Marjorie Turner Hollman is a writer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.
A highlight of our trip to Newfoundland was returning to Gros Morne National Park on Newfoundland’s western coast. When visiting a place for the first time we often say, “We need to come back.” Much less often are we able to say, “It’s so good to be back,” especially when referring to more far-flung destinations. At the bottom of this article are links to previous posts on our earlier visit to
Gros Morne.
Filed under Blog posts--Easy Walks
Marjorie Turner Hollman is a writer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.
A mild winter’s day seemed just the time to take a day trip to East Haddam, Connecticut to visit Gillette Castle State Park, overlooking the Connecticut River. We had been to this area in the past for a winter boat ride along the river (February and March) in hopes of seeing bald eagles that winter in the area. The river stays open through winter and thus provides ideal hunting for eagles through the winter months. Our first trip favored us with multiple eagle sightings, but on this more recent visit we were not as successful. We caught a glimpse of what looked like an eagle soaring into the clouds overhead, but we’re not bird experts, and the glimpse we got was brief.
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Marjorie Turner Hollman is a writer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.
Often outdoor walking locations are “hiding in plain sight.” Locals know about what makes a specific place special. There may be a pull off for a good place to explore, but no sign is posted to assure visitors they have found the right location. The Keystone Arch Bridges trail starts in Chester MA and heads into Middlefield and Becket.
Clear signage has now been posted directing would be visitors where to find parking and get views of the dry laid stone railroad bridges that were built in the early 1840s to carry trains over the Westfield River. For background on the history of these bridges, learn more here. Information signs have been recently placed on Middlefield Road, next to Hebert Cross Road in Chester. Parking for about nine cars is available off road just past the sign.
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Marjorie Turner Hollman is a writer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.
Ice can be a huge barrier to getting out in winter. For those of us with mobility challenges (and others) it can keep us inside, missing out on the beauty that is found in colder weather. In general, newly fallen snow is pleasant to walk through. With little snow so far this winter in New England (at least southern New England) we have been able to get out fairly often without the concern of ice. A beautiful spot we revisited recently after a light snow is a Mass Audubon property, Pierpont Meadow in Dudley, MA.
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Marjorie Turner Hollman is a writer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.
New England is often an icy, pretty cold place to be in winter. However, the winter, 2022-23 has mostly had little snow, has been relatively warm and thus we have found little or no ice on local trails (at least where I am in south central MA). We generally avoid Cape Cod in summer since that is where everyone else seems to head. Instead, we wait for cooler weather then set out for locations on the Cape within about an hour or two from our home.
A January day with temperatures in the 40s seemed a good time to visit the Cape. I had wanted to visit the Knob, in Woods Hole, MA since I heard about it. This conservation land is part of the Salt Pond Bird Sanctuaries properties. When I had last checked, the trail out to a peninsula in Buzzards Bay had been closed for repairs. I felt sure it was still closed, but the website for this destination indicated the trails were open to the public again. In case this turned out not to be accurate, we made a plan B to stop at the Shining Sea bikeway. (We ended up stopping later at the shoreline access for the bikeway anyway.) Here’s an early fall visit to the bikeway.
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Marjorie Turner Hollman is a writer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.
Visits to Sachuest Point National Wildlife Refuge in Newport, RI never disappoint. We enjoy the wide level graveled path that encircles the spit of land jutting out into the surf. Although we have been here countless times, it never gets old.
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Marjorie Turner Hollman is a writer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.
Rocky Point amusement park was a “go-to” destination for summer visitors in Rhode Island for many years. First arriving by boat, later by trolley and finally by car, people found open fields, a restaurant and carnival type rides, which drew huge crowds through the years.
The nation’s 200th anniversary celebration of 1976 was an occasion when hundreds of thousands arrived at the park for a shore dinner. By the early 1990s the privately-owned park closed and remained that way till 2014 when it reopened as a state park.
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Marjorie Turner Hollman is a writer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.
Our trip to Newfoundland had so many highlights, but perhaps our favorite spot, for many reasons, was Blow Me Down Provincial Park, located between between Lark and York Harbor.
For those more adventurous than me, the park offered a stairway to the top of the mountain that met the shore next to the beach area. Wooden steps follwed the edge of the mountain up to the ridgeline. My husband hurried up to the top on our first evening there, taking advantage of the late sunsets of the Newfoundland summer season. At that point the sun did not set till about 9:15 PM. I enjoyed the photos, and was fine with avoiding the steep climb up to the view.
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Marjorie Turner Hollman is a writer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.
As we crunch along on the trail through fall leaves that now lie underfoot, we are reminded that winter is not far off. Here’s an excerpt from my memoir, My Liturgy Of Easy Walks: Finding the Sacred in Everyday (and some very strange) places.
Sounds of Silence
We were tromping through the drifts on a short walk in new fallen snow when I spotted the tracks. Ha! These were our own footprints—we were retracing our steps, headed back home. We had ventured to an old trolley line rail bed that still stands in the woods near our house. The dirt road cuts a straight line through the trees; the path we took did not. Despite the straightness of the trail we still created a wobbly line as we walked.
Continue readingFiled under Blog posts--Easy Walks
Marjorie Turner Hollman is a writer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.
Fall is still with us in New England and we have been anxious to get out before the gray of upcoming winter sets in. We headed out to Noon Hill in Medfield on a blue-sky day, since there is a nice view from Noon Hill (thus the name).
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Marjorie Turner Hollman 