439. BOXING the NET (Part I)

A newly blazed and boxed link in the lower CT portion of the New England Trail heading from the Canadian border to Long Island Sound

Well, seems like a long time since we've gotten excited about any new trails being built anywhere around our usual US "stomping grounds", since we figure we've already hiked most of the ones we're likely to do in our lifetimes, some of them many times over. However, when we found out just this past spring that not only were several of the old trails we'd first hiked in the 1970's and 80's (Mattabesset, Metacomet-Monadnock, Monadnock-Sunapee Greenway, etc.) now recently connected and repackaged as the New England Trail, but that new extensions of that "composite trail" were being built on either end, naturally our curiosity was piqued and we just had to check it out...



So, after exploring a couple of sheep-related preserves on National Trails Day and before joining a group scouting out possibilities for the extension of the New England trail on its last few miles south through Guilford, CT, we happened to catch sight of a group of "old-timers" having a tail-gate picnic lunch near a trailhead parking area on the north side of route 80 a mile or so east of route 77. They had just finished a relatively new 6.7-mile section of the New England Trail as a shuttle hike from the route 77 Bluff Head trailhead to the north before continuing on with another new link to the south, so we vowed that if they could still do it, we'd have to come back to do that hike ourselves sometime soon, too!

Our chance finally came on a buggy fall day, when a lovely Bluebird graciously flew out to meet us at the above trailhead not very far from her "nest" in CT. We shuttled up to the Bluff Head parking lot on the west side of route 77 several miles north of route 80, cautiously crossed the road and headed easterly up the combined Mattabessett/New England Trail. The first 1.3 miles of trail were "old hat" for us, but if you haven't done this part of the trail before, you might want to look out for a few other boxes along this rocky stretch before you finally reach the junction pictured above, where the Mattabessett heads left, and the new Menunkatuck/New England Trail heads right (south) 5.4 miles to the route 80 trailhead, mostly on easy old cart paths.

From this point on, we were going to keep track of the time to give a rough idea of how long it took us to walk between each of the boxes (perhaps about 15 to 20 minutes?), but we didn't keep an accurate count, so you will just have to rely on the "milestones" noted below.

For Box 1, proceed south from this blue trail junction. Pass a short trail on right which leads to a pond. Arrive at a kiosk for Broomstick Ledge. Follow trail that now has both blue and green blazes. Continue on old cart path downslope to a flat area. Take note of a yellow "Public Water Supply" sign on the left. (The yellow sign seems gone so you'll just have to continue on old cart path downslope to a flat area just before a left hand bend in the path.) See rocks on left with small tree growing up from a tilted rock. Find Box 1: MOSQUITO HEAD NET placed to the left of the tree in front of the 2nd (slightly recessed) of 3 tilted rocks.

For Box 2, continue on the blue trail crossing a stream. The blue trail turns left off the cart path and passes an "ostentatious tombstone" on your right. After a while the trail returns to the cart path at a muddy area. Pass a cart path on the left and then over an iron pipe in another wet area. Come to a junction with a red blazed trail and a large boulder in the center of the junction. With that boulder to your left look right to see a smaller boulder next to a fallen tree. Box 2: HAIR NET is at the NE side of that boulder and adjacent to the fallen tree.

For Box 3, continue to the right with the blue trail and then immediately right again on a level cart path (where the red trail forks left). Continue downhill to a cart path coming in on the left and marked with red dots. Continue a couple hundred feet and fork left with the red dots, then immediately turn right with the blue blazes onto a lightly worn trail. Follow blue uphill to the top of a rocky knoll. There is a large flat rock area to the left of the knoll. From the large oak adjacent to the left side of the trail go 4 steps east and kick up your heels to find Box 3 : FISHNET STOCKINGS in a crevice hidden by small stones.

This concludes our Part I of "Boxing the NET", but be sure to get Bluebird's "Boxing the NET (Part II)" clues to continue on the blue trail several more miles out to the NET parking lot on route 80, where hopefully your shuttle car and perhaps a nice tailgate picnic await!

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