#46 2022 52-Hike Challenge: Susquehanna State Park Circuit Hike / 7 miles
I'm heading towards completion of the 2022 52-Trail Challenge with only a few more hikes to go before the end of the calendar year, but today we hike to celebrate the end of the solar year! Happy Solstice! Only a few miles south across the Mason Dixon Line in Maryland is Susquehanna State Park which is home to a few old friends. I used to work as a park ranger in SSP when I served with the Maryland Park Service, so this seemed a good choice for the shortest day and a bit of a reunion.
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| Mason Dixon Trail at the fork to Deer Creek Trail |
I watched the sun rise over the river hills across the Susquehanna River and sat with Amos in the truck for a nice breakfast of egg sandwiches. My old friend, Dean, met me soon after for a huge hug and a little run with Amos. We waved him off to finish his trail run and began our road hike from Rock Run Mill along the river to the confluence with Deer Creek, then up up up a talus slope on the Mason Dixon Trail. I told Amos to keep an eye open for Dean on his loop run of the same trail we were now on. Dean has been trail running since he turned 65 - he is now 75 - and runs almost every morning in the park.
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| Confluence of Deer Creek with Susquehanna River at the trestle |
The trail was frozen solid so we sped along without slipping or sliding. Yay! But there are so many deer in the park that it seemed every five minutes Amos caught scent and tried to back track on leash to locate a crossing, then tangled me in the leash and sent me tripping. Luckily, I never hit the ground but I did learn a few new dance steps.
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| Looking down at Deer Creek and road from Deer Creek Trail |
We rounded the ridge on the Deer Creek trail to meet up with old friend #2, a very old and spready American Beech tree, a Maryland Champion. This poor old tree has suffered so much carving over the years that it now appears sickly and in decline thanks to numerous open wounds and fungal infections. Beech bark is thin and a favorite target for people to carve names and dates which is considered in Maryland parks, vandalism. This tree, however, is so deep in the woods that no one ever really gets caught, although I do remember Dean lying in wait one night for a group of rowdy campers who were making their way by headlamp out here. Busted! Now looking this old soul, I was a little (a lot) sickened by the heights to which people climb into the canopy on any limb that will support them - just to leave their ugly mark in carving.
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| Maryland Champion American Beech, vandalized by carving and in decline |
We left the old Beech and continued on towards old friend #3, a champion White Oak, a mile further on. Dean came jogging up and stopped to share a story about the time he was making his daily run and found a guy stuck in the old Beech tree, unable to get down. I would've paid money to see that, I said. "He paid a fine!" said Dean, who (at age 69 then and long retired from the park) ran double time to the park office to get a ranger. We talked a little about how the park service has changed after we both left - some for the better, some not so much - and where some of our old friends from those days went. Then he told a dad joke, we hugged, and said our goodbyes until the next hike/trail run when we meet up again. "Happy Solstice!" he called. Amos gave him his best ARROOO and off we went.
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| Maryland Champion White Oak |
The enormous White Oak is much more accessible from the campground and it seems better cared for than the isolated Beech tree. Benches offer seating so one can take in the full spread of its enormous canopy and in summer, its cooling shade. We did a quick round the trunk measure and estimated it to be 300 years old, a real sentinel in what would have been open pasture where it received ample sun and grew in rich soils, spreading out in every direction. No doubt both trees held flocks of Passenger Pigeons that fed on beech nuts and acorns, quiet witnesses to the passing of a once abundant species, now extinct.
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| Scary Wrapped Hay Bales |
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| Farm Road Trail |
The trail opened out on to the hayfields, leased by local farmers to grow high quality forage. We were really moving along! Until we weren't. Amos stopped dead in his tracks when he spotted a group of round bales lying in the field. I have no idea what he thought they were, but he refused to walk past them. He growled a little. When I tried to coax him on, assuring him everything was okay, he dug in and refused to move. We had to turn around and hike to the woods edge to cross the field! Poor Amos. He kept an eye on those hay bales from a distance as we walked along frozen wetlands just inside the woods, cracking and creaking on ice as we went.
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| Frozen wetland |
Once past the scary hay bales and the main park shop and office complex - he didn't like that either (bad vibes?) - we were safely back in the woods on the Ivy Branch Trail. For a few more miles we hiked across rolling hills, crossed creeks, and enjoyed the path. I did a little dance with the leash as Amos snapped a back-track for a deer crossing while I spotted a large buck in an open pasture staring right up at us. We passed a hiker, the only other person besides Dean on the trail today, who wished us Happy Solstice. He warned me that the trail was defrosting up ahead. "A little slippery!" as he showed me his muddy knees and rump.
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| Stream crossing on Ivy Branch Trail |
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| Ivy Branch Trail |
The hiker's warning was heeded and I walked just off trail in the leaves to avoid steep slippery patches all the way to the road crossing that would lead us back to the truck. As we kept to the side of the narrow road we stopped to admire the mill dam that fed the mill race to Rock Run Mill. I spotted a mylar balloon caught in some stickers on the crest of the race. As I was coming down the embankment with my silver and purple ribbons and busted Ravens football balloon, I was stopped by a park employee driving by in a park truck. "PLEASE STAY ON THE TRAIL!" she shouted pointing to a sign that asks hikers to walk the road. I was standing ten feet away. "No need to shout," I said, "Just picking up litter." She seemed a little embarrassed and instead of saying anything, gunned the truck up the hill.
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| Rock Run Mill Dam on Rock Run |
So that is how my Solstice Day Hike almost ended, me being a little angry. I didn't like how that encounter made me feel and I wasn't about to let it ruin my day. As we walked the quarter mile down the road towards the mill, I continued to pick up bottles, wrappers, plastic bags, and other plastic trash along this well used park road. Another mylar balloon (Happy 16th Birthday!) and a full shopping bag of trash later, I packed out the garbage others tossed and felt pretty good about keeping at least a little bit of plastic out the creek, the river, and the Bay.
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| Frozen overshot wheel, Rock Run Mill |
Notes:
There are actually several other current and former Maryland Champion Trees in the park including a Black Walnut, American Sycamore, Tulip Poplar, and White Pine. Our trek today took us past just two of them. https://www.mdbigtrees.org/
Susquehanna State Park in Harford County, Maryland, is sometimes confused with Susquehannock State Park in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Full disclosure, I worked here and at Rocks State Park nearby from 1990 - 1994 as a commissioned law enforcement ranger which Maryland Parks no longer employ, with all enforcement duties now given over to the Maryland Natural Resources Police and local enforcement agencies. https://dnr.maryland.gov/publiclands/pages/central/susquehanna.aspx
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