until we were about 25% through the M&M, so the dates for the first several posts will be significantly later than the actual hike dates.

The Metacomet-Monadnock trail is blazed white, just like another long-distance trail I have some experience with (see http://tenfeetofcrazy.blogspot.com/).  Which makes it kinda oddly reminiscent of that grand trip.  The biggest difference now is that I have Peanut on my back and there is no ultra-lite way to travel with her.  In fact, she'll keep getting heavier as we go.  But since we are section hikers, we travel without tent, bag, etc: just some water, milk in a thermos, squeezy pouch of pulverized fruit, and some goldfish.  I may share the latter.

For our debut, we drove to the very tiny village of Rising Corner, Mass and parked along Rising Corner Rd., just a few hundred feet north of the Conn. border, which I am happy to report is a peaceful frontier.  I didn't see signs for the blue-blazed Metacomet Trail which travels south towards Hartford, though I believe its initial stretch is a road walk.  Instead, we turned north, away from a yappy retriever who bolted across this luckily mellow road to bark us either 'good luck' or 'get lost'.   (Been a while since I spoke Dog.)

The M&M crossed a field and immediately entered a wild woods, soon crossing a large and submerged swamp area via beautifully made puncheons:

This was a great welcome - not only because you really feel like you are leaving civilization behind, but also because it's evident how much care goes into the maintenance of the M&M.  The Berkshire chapter of the famed Appalachian Mountain Club or AMC, which is New England's - nay America's - premier hiking and trail maintenance organization.

From here we climbed onto the low ridge and followed it for 2 miles to Route 57, mostly on dirt roads that access portions of the Agawam Bowman Archery Club property.  Knowing that helpfully explains the cryptic signs on some of the trees:

Views?  None as of yet, besides a narrow slice west along a power corridor, where we stopped on the return trip for our squeezy pouch and goldfish.  No other hikers seen, but many squirrels and chipmunks in the woods, and frogs and songbirds in the swamp.  All in all, a nice return to long-distance hiking, and a pleasurable start to the M&M.

So we're now at mile 2.3 of 114, though we walked 4.6 miles today.

The M&M Trail!

The "backbone" of the Pioneer Valley hiking experience is the Metacomet-Monadnock Trail, aka the M&M Trail.  (Peanut was disappointed to learn it was not a candy giveaway).  This long-distance trail parallels the Connecticut River on narrow ridges and upland areas, running 114 miles from the CT border in the south to the top of 3,166ft Mount Monadnock in New Hampshire.  Despite its proximity to urban and agricultural areas, it offers a pretty remote and wild experience.

Doing the entire M&M provides Peanut and I with a manageable goal, and will help introduce us to our new home here in western Massachusetts.  Our plan is to section the trail, walking off  consecutive pieces as we move north, with an aim of reaching Monadnock before the cold temps and snow(!) ends the season.  We are starting in late August - just as the mosquito season ends, and my guess is we should wrap it up by early November.  Which should give us a few months and give us some amazing fall foliage.

Your geography lesson for today:

The Pioneer Valley, aka the Connecticut River Valley in Massachusetts and shown in green in this map, is a broad rolling valley situated between the Berkshire plateau (the white area to the west and the central Mass uplands to the east.  It is a kind of breadbasket of New England, with rare stone-less soil and lots of active farming.  A narrow ridge of basalt traprock - the Metacomet Ridge - pokes through this valley and runs north-south up from Connecticut, curving east at Mt Tom.  The trail follows this ridge in its southern half.  Its northern half winds among the uplands that frame the eastern side of the Pioneer Valley, and reaches up to into New Hampshire to the magnificent stand-alone Monadnock for a finale.  (The dashed portion shown here is no longer blazed because of landowner wishes, and the trail's guardians are seeking a more permanent solution.)

As you can see, the trail does have an extension south into Connecticut (via 63 miles of the Metacomet Trail), and even connects to the Long Island Sound near New Haven via another trail.  Collectively, these trails make up the recently federally-designated New England National Scenic Trail - a designation which elevates the trail's status to that of the more famous Appalachian Trail and Pacific Crest Trail.  To the north, not shown on this map, 50 miles of NH's Monadnock-Sunapee Greenway will get you up close to the White Mtns.  So, lots of long-distance possibilities if you need to escape.

But since most of the time Peanut and I have to rely on a single car (plus the fact that Vivs is a Very Small Peanut who can only manage a few hours in the backpack and is not ready for overnight trips), we are limited to doing chunks of up to five miles maximum since we have to turn around and walk back the way we came to get to the car.  On the plus side, we'll have hiked the trail twice when we're done. On the downside, it takes us twice as long.  So we are sticking with the "classic" M&M: a northbound hike from the CT/MA line to Monadnock.

Fortunately, this is very doable since there are fairly frequent road crossings where we can begin and end sections.  Plus, residing in Springfield gets us easy access to the M&M, especially the southern portion.  Still, with weather and other obligations this time of year, I'm thinking we'll have to cover ten trail miles or more every week to finish.  Can we do it?  Stay tuned!

Welcome!

Peanut - aka Vivian, Vivi, Vivers, Vivvles, etc - and I - aka Dada - are avid hikers.  At 1+ years old, she's just begun the walking life, but I've been doing it for years.  It's the greatest way to experience the world, in my opinion.

Springfield, Massachusetts and the Pioneer Valley, as its known, are entirely new to us.  We moved here in the summer of 2012, after years of city life in the one of the most walkable locations in the States: Philadelphia.  As a way of getting to know our new locale, Viv and I will walk it!