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MY WORD - 4/23/2008
(by Holly Stewart - OpEd Columnist - April 22, 2008)
In the heart of the Highlands
In every walk with nature, one receives far more than he seeks.
—JOHN MUIR
Commuting to work down Macopin Road one morning last summer, I noticed a new sign on the right just before High Crest Lake. It had a graphic of two hikers on it with the words “Apshawa Preserve” and an arrow pointing towards Northwood Drive. Not long afterwards, I followed the sign a few hundred yards to a dirt parking lot where a wooden kiosk displayed detailed maps of the area; a hinged drawer held brochures describing the preserve. I studied the big maps for a few minutes, took a few copies of the brochure and went about my business.
Some time later, I mailed my sister Margie one of the brochures. We are amateur naturalists who enjoy a good hike in the woods, and the trail in the Apshawa Preserve appeared to promise that and more. A joint project of Passaic County and the New Jersey Conservation Foundation, this land parcel comprising 576 acres has only recently come under volunteer stewardship by the NJCF. They currently maintain seven miles of trails with at least one more trail to be blazed in the near future.
When winter ended, Margie and I started talking up the idea to walk one or more of those trails. For one reason or another, we kept postponing our trek. Finally, last Sunday, with our brother David in tow, we reached the parking lot around 10:30 in the morning. It was cool and cloudy as we set out along the White Trail, which climbed several slopes along the way to a scenic overlook. The 40-acre Butler Reservoir lay in one direction; the gleaming skyscrapers of Manhattan appeared directly opposite. Cedars, pitch pines and bear oaks held stealthily to the thin soil on the hilltop; such plants thrive only at the highest elevations in North Jersey.
From there, we made our way down a steep path to the reservoir’s edge. (To clarify, this is one of two area water features named Butler Reservoir; the other is between Kakeout and Fayson Lakes Roads in Kinnelon. I find it amusing that neither of them is actually in Butler.) The shoreline was quite littered. Glass and cans were everywhere, as was evidence of fire, plainly identifying this as a long-time party spot. Many of the cans even had pull-tabs, which were phased out in the 1980s.
We decided not to go completely around the reservoir and headed uphill on the Green Trail behind the dam. We climbed a gentle slope for half a mile or more, passing tree stands and a rusty old truck. Suddenly the sound of cars rushing by on Route 23 far below us became loud as we approached a clearing. We stood several moments at this spot, enjoying the views of Smoke Rise and Copperas Mountain to the south and west. A sun shower broke out, which I found quite welcome; I had managed to lose my bottle of water near the dam.
Down we walked again, deep into the heart of a ravine, until the sound of rushing water replaced the whooshing traffic noise. The narrow, rugged footpath we’d been following turned left onto an old gravel road, where we found a charming waterfall with a sizable pool, part of the Apshawa Brook that flowed down out of the reservoir. We paused to take pictures and continued on to find a most unusual sight.
The ruins of two stone-and-concrete buildings stood near several huge and rusting water tanks laid on their sides. My best research thus far suggests that this installation was a water purification system built in the 1930s by the Borough of Butler and that those tanks once held chlorine. Just above this area, there’s a curved concrete dam from the same era with a small holding pond to regulate the flow of water in the brook.
The path steepened dramatically at this point, eventually leveling out for another half a mile until we saw High Crest Lake and the parking lot in the distance. We’d hiked for nearly four hours and took a longer route than we’d intended, but no worries: We would have missed the view over the highway as well as the waterfall and water-related structures if we’d taken the shorter trail.
For more information of a printable map of the Apshawa Preserve, go to njconservation.org. Maybe I’ll see you up there; we’ve vowed to go back in a few weeks when the wildflowers start to bloom.
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