Tag Archives: Branbury State Park

Keewaydin Caves Redux

I have made it a habit not to “redo” a post on a particular run, unless it has been a few years since I last blogged about the route. I am making an exception this time. In June of 2019, while trying to find a cave called “Speedy’s Cave” whose location I only had the vaguest memories of, I ended up not finding the cave in question, but had an adventurous and challenging “mostly hike”, as the terrain was too rough for running, along the midsection of the Rattlesnake Cliffs above Lake Dunmore. Most of this little adventure was on the trails maintained by Camp Keewaydin. A few of my readers mentioned that they would someday like to join me on this “run” someday, as it sounded interesting. So, on a pleasant Saturday morning, 5 of us set out. It wasn’t my intention, at the start of the journey, to write a blog posting on it, and as a result, I didn’t bring my camera, and didn’t even turn on my GPS watch until we were about 0.8 miles into things. Fortunately, my friend Josh, who joined us for the first part, had his camera with him, and all the new pictures here are his. For my first description of this route, with my photography, see my original posting:

The Wrong Way to the Keewaydin Caves

Yup! I thought I had gone the wrong way to find the “Speedy’s Cave” of my memory. I now know I was wrong about being wrong.

We set off from the Falls of Lana parking lot, taking the usual dirt road up, and when the trail made its first sharp hairpin to the right, we went straight, over the bridge, and up the easy section of trail until we saw the sign for the Aunt Jenny Trail, and we ascended this trail for a few minutes. The first tricky part of the routefinding in this trail is actually finding it. Many years ago, there was a sign here stating “Caves” to guide adventurous hikers, but as I discovered last year, that sign had been removed, and in fact, this year, several tree branches were laid across the faint trail to discourage errant hikers. That said, you will know that you are at the correct place if you see a small sign on one of the nearby trees saying “trail” and pointing along the far more apparent Aunt Jennie Trail. Some things about this cave trail haven’t changed – it is still a faint path, but with generally well marked blazes on trees. It also tortures hikers with countless dips and climbs for no apparent reason.

While I failed in re-finding Speedy’s Cave last summer, we quickly discovered that five pairs of eyes are better than one. Sure enough, in little more than a third of a mile along this trail, one of my party looked up above their feet (where one’s eyes usually are on rough terrain) and saw the sign for the cave! I think we had an advantage this year – a narrow sunbeam of light escaped the heavy foliage and illuminated the sign as if it was some sort of sacred shrine.

At this point, we scrambled uphill 50 feet or so to the mouth of the cave. As I remembered, it was a fairly spacious cave, and in fact, I could notice the remnants of a small campfire inside it. Unlike the far more extensive, truly subterranean Weybridge Cave, which demands a rappel to enter, the Keewaydin Caves are simply spaces created by rockfall from the cliff bands over the eons, and are generally small and cozy. Curious as to the origin of the name of this cave, a search of the history of Camp Keewaydin indicated that it was probably named after the name of a mid-20th century owner “Speedy” Rush.

Scrambling back down to the trail, we continued, and not long later, Sandra, a member of our group, looked up to the right, and shouted out that she thought she saw another cave, this time without any sign indicating its provenance. We bushwhacked our way up towards it, and at first glance, there didn’t seem to be much too it. Then, its discoverer noticed that she could squeeze under an overhang, and she headed in until all we could see were her feet sticking out. The arrow in the photo is putting at her well-camouflaged sneaker.

Knowing that we might be doing a little crawling around in caves, she was the only person who thought to bring a headlamp, and as she crawled in a little further, discovered that there was a large inner room that should prove accessible. No doubt this has been and will be a comfortable home for one or more wintering bears in a few months! None of us were really clothed to shimmy into it – so that will have to wait for another day, presuming we can find it again. Given that there was no sign affixed to this cave, naming it after some Keewaydin luminary, we decided that our party was the first there, and we named it after her discoverer – Sandra’s Cave it is!

After most of us did the short shimmy into the opening of the cave to glimpse the inner room, we returned once again to the trail, and commenced our zigzagging up and down the face of the Rattlesnake Cliffs, constantly on the lookout for the next white blaze. The next “named” location we came across was a viewpoint which I remembered (of course) from the previous year’s exploration – Jeff’s Lookout! I am not simply claiming as my own – there is an aging sign at the edge of the overlook claiming it for me.

.From this point on, following the route from the previous year, we came across the Cave trail sign, which went pretty much straight up the side of the mountain, bringing us in a few strenuous minutes to the only cave I managed to bag in my previous outing, “Curly’s Cave”, which was much smaller than Speedy’s Cave, but standing inside it, you had the feeling you were looking out from the throat of a monster – check out the teeth! I was unable to determine the origins of the Cave’s name, but I will ask some people I know who have been associated with the camp to find out.

Returning to the trail, we soon came to a sign for the Wildcat trail, which may have been the name for the trail we were on all along, As we got closer to the camp proper, the trails became better marked and easier to follow. One of the coolest parts of the descent to the camp was a cliffy area called The Deer Staircase. At some point in the last year and a half, someone had put in a few log ladders, making the descent far easier than it had been in the past. I am not going to go into the details of the rest of the descent – all downhill trails probably lead to the main grounds of the camp and the East Shore road. When we got to the dirt road called “The Summit Trail” we were able to resume running for the first time in about two hours, and eventually ran back to our cars alongside the main road.

This was a very fun little adventure that took up pretty much the whole morning. Running options were sparse, as the terrain was quite rough and the trail maintenance meager. Given the late start on my GPS watch, the journey was longer than shown, probably a little over 5 miles. My watch recorded 1400 vertical feet of climbing, but since the first easy sections weren’t included, it was probably closer to 1700 or 1800. That’s a lot of up and down – and to put it in perspective, the ascent of Mt Abraham, the nearest big mountain, is only 1500 ft.

Back to the Springtime Trails

This year’s never-ending winter seems to have loosened its grip – there are only a few stray patches of snow at the higher elevations, and my legs seem to be recovering from my first 26.2 in a year and a half, undertaken a week and a half ago. A lot of my friends ran in the Middlebury Maple Run this Sunday, but my legs didn’t feel recovered enough yet for a decent half marathon, so I decided to head out to one of my favorite runs – the ascent from the Falls of Lana trailhead, past Silver Lake, to the Goshen trailhead and returning. I know I have done this run countless times, and blogged it quite a few times as well. But, I almost always do this run as one of my first trail runs of the warm season. The long mornings in the treadmill in the depths of winter and a few months of all my outdoor running being on the roads is finally giving way to the best part of the running year. This particular run is a great way to test out my legs on a trail which isn’t as muddy as most of the single track trails in May, and I get to see how things feel when I start to mix some more serious hills into my running. Finally, it is fun to see how my times improve as the summer progresses, so this first trail run of the season will serve as a benchmark for later runs!

A few recent articles in Runners World have put Middlebury on the map as a great runners’ town, and for road runners, this is probably due to the popularity of the Maple Run, while the TAM gets a lot of good press for trail runners. As relative newcomers start to look for more adventurous terrain than the TAM has to offer, the Moosalamoo region, which this run is part of, offers a fun step up. There are trail races ranging from the challenging, but accessible (The Goshen Gallop, 6.6 miles) to the longer challenges (The Moosalamoo Ultra 14 or 36 miles) to the downright ridiculous (Infinitus – up to 888 miles over 8 days!) The run I am blogging today provides a nice introduction to trail runners interested in a little wilder than the TAM offerings! When I started enjoying this run, 10-15 years ago, I never saw another trail runner on while I was runnin, but now, it is rare that I don’t cross paths with other runners enjoying it.

The run starts at the Falls of Lana parking lot, the large lot on the right, just south of Branbury State Park. I just learned the origins of the name “Branbury” by the way. It is not the name of some famous settler, politician or benefactor – it is simply an amalgamation of Brandon and Salisbury – the two nearest towns. How creative……. I usually skip the short connector trail that heads diagonally up from the parking lot, instead heading north on the road towards Branbury for just a few yards, taking a right onto the gated forest service road which climbs steeply from the start, before leveling off and crossing under the penstock. What the heck is a penstock? I just happen to have the answer in a previous post. After a series of hairpin turns, the trail climbs relentlessly towards Silver Lake. I was concerned about how passable I would find the trail, as it is still early spring, and we had a few very windy days where a lot of trees got knocked down. Fortunately, the trail crews had already made short work of the many down trees, with the only sign being their trailside debris.

Trail Maintenance

Continuing up, I reached the shores of Silver Lake after a mile and a half. For most casual hikers, this is the point of the trip up from Lake Dunmore, but looking for higher mileage, and more climbing, I stayed on the trail, which after another short, steep climb, veered to the right to reach the high point, a few hundred feet above Silver Lake, at the Goshen parking lot. This lot has a bit of a bad reputation for car break-ins, so I rarely use it. I was comforted, however, to see a Forest Service vehicle parked there, perhaps providing a little deterrent to window-smashing wannabees.

Forest Service Patrol Car

At the far side of the parking lot, the obvious trail down begins, and after about a quarter mile, the right turn at the trail junction begins the descent to Silver Lake, in earnest. Running down this one section of true single track trail, I heard some scampering sounds in the woods, and reminded myself of the usual adage – “If you can hear it, it is just a squirrel”. However, at one point, I turned around and saw my first bear of the season bolting up the hill, a few yards behind me, and getting away from me as quickly as it could. My guess was that it was running away from whatever I was running away from. That said, it is always a rush to see these magnificent animals, and I stopped to watch it amble away, made all the easier by the lack of foliage at this altitude, this easy in the season. Someday I will get a decent picture of one of my bear incidents!

As the bear disappeared into the forest, I resumed my run down the hill, reaching the Leicester Hollow trail, where I turned right, passing by a few groups of hikers, letting them know of what they had just missed. When the sign for the Silver Lake picnic area appeared on the left, I took it, coming to the bridge over the sluiceway bringing water down to Silver Lake from the Sucker Brook Reservoir, a mile or so away at higher altitude. Sometimes, this sluiceway is dry, as Green Mountain Power tries to collect the water in the higher reservoir to save it for high electricity demand in the summer months, I presume. The rush of the water told me that they had to let some out – I bet the reservoir is pretty full at the moment due to the sudden snow melt! I hope to run up there soon to see.

Roaring Sluiceway

From here, I ran along the shore of Silver Lake – a great place to take a dip during summer runs, and returned to the forest service road, for the high speed plunge back to my car. The footing was usually good enough to just let my legs cut loose, but some glute tightness the next day reminded me that this was the first serious downhill run of the season. Returning to my car, this ended up being about a 5.5 mile run, with about 900 feet of climbing and descent. Challenging, but not overly so, by Vermont standards at least. If you haven’t run up here – give it a try. It can also be a great place to put in a good workout in the heat of the summer – it is typically 5-10 degrees cooler there, between the shade and the swimming spots.

Finally, this is the beginning of the 10th year of this blog. I have some really fun “bucket list” runs in the planning, which I hope some of my friends can join me on. Hoping we all have a great summer!

Google Earth of the run

Altitude Profile

Rattlesnake Cliffs

Here it was, the last Sunday of my summer vacation, on a spectacular, cool, clear Sunday afternoon. I knew I had some class prep to get ready, but I also knew that if I didn’t get out for at least a short run, I would be kicking myself. So, I headed for one of my favorite trailheads, the Falls of Lana trail just south of Branbury State Park, and decided to try and run up to the prominent cliffs behind the state park, known as “Rattlesnake Point” or “Rattlesnake Cliffs“.

The name of this prominent landmark undoubtedly brings up rather scary connotations for some hikers – I mean who wants to climb a cliff named after a poisonous snake? Curious as to the presence or absence of these reputedly dangerous vipers, I contacted Jim Andrews of Salisbury, and herpetologist extraordinaire, and asked him “Are there really rattlesnakes up there?” His response was, as follows:

“…that is a definite historic site with solid documentation of collection of rattlesnakes for snake oil by local families. However, we have no proof that rattlesnakes continue to exist in that area. It has been many decades since anyone has provided solid evidence of rattlesnakes there. That said, there have been a few reports over the last few decades from people who believe they have seen rattlesnakes in that area, but none of them took photos, or even described the snake well enough to confirm the sighting.”

There you go – I think it is safe to say that you can hike or run on the Rattlesnake Cliffs without your snakebite kit!

Comforted by this information, I headed up the hill on the Silver Lake Trail, as I have done countless times on my runs up to equally well-visited Silver Lake, but at the switchback to the right after about a half mile, instead of following the main trail, keep going straight, taking the bridge across Sucker Brook, following the Rattlesnake Trail. This trail climbs pretty steadily, but fortunately, never particularly steeply. A lot of mountain trails, particularly on the Long Trail, or in the Adirondacks get either too rocky or too steep for running, but this trail was runable, at least to me, for about 90% of it’s length.

After climbing about 2 miles, a left turn to the actual cliffs comes up, and is easily recognizable by a warning sign, warning hikers and runners to stay away from the cliffs from April until the end of July while the peregrine falcons nest. But, since it is September, the coast is clear, and I finished my ascent heading straight on the trail to the west facing cliffs overlooking Lake Dunmore.

Lake Dunmore View

I hung out at this overlook for a few minutes, chatting with a couple from North Carolina, before following a weak herd path to the viewpoint facing south towards Silver Lake and the southern end of Lake Dunmore – another stunning late summer view. In the picture below, Silver Lake is the small body of water in the left center of the photo, while Lake Dunmore and Fern Lake are on the right. On the way back towards the Rattlesnake Trail, I met up with the North Carolina folks – apparently they had tried to follow me on the unmarked path I had followed, and had gotten a little bit lost before backtracking and reaching this place on more established trails!

Silver Lake View

The descent was fast and fun – since the trail makes a broad switchback on the south side of the mountain, it rarely gets too steep to run on the descent. Returning to my car, I saw that this was “only” a little over 4.5 miles, but with a 1200 ft vertical climb, and a great way to end the summer.

Google Earth projection of the Rattlesnake Cliff run

Altitude Profile Rattlesnake Cliffs

Microspikes to Silver Lake

Once again, it is a beautiful Saturday, so I thought it would be a great day for a ski or trail run. A few days ago, I was talking to my colleague Joe the Geographer, and he mentioned how nice the running up to Silver Lake had been recently, and I realized then that despite the fact that I run there during most of the year (and blog about routes near the lake regularly), I had never been there before in the winter! I also knew that my spiked shoes probably wouldn’t provide quite enough traction, so I went to the Middlebury Mountaineer and picked up a set of “Microspikes” which are basically slip on mini-crampons designed to be worn over running shoes or lighter hiking boots.

I started this run, in the usual place, the Falls of Lana trailhead, and started up the steeper early sections of trail, which had been well groomed by and for snowmobiles, making for easy running with my spikes on. While the beaten down section of trail proved to be easy running, if I stepped off the trail, I quickly sank in, close to up to my knees, so there would be no trailbreaking for me today! Chugging up towards Silver Lake, I noticed that some snowshoers had beaten a trail to Lenny’s Lookout, the high point of the powerline clearing overlooking Lake Dunmore, so I headed up that way to enjoy the view after a short climb. I could see lots of ice fisherman down below, and it was curious that they were mostly clustered in one small part of the lake. Was the fishing better there? Or did someone bring the beer?

Lake Dunmore Ice

Returning to the main snowmobile trail, I continued up to the lake shore. I must confess, I was kind of hoping that some ambitious snowshoer had traipsed around the lake, making for easy passage in running shoes, but I could find no such tracks, so I had to content myself with a short slog through the snow, out on the ice, to get the sort of perspective that requires swimming in the summer. In addition to shoreline views, I also saw a few snowmobilers, off of their sleds and walking along the shore. With those big helmets on their heads, I kind of thought they looked like popular music artists “Daft Punk“, a duo reknowned for wearing face-obscuring helmets as they play.

Silver Lake Dam with Rattlesnake Cliffs in the background

Continuing on, I thought it might be nice to head down the Leicester Hollow trail, but was disappointed to see that trail had barely been broken on this, so I continued up the main route above Silver Lake. When I reached the trail split, half going right towards Goshen, the other half going straight towards Moosalamoo, I though I would head straight for a little while to check out the rarely-visited Sucker Brook Reservoir. Somewhat surprisingly, when I split off of the snowmobile trail to go to this small body of water, there was one set 4WD tire tracks heading down the steep road for me to run in. Somebody whose job it is to inspect the dam in the winter has one heck of a big set of snow tires, and a vehicle which does really well in deep snow! When I got to the reservoir, it was……empty. Apparently they drain it in the fall, probably to leave room for spring snowmelt?

Heading back up the hill to the trail junction, and not quite ready to return down to my car, I headed up the road further to the Goshen/Silver Lake trailhead parking lot, which was empty due to the fact that the road it lied at the end of was not plowed in the winter. I did notice that the snowmobile continued on however, and was surprised to learn that it followed the course of the Ridge Trail, up on the hillside above Leicester Hollow. I previously described the Ridge Trail in a summer running post, and found that there was nothing particularly remarkable about it, and had never run it again since. It took on a whole different look in the winter, so I am now eager to-re-explore it in the upcoming weeks while everything is still under deep snow. This time, however, I was not prepared for a longer run (no food or water), so after going a short distance on the well-packed Ridge Trail, I returned to the Goshen parking lot. From this point on, it was about 2.5 miles all downhill, and my Microspikes made it so that I could run fast, and confident in my footing for the duration of the descent.

Returning to my car, this made for a slightly longer than 7 mile run, with about 900 feet of climbing and descent. The day was so nice, that after I got home and had a light lunch, I managed to get out for an hour of cross-country skiing as well!

AltitudeProfile

The run, in Google Earth

Happy 100th Post!

On a cool mid-October day, I realized that it had been a few weeks since my last blog posting, so I thought about some good possible runs, and went online to perform a little cleanup to this blog. Then I realized that this was going to be my 100th posting! Should I come up with something particularly epic, or maybe even a little bit dangerous? Nahhhhh…. Instead, I decided to retrace the steps of the same run that I did for my very first posting, way back in June 2009. So, here goes – my inaugural run for “The Middlebury Trailrunner”, the run from the Falls of Lana/Silver Lake trailhead, up past Silver Lake to the Goshen Trailhead on the hillside above the lake, and back. I have done more runs from this trailhead than from any other starting point, but had not written up a new posting on this identical route, although I have run it countless times. Whilethis is probably not a recommended for for running neophytes, it is an appropriate, adventurous run for folks for whom road 10K’s are “about right”, but want to start exploring more adventurous terrain. This particular route has some significant hill climbing, but is primarily on double track forest service roads (only open to maintenance vehicles), so it is a great place for decent runners to start exploring trails. Kind of like me, 5 years ago.

A lot has changed in the last 5 years, at least as far as my running goes. When I first blogged this run, I thought of this as a pretty adventurous route, between the significant climbing, and its backcountry feel in a very scenic part of Addison County. Regular readers will note that while I do continue to weave in runs of moderate length, my longer runs have gotten…well….longer! I have also become more adventurous in my choice of new routes, with my attitude to new routes evolving from “Gee, I would like to know where that trail goes, so I can give it a try”, to “I bet that trail goes somewhere new, let me check my map”, to “OK – there is a path I have never noticed before, here goes!”. Adventure follows! Trailrunning has also rejuvenated my running, as I have found that I can go out on longer runs with greatly diminished frequency of injuries. This is key for middle-aged athletes, as every ache and pain becomes an excuse to not run, and a gradual acquiescence to the inevitability of old age – prematurely. Trail running puts one in the situation where every footfall is unique, and that fact, combined with its slower pace, minimizes the repetitive use injuries so common in distance runners. The other wonderful discovery I have made is that a steady diet of trail running on challenging terrain, with a longer runs every few weeks, is great preparation for marathon running, an empowering aspect of running which I had given up on for close to 20 years due to frequent annoying injuries.

Now – on to the run! When I first blogged this run 5 years ago, it was an early summer run in June of 2009, and the run reflected that season. This time? Mid-October, while still lovely, at least this year, is the very end of fall foliage, and the summer resort around Lake Dunmore is mostly shut down for the season. The Kampersville Squirrel? Still there, but she somehow looks a little creepier on a grey day. As I drove around the shoreline towards Branbury State Park, I also noticed a lot of “For Sale” signs in front of lakeside homes. I suppose their owners wanted one last summer on its shores before starting the process of turning over their summer haven to new owners? I also noticed that, at least on this blustery Sunday afternoon, that there were no cars or beachgoers along the shoreline of the state park. However, I was pleasantly surprised to see that the Falls of Lana trailhead, just south of Branbury, was pretty close to full. I guess trailrunners and hikers are a hardier sort than beach folks? Apparently, although I suspect some Maine coast beachcombers would beg to differ, or even those who brave the Atlantic coasts further south in the off-season.

I am not going to spend a lot of time describing the details of the route – it is pretty easy to follow. Run up the forest service road departing from the Lake Road a hundred yards or so south of the parking lot, and follow its switchbacks all the way to Silver Lake, at about a mile and a half, and continue up the hill above Silver Lake on this road until you reach the Goshen trailhead , at which point you follow the trail descending back to Silver Lake, reaching the lakeside Leicester Hollow Trail, where you take a right turn. After slightly less than a half mile on this trail, take the left turn, following the campground sign pointing to the picnic area, which will bring you to the Silver Lake “beach” and then back to the original road on which you initially climbed, where you complete your descent back to your waiting car, for about a 5.6 mile run, with about 800 feet of climbing and descent.

That said, since I have run this trail countless times, but never at this specific time of the year (past-peak foliage, segueing into stick season), I made a point to look for things I had never noted before. So, for the rest of this posting, I will share these bits of minutiae. So – here goes!

1. A little over a mile into the run, if you look to your left through the trees, you will notice what looks like a small body of water to your left. I had always called this “Moose Pond” in my mind, but had never done the very short bushwack to actually stand at its shores. I associated it with moose, as I had envisioned it as a great place to see a moose someday. I finally took a few moments to actually step onto its shore, and while moose sightings continue to evade me when I am running, I realized that my name was a misnomer: This is a rather substantial beaver pond! If you look at the picture carefully, you will see the beaver hut in the middle of the pond. There is also a rather substantial beaver dam, just to the right of the frame of this photo.

Beavermoose Pond

2. When you get to the shores of Silver Lake, you will notice a campsite for a campground host to your left. Over the last few years, there was an elderly gentleman who filled this role, and while I stopped to chat with him a few times, I never inquired as to his name. He was not there this summer, and for most of the summer, the campground host camp site was empty. I hope he is in good health? That said, I had always romanticized he notion of spending a summer in the forest, away from the comforts of home. On this run, I took the time to look around the empty site, and found its dirty little secret – it has electrical power. Set me up in the campground, and let me rock tunes on my portable electronic devices!

3. Much of the road ascent during the summer has a tunnel-like feel. The overhanging foliage blocks most views, and keeps the road more or less permanently in the shade. On this run, with most of the trees bereft of leaves at the higher elevations, rather expansive views opened up!

4. As I approached the Goshen parking lot at the end of my ascent, I noticed an old wooden sign, with the number 9 painted on it. Does anyone have any idea what this means? It was not one of the blue signs with yellow numbers, which the Blueberry Hill Ski Touring Center uses to mark its trails. Nor was it one of the far more polished numerical signs which grace the shores of Silver Lake, which I assume accompany a pamphlet which I have never seen, probably with a name like “Groovy Trees of Silver Lake”. Maybe the Number 9 was referring to one of my favorite summer microbrews? I doubt it!

Number 9

5. There are a few well placed marble blocks on the shoreline of Silver Lake. I have never noticed these before, and I can only assume that these remain from the old Silver Lake Hotel. If you would like to learn more about this long gone hotel, you should purchase “Leicester Vermont’s Silver Lake — Beyond the Myths” By William Powers. You can find it on Amazon, or at the Sheldon Museum!

Marble Steps

I am going to finish with a few observations I have made associated with management of this blog, as I have learned a few interesting things about how the internet really works through the use of WordPress (the software I use for this blog) analytics.

1. About 90% of the information transferred on the web is total spam. We are all familiar with the junk mail that fills our inboxes, but the amount that assaults this blog, in an attempt to post links leading to god knows where when clicked, blows my mind. I probably see 10,000 spam messages for every real reader response. Fortunately, the brilliant software which the WordPress programmers have added to the blogging software is ruthlessly efficient at blocking this, so it only takes me a few moments each week to delete, and it never clogs up the blog comments. For some reason, spam touting the wonders of Luis Vuitton handbags, and Adam and Eve sex toys seem to be the worst offenders. I have also noticed that every time I mention my Garmin GPS watch, I get inundated with Garmin spam for a week or two. Yes, the web is dominated by spam bots!

2. One of my very first posts, describing a run I did in Bristol entitled “Things to do in Bristol when you are bored” seems to get a lot of hits due to people Googling the terms “bored in Bristol”. For the life of me, I cannot figure out why almost every day, one or two people somewhere in the world google “bored in Bristol” and end up on my blog. I have googled these terms, and seen nothing of note. I wondered at one point if my mischievous teenage daughter was messing with me, but she claims innocence.

When I first posted this run, I also mentioned the ready availability of creemees and other frozen treats at the Kampersville Deli. Alas, this summer attraction is also closed for the season, but its whiteboard price list is still inviting. I wonder if the price list will still be there in the spring?

No more ice cream :(

So now, I have to ask my readers (both of you?)- Do you know of any good treasure troves for trail traversing which I (we) might explore at some point? I have a few good ideas of new places in the vicinity to explore, but am always looking for some new suggestions. Feel free to respond with any of your inspirations!

Cheers, and hope to see you at post #200

Jeff

Google Earth projection

Altitude Profile

Up the North Branch Trail

Two summers ago, I had the pleasure of competing in the inaugural version of The Moosalamoo Ultra, and while I will not be running the full 36 mile version of it this year, I thought I would piece together a significantly shorter run which included at least a few segments from this far more grueling course. I also wanted to piece together bits of trails in such a way that I had never run that particular combination before, so I chose a route starting from the Falls of Lana trailhead, just south of Branbury State Park, ascending to the Goshen-Ripton Road on the North Branch Trail and the Voter Brook Overlook road, and descending on a mix of snowmobile trails and unmarked trails. It has not gone unnoticed by myself and others, that the frequency of bear sightings in the Moosalamoo area has been on the rise. Bear sightings on the trail are a true treat, as long as the bear chooses the appropriate response – that of running away. So, I have decided that the key to a good bear sighting is to run quietly, and wear garish clothing to scare the bear away once contact is made. With this in mind, I purchased a brand new Ben and Jerry’s tie dye t-shirt – do you think this will scare away a startled bear? And yes, I looked into this idea, and bears are not colorblind, although I would not have wanted to be the person holding picture books with hidden numbers in front of hungry bears….

Bear-repellent

I set up the now routine climb on the Silver Lake service road, but instead of taking the heavily traveled sharp right hairpin turn at the half mile point, I went straight as if I was planning on ascending to the Rattlesnake Cliffs. After a few hundred yards on this trail, I came to the open meadow where the North Branch Trail bears (pun intended) right. This small sunny oasis in what is mostly a pretty heavily forested section was full of mid-summer wildflowers. I was particularly fond of the small, daisy-like flowers which flanked the path on shoulder-height stalks. Does anyone know what this wildflower is called?

Not Quite Daisies

At this point, my run joined a section of the route from the Moosalamoo Ultra. This trail junction is where the first feed station, reached after the early-race ascent and descent of Mt. Moosalamoo, around mile 8, and is the lowest altitude point of the race. From here, over the next two miles or so, there is a steady climb along the banks of the North Branch of the Sucker Brook, a rather attractive little stream. Most of this single-track trail has good footing, although there are a few sections with wet rocks necessitating some care in one’s footing, and a few short steep scrambly sections.

Babbling Brook

This trail passes by a few opportunities to get onto easier terrain, as it more or less parallels the rough road connecting the Goshen-Ripton Road to the Voter Brook Overlook. As the weather went from dreary to drizzly to pouring rain, I chose to remain in the relative shelter of the forest rather than the easier travel of the road. This section of the North Branch trail eventually does cross the dirt road, and continue through the woods until it reaches the Moosalamoo Campground, where one must finally continue to climb on the road to get to the Goshen Ripton Road. At this point, the Ultra crosses the road, for a long series of loops up and around the Sugar Hill Reservoir, but on my much shorter run I turned right on the road, and continued for a little over a mile until I came to a well marked snowmobile trail veering to the right. At this point, I rejoined the Ultra route, and this road crossing is the site of another feed station, at around the 21 mile point. The next two miles are pure running pleasure – gradually downhill, double track running, with only a few muddy patches. In fact, when I ran this section of the Ultra two summers ago, this stretch got me in trouble – I felt so good that I neglected to take in fluids, and paid dearly for my dehydration a few miles later! No such problem on this run today however, and the falling rain kept me quite cool. There are a few trail junctions where one should follow the signs for the snowmobile trail system, although some of the other trails crisscrossing my course look like they are worthy of exploration someday. After about two miles on the snowmobile trail, and a short, steep climb, the trail came to the service road connecting the small Sucker Brook Reservoir to the Silver Lake access road. In keeping with my plan to duplicate the Ultra trails, I took the sharp right descent, leading me to the “shores” of the Sucker Brook Reservoir. I put the word “shores” in with quotes, as it seems that there isn’t much water this summer in the reservoir, which exists for flood control, and to control the waterflow heading through the penstock down the the hydroelectric plant at Lake Dunmore. So, I am afraid this small lake is nothing more than a mudpit this summer.

Sucker Brook Mudpit

My run then followed the Ultra route, following the road below the earthen dam and joining the broad swath of clearing alongside the buried pipeline connecting the reservoir to Silver Lake. When I ran the Ultra, this section had been recently brush-hogged, making for easier running, but at this point, the grass here is very high, concealing some challenging footing below, on a steeply leaning embankment without an obvious path of least resistance to the runner. I have found that staying high, on the runner’s left makes for the easiest passage on a fairly challenging piece of running for the next mile or so. After a while, it flattens out, and while there seem to be a few different trails here, they all end up at the same place, connecting to the Silver Lake Access Road. When you reach the Silver Lake Beach, this is where another feed station is located at around mile 26 in the Ultra, and the race continues with the exhausting loop up over the Chandler Ridge and around Silver Lake before returning to the Blueberry Hill Inn and the finish line. At this point, I was very wet and had run enough, so simply descended on the service road to my car and the completion of the run.

Now, I’ll bet my readers were guessing that there would be a bear sighting in this run. Sorry to disappoint you – I guess my t-shirt worked too well! This ended up as a 9.5 mile run, with about a thousand feet of climbing. I also learned that my new t-shirt needed to be washed, as it had leached blue dye all over my torso!

Clockwise, from trailhead at the lower left

Altitude Profile

Last Run Before Spring

The title of this post, “Last Run Before Spring”, might have you scratching your head over chronology. While long delayed this year, the full foliage on the trees in the Middlebury area certainly indicate that the few short weeks we know of as spring are most assuredly here. So a confession here – I did this run a few weeks ago, in mid-May, while the trees were still quite bare, and it has just taken me a while to post it. Nonetheless, it is a good run, so I thought it quite worthy of posting – better late than never!

Regular readers by now know that the Silver Lake and its surroundings make up one of my favorite running destinations, and this post represents a new variation on that theme. At the core of this run, is the very first post I made to this blog, the ascent from the Sucker Brook Trailhead, past Silver Lake, to the Goshen Trailhead, and back. On this particular run, I chose to extend it beyond this central loop, in the name of checking out some new terrain, as well as visiting an old favorite location for great views.

This run, on a warm weekend late afternoon, was undertaken to be one of my last real runs before tapering my training prior to the Vermont City Marathon at the end of May (note – I actually completed the marathon by the time I got to this post – I am not going to write it up for the blog, but it went well!), so I wanted to stretch it out to the 8-9 mile range. So, I set off up the 4WD road (yes – it is closed to motor vehicles) from the Silver Lake/Sucker Brook Trailhead just south of Branbury State Park, and chugged my way up past Silver Lake up the the trailhead above the lake at the end of a rarely traveled dirt Silver Lake Road, which emanates from Goshen, as a right turn from the Goshen Ripton Road, a mile or so south of the Blueberry Hill Inn.

When I reached this road, I realized that it provided an opportunity to add some mileage, so I continued on past the hikers’ parking lot and trailhead, which I knew would descend me back to my parked car, 800+ vertical feet below. So, I continued on this road, which while open to vehicles, is so lightly traveled that it feels almost like a trail. At this time of the year, before any of the trees had leaves, there were great views towards the the main ridge of the Green Mountains, while views towards Silver Lake and the west were obscured by the modest ridge. At a few locations, I noted primitive roads heading up the eastern flanking ridge, but abandoned them when I realized they were driveways up to “off the grid” homes and camps, and I wanted to respect their owners’ privacy. After a little over a mile on this road, I could see Hogback Mountain, and Romance Mountain, the two peaks behind the Blueberry Hill Inn, and thought it would be fun to link to that trail system on this run, but due to the lateness of the afternoon and impending sunset, I decided to turn around at one particularly impressive glacial erratic on my right.

On my return, gazing into the forest for sights which would soon be hidden by the foliage, I noticed a series of PVC pipes stuck in the ground, 20-50 yards from the dirt road. I have come across pipes like this, even further from the road on past explorations. Does anyone know why these are here, or what their purpose is?

Mystery PVC

After contemplating the mystery of the pipes, I continued back to the Silver Lake trailhead, and descended the short trail down to the lakeside on the Leicester Hollow Trail, where I took the right turn back towards the campground and the small beach at the north end of this gem of a lake. Rather than simply follow the trail which I had previously ascended back to my car, I chose one last variation, and instead took the short trail down below the Silver Lake Dam, and followed the penstock (that is the fancy word for “big fat pipe”) back towards the power line, where I ascended its trail to catch the early evening views and impending sunset over Lake Dunmore. In a month or so, the lake will be busy with summer vacationers and boaters, but on this quiet spring evening, there was only one boat traversing what must be an otherwise silent lake. I had hoped that the lone raptor in the skies would land nearby to get his picture taken, or at least hover nearby, but my presence led it to seek out a quieter eyrie.

Dunmore Sunset from Lenny’s Lookout

On my descent from this lookout, I took another obvious left turn which returned me to the main trail up from the lower parking lot, where I came across what must be a fairly recently placed sign, where the over look was referred to as “Lenny’s Lookout”. This is the first time that I have heard this name applied, so I am also curious as to the origins of this name. Who exactly is Lenny, and why is the lookout named after him? A google search shed no light on this question, although it did lead to some beautiful photography from another hiker who has posted their pictures of this location.

Lenny’s Lookout Signpost

From this point, it was an easy skip down the trail to my car, making this a slightly less than 9 mile run, with about 1100 vertical feet of ascent and descent. Bring on the summer!

Google Earth of the Run

Altitude Profile

The Middlebury Blog Network

Selected Posts from the Midd Blogosphere

Tag Archives: Branbury State Park

Keewaydin Caves Redux

Back to the Springtime Trails

Rattlesnake Cliffs

Microspikes to Silver Lake

Happy 100th Post!

Up the North Branch Trail

Last Run Before Spring