Before coming here, I wasn’t sure if this was an affiliate, a heritage area or a trail, but I thought a road trip along the NJ coast between Cape May and Sandy Hook, worthwhile. Cape May above is a lovely old town with Victorian style, boats and beaches. The Pine Barrens near Great Egg Harbor extend for miles. There are wildlife refuges, lighthouses, and historic sites, especially around the Battle of Monmouth, where Washington’s troops eked out a victory after training in Valley Forge. Locals freely admit that Seaside Heights is tacky, but much of the Jersey shore is both classy and trendy, especially in areas like Asbury Park. Technically, it turns out that this is a lapsed trail, that once partnered with the park service and was considered for heritage area status, which explains why it still appears as an obscure NPS site in a few places, but it is no longer authorized under the national park service. However, I’m glad my mistake and my curiosity about this area drove me here, and I enjoyed exploring this fascinating stretch of historic coast.
Gateway is multifaceted, but for me the most important part is the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge above. Here there are migratory and year round birds, butterflies, trails, groves of trees and pleasant views. The contrast between the busy planes of JFK and the mute swans could not be more striking. Although the road noise limited my birdsong app, I still lost count at a dozen species. With more time, I would have kayaked around to see more birds.
But for folks interested in other things, the park includes Forts Hancock, Tilden & Wadsworth, beaches, parks and more, spread out over western Long Island, Staten Island and Sandy Hook peninsula in New Jersey. The Sandy Hook unit has miles of beautiful beaches (below with NYC skyline view) and paved bike trails to enjoy.
This park needs some explanation. Behind over-developed Ocean and Atlantic Cities in New Jersey, there’s a large underdeveloped lowland pitch pine forest with rivers, creeks, swamps and bogs. The ground is sandy, so colonial farmers wrote off the whole area as the “pine barrens”. There were a few failed attempts at industry, including mills, glassworks and munitions, but the lack of elevation meant little hydro power. In the 1920’s Atlantic City boomed, but the swamps were mostly for bootleg gin and mosquitoes.
In the 1970’s developers and environmentalists faced off to decide the fate of the remaining forest. By then, cranberry and blueberry farmers had begun commercial farming, roads crisscrossed the area, and there was a diverse mix of increasing rural and residential growth. Development is the primary cause of unnatural fire suppression, which changes the ecosystem over time. The pine land was becoming valuable and the forest at risk.
Environmentalists argued that the unique pine forest was home to several rare species—including Pygmy pine, a tree frog, an orchid and many birds—, and, by adapting to historic wildfires, the hot-burning pitch pine trees became dominant by regrowing faster than hardwoods. They also pointed out that underneath the entire sandy swamp was a huge pristine freshwater underground aquifer that supplied places like Atlantic City. Develop the forest, and you create big problems in the future. The battle is still ongoing, but much of the forest is now protected. UNESCO has recognized the Pinelands as an International Biosphere Reserve.
The park service only protects the main river—just the water—, and much of the land alongside the river is maintained piecemeal by different county’s parks. The largest undeveloped pine forest area is managed by the state, and there are four state forests in the Pinelands, along with many wildlife reserves and other parks. The Pinelands National Reserve is affiliated with but not run by the National Park Service. Since I’m visiting official national park units, my challenge was finding the river amid the forest.
I stayed at one of the county campgrounds near Mays Landing, Lake Lenape West in Atlantic County, where it’s easy to put a kayak in the water and paddle around. Lake Lenape itself is like a neighborhood recreation area, with a ridiculous little lighthouse, but if you paddle up to the top, there are nesting bald eagles where the river enters. There is at least one campground upstream, Winding River, that rents equipment, but be advised that there are likely obstructions from low hanging trees potentially blocking progress near that section of the river. Estell Manor Park downstream has a nature center with extremely knowledgeable park partners who patiently explained all this to me and directed me to the side channel in the river above, where there’s an artesian well and the overgrown ruins of an old business. It’s a fascinating area in an underrated state that just requires a bit of extra effort to figure out and explore.
To say the gap is in the Poconos is redundant, because ‘pocono’ means water gap in the Lenape language. The whole area was supposed to be inundated by a flood control project, but that was deemed too expensive. Which is great, because the park service preserves big, beautiful, wooded, hilly land on both the New Jersey and Pennsylvania sides. There are at least seven named waterfalls with trails—above is one of two easily seen on Dingmans Creek Trail—, more hikes including a section of the Appalachian Trail, an exceptional bike trail, many campgrounds, some historic buildings and more. A brown bear crossed the road in front of me, so there’s definitely wildlife here too.
Technically, the 35 of 40 miles of river itself is a separate park, and the gap is the land plus 5 miles of recreational river. If it were up to me, I would combine this with the Upper, Middle and Lower Delaware River parks, and make all four into one National Park. That’s been proposed, but some residents oppose it. Traffic or something. I found it easy to drive around, but crossing the river gets you a toll. If we want to preserve species, we need to start being much more aggressive about preserving our rivers and forests.
This is the middle of the river, in the middle of the park, in between the upper and lower sections of river, between Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Fortunately, it was calm enough that I got a mostly undistorted panorama, but there are a few fun class I rapids on the 10 mile section I paddled from Bushkill Access to Springfield Beach ($10 parking). The river is gorgeous, and I saw at least a half dozen bald eagles. It was surprisingly easy to catch the free hourly summer weekend ‘river runner’ shuttle to bring my kayak upstream. The driver let me bring mine inside folded, but other paddlers I saw put theirs on the canoe/kayak trailer.
The bus is also called the ‘Pocono Pony’, and it’s a lot of fun to chat with other riders. I was bragging about how many parks I had visited, when the guy next to me said he had been to all of them. He’s a riot, and he was on TV for #413. We chatted on the bus & river and compared notes. Well, mostly he chatted. In his old job, I think the conversations were mostly one-sided, since he’s a dentist. I enjoy meeting interesting folks, especially when they’ve got a great sense of humor and can teach me more about our parks.
Christmas night 1776 was a bad one. The Revolution was going poorly for the Americans. The British Navy had taken New York City and controlled the whole area. Some American militiamen were heading home, and the British had reason to believe they would win the war soon. Their regular army left Hessian mercenaries in charge of camps along the Delaware, but as the river was filled with dangerous ice flows, patrols were limited. Not that the German soldiers were drunk, mind you. They were professionals, and they were keeping careful watch, despite the storm.
George Washington wasn’t going to let the weather or river stop him. He wrote ‘Victory or Death’, and loaded his 2,400 troops and 18 cannon into sturdy river cargo boats which made repeated trips across the Delaware River (see photo) from Pennsylvania on the right to New Jersey on the left. Two other crossings had been aborted, and the storm was getting worse. It took longer than expected, but by around 4 am, his troops (and horses) climbed the hill and began marching south towards Trenton. The Hessians fought back, and the British reinforced. But Washington won three battles, two in Trenton and one in Princeton, before making camp in the mountains. The war would not be over as soon as everyone thought.
The New Jersey side of the crossing has a large wooded park on a hill, with trails and a small museum with some interesting artifacts. The Pennsylvania side has a museum, replica boats and some historic buildings along the river. I took the photo above from the narrow bridge as I walked between them. The lower section of the Delaware is either a full park unit or an affiliated multi-partner site, depending on who you ask or which website you check. There are roads and a fair amount of development on both sides, so it’s not particularly wild or even scenic in stretches. The designation seems aspirational to me. But our rivers do need more protection, and there are many interesting historic places on both sides of the river. Congress did authorize parts of the lower Delaware as ‘wild & scenic’ in 2000, but if you paddled it, you’d go in and out of those every few miles. There are no federal facilities, so although the park website calls it a ‘unit’, I don’t think it counts towards 424. Still, just in case I’m wrong, and out of respect for our first Commander in Chief, I humbly post.
While Blackstone was operational two years earlier, Paterson’s mills were churning out fabric a few years before Lowell. Where Lowell was focused on all things fabric, Paterson went through a variety of industries, including silk, revolvers, locomotives and even airplanes, including the Spirit of St Louis. Also, Lowell made clever use of a much smaller drop in elevation, using a large volume of water to drive many small engines. But the Great Falls at Paterson, which inspired Alexander Hamilton to found the town, had enough vertical drop to drive electric turbines (from Thomas Edison), which still run in the building on the left. As in the other mill towns, child labor was exploited and dyes poisoned the river. Here, young mill workers went on the “baby strike” for a shorter workweek, and cheaper competition eventually doomed many of the huge businesses. In the background at the top, there’s an old Negro League Baseball Stadium under reconstruction where a local high school star named Larry Doby played before he broke the color barrier in the American League just 3 months after Jackie Robinson. And it’s all part of this relatively new park, which has big plans for improvements.
Note well that the statue is carrying an illuminated electric lightbulb. From his work-study above to his inventions, patents, accolades, experiments, machine shops, laboratories, greenhouse, and especially to his garage, with it’s electric wall charger and multiple electric vehicles, Edison’s park is wondrous to explore. I did nothing in the proper order, ignored the scheduled tours, skipped the film, neglected to reserve a house tour, poked around, peeked in every corner and enjoyed it immensely.
In particular, I studied the evolution of his recording devices, from telegraph and phonograph to motion picture. I was very pleased to see that he took the time to invent a coffee maker (drip style, also makes tea). I noted that his wife drove him around in their electric car. And it was interesting to learn how his higher quality proprietary records lost out to cheap vinyl recordings, in part due to his unpopular taste in music. So much more than merely the inventor of the light bulb.
“I’ve not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”
Couple reasons for choosing this old Colonial $30 note. First, the visitor center/ museum at Morristown has an exceptional collection of Revolutionary War artifacts: Washington’s cane, his inaugural sword, a Ferguson rifle (designed by the British commander killed at Kings Mountain), clothing, household items and numerous books and pamphlets, plus the original note above. I enjoyed the Cross garden, driving through Jockey’s Hollow (where the soldiers camped), the wooded hilltop at Fort Nonsense, and the tour of Washington’s HQ, but the detailed items on display are unique.
The war lasted 8 years, so Washington had as many winter camps and HQs, including at Longfellow’s House in Cambridge and at Valley Forge. But Washington spent three winters here in Morristown, early, mid (worst winter ever) and late war. New Jersey was central to his efforts in the north, with good roads, hills and provisions. Especially after the British Navy helped them take New York, New Jersey was critical to holding the colonies together. New Jersey is a beautiful and historic state, that is often in the shadow of New York. But, especially after Washington’s victories at Trenton and Princeton, New Jersey was the lynchpin of the colonies, and Morristown was at the crossroads of the revolution.
Which brings me to the second reason the note is important. The war dragged on far longer than most realize, and simply feeding and clothing 10,000 troops was a monumental task at the time. Our government was broke, divided, broke and out of money. Congress printed so many dollars, that they lost 70% of their value, and then they simply issued IOUs. Having to wait years for repayment, assuming we won, burdened people and drove some bankrupt. Hamilton cut his teeth for his future as Washington’s Treasury Secretary trying to administer the financial end of the war. Now the ‘full faith and credit’ of the United States is recognized internationally, but when the outcome of the Revolutionary War was in doubt, it took a great leap of faith to accept that dollar above, especially when the enemy was paying in actual gold and silver coins.
One of the key reasons we won the war was because the Marquis de Lafayette used his own money to join Washington’s army. The French noble was on a quest to avenge the death his father at the hands of the British, but the King hadn’t yet authorized direct military assistance. So Lafayette bought his own ship, and joined Washington’s army for free, even paying his staff, aides & junior officers out of his own pocket. Lafayette’s direct connections to the French monarchy helped convince France to join the war, and his negotiations with the balky French forces in Newport led to Washington’s strategic partnership with Rochambeau that helped end the war at Yorktown.
Washington had a knack for recognizing and inspiring talent, including von Steuben, Lafayette, and Hamilton. Those he mentored gave their all for him, and some grew resentful if they didn’t get the recognition they wanted. Benedict Arnold blamed Washington for not helping him enough after Arnold’s court-martial on a profiteering charge, leading Arnold to his infamous act of treason. Hamilton helped defeat a cabal of Washington’s rivals, but quit Washington’s service in a momentary quarrel over respect. Lafayette not only was devoted to Washington, but he helped bring our revolutionary ideals back to France, where he razed the Bastille and brought Washington one of the keys.
Washington’s leadership united our fractious states, overcoming deep distrust between many colonists. Which is why it came as such a shock to me when some of the tourists today interrupted the tour to propose alternate US flags, arguing (falsely) that the 16th Amendment (income taxes) wasn’t ratified and that Washington had created a religious flag (he didn’t) for the ships he sailed (he didn’t). The ranger was making a point about real slaves in actual slavery, when the nutter said that ‘we were all slaves but we didn’t know it’. Given how hard Washington worked to unify the original colonies and hold our country together, so that it could become the United States of America, I found it sad that selfish, misinformed and misguided citizens would be so clueless as to raise this nonsense where he once slept.
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