The Tribe Has Spoken!

What? What "Tribe"? The tribe of teenagers in Haverhill.

I feel that there is no group of people more oriented to being outdoors that the average gang of Highschoolers. Wherever they are located they will tend to find an out of the way location in the woods or in the fields, where they can "party". In this case, they have found the Crystal Spring Conservation Area here in Haverhill. I came across this lean-to and this mess when I was out exploring and hiking the other day. It was quite a little camp site that I found out here. What is funny is that this is clearly visible from the homes on the other side of the lake, especially at night when the fire is lit. This a big space that is occupied by a lot of kids. It is pretty far into the woods though, about a half mile, maybe a little less. It's only half the story though. I came across a half dozen more little camp-fire sites in this tinny little preserve that is supposed to be all conservation land (this is the city's drinking water supply!). These woods must be FULL of teenagers on a Friday or Saturday night!








This thing was disturbing though. This was construction. It was right on the main trail and right off the roadway. You can see the rode from here and this is huge. What you can not make out so well in the pictures is the face that this thing appears to be occupied! There are two bags of cloths in there and some other junk. There is some one living in this thing, on conservation land, near where Children Play (ok, ok, teenagers drink and fuck, but close enough for this discussion) and it is within 100 feet and in FULL VIEW of the road. Sorry. This is disturbing.

Well, what can be done about it. I suppose that I could "tell the Police". Sadly, I do not have the greatest respect for the greatest proportion of the cops in this town. To be fair, there are sections of this town that keep them busy. Very busy. I think that that has degraded their "detecting" skills and their "rational thought" skills a little. Bad guys are easy to find, identify and round up. Evan having said that, I don not think that there is ANY shadow of a doubt that the local constabulary knows this place exists. Heck, I am sure that this place was where they hung out when they were kids! But they aren't any more. Regular citizens should be allowed to come here and enjoy this land without having to view the eyesore of the camp or be in fear of whoever created that Hobo House. This is the water that we drink for crying out loud and while I have not met too many 16 year olds who's primary concern is Water Quality, it should be important to a grown, police man who's wife and children drink this water. Honestly, other than that I don't know what to do. Reporting it to the Trails Commission or whoever will get the structures removed (probably) and the area cleaned up so that the kids have a nice clean party site to return to! This should be a beautiful, secluded spot to walk the dog, hike or bring my children to enjoy. Sadly, it is a blight and an eye-sore and potentially, a dangerous place to be. Yea. I love Haverhill!

Essex County Greenway?

No way! My own little through-hike, right in my back yard! I have been going into the Georgetown-Rowley state Forest for years, mostly on Dirtbikes. It was only yesterday, however, that I realized that the GRSF abuts The Hood Pond section of the Willodale State Forest which leads into the Pine Swamp Area and then into the Bradley Palmer State Park! I'm not sure where it leads from there! (I can't get the state's mapping program to work smoothly on the computer).

AT!!!!!

Ok, sort of. About 2.6 miles of it. And it almost killed me! We went up to Crawford Notch. The idea was to hike Ethan Pond Trail and stay at the shelter there. We got a very late start. Due to that, and my VERY poor conditioning, we were forced to turn back and camp at a state camp site for the night. It was actually quite pleasant. The next day we hit the trail again. Wow. I guess I was more rested up or something since I was physically able to get up the initial ascent but that was only half of it! The last .8 miles of it was all snowed in. Fortuneately, most of the snow had melted. Un-fortuneately, the only part of the trail was a 4 inch wide ridge of packed snow running along the middle of the trail. Fall off, or through, the ridge and you sunk knee deep in the snow and landed in an ankle deep puddle of cold, muddy, icy water. Yech. It took us over three hours to get to the camp site. Thank God that we didn't attempt that last night. We never would have made it! It took us two hours to get back and that was all down hill!! 5 and a half hours to go 5.2 miles. Slow going I guess!