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Imagine yourself wandering aimlessly along the sandy trails that frame the Mullica's descent past Atsion and Batsto to the sea. Beguiled by the soft soughing of the breeze in the pines, and lulled into a false sense of security by the gentle, surging flow of the oily brown waters at your feet...

From the NYT this morning: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/10/business/10novel.html?hpw

Calico has held a fascination for me ever since I first learned of it a couple of years ago. Perhaps it was the hints at its whereabouts on old maps, or the fact that Beck gave an absurd location for it, which I am told he sometimes did with things that were worth finding. Maybe it was just that...

This fellow contacted me through my blog and passed along the following pictures of a structure he saw out near White's Bogs. It looks like a sawmill ruin to me, although maybe a little newer than some. I told him I would post the pics here and see if anyone could identify the site.

I originally planned to call this post "Brindletown to Callico," but in the end that would not be a true description. I set out yesterday morning to visit several spots, the first of which would have been the spot on the lake not far from Hockamick where Beck described a crumbled dance pavillion...

Well, it was an unusually fine day to be out and about in the Barrens. I wish all I had to talk about was what a great time we had with the dogs, hiking the causeways around Friendship bogs and enjoying the unseasonable weather. Instead I find myself seething over another act of wanton...

You don't miss it 'til you don't have it. As you guys may have heard we got slammed Tuesday by a freak October storm that dumped up to 11 inches of really wet snow on our area in about three hours. It was like a bomb went off. Every tree or limb that was even slightly weak came down. I've got a...

While we were with Stan inside the White Horse Inn at Chatsworth, talking about the Blue Comet and the Central RR as the festival whirled on outside, he mentioned that a couple of cars from the Comet were on a siding down near Winslow. Afterward my friend, who works for a mosquito control...

Some friends and I decided on the spur of the moment to visit the Chatsworth Cranberry Festival last Sunday. Eastbound down 532 we were stopped by a line of cars stretching westward out past the lake. After about 20 or 30 minutes we made it to the official parking field and paid our five...

A friend of mine and I gave another friend's son a tour of some sites on Saturday. Our last stop on a generally eastward progression was the pumping station north of Martha. I was last here perhaps 3 months ago. On this visit I noted that the spit of land adjoining the inlet behind the pump (now...

I just finished "Iron in the Pines", and among a number of interesting assertions the following one jumped out at me: Pierce mentions offhand during a discussion of the paper mill at Pleasant Mills that "a number" of paper mills in the country were importing "shiploads of Egyptian mummies" in...

I've been reading Arthur Pierce's "Iron in the Pines" and "Family Empire in Jersey Iron" over the last few days, and was wondering if anyone makes iron in the old way? Do they do that at Batsto, by way of demonstration? Actually the original idea was to build a small furnace, dig some ore...

Clear off that 12 or 14 miles of track from Atsion through Whiting and do this... http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/08/travel/escapes/08RAILCARS.html

Anyone else have Cicadas in their trees? We had a nice little emergence here over the last week. My girls have been getting all grossed out by the shed pupal (I think) shells hanging off all the trees.

The day started out with such promise. I went in on Bryant and over Woodmansie to catch Lauries Road south, for no other reason than that I came in from the north on 539 and wanted to get the hell off pavement. I decided to jog up to Old Halfway and take some pics with the new camera. It was the...

Pictures from opposite ends of New Jersey today :). While I was up photographing abandoned farms in the Water Gap region my friend Jack was out with his dog in the area of Lower Forge when he spotted this guy: At first he thought it was a rattler, since it "rattled" its tail against the...

Brought the girls down for our annual July 4th expedition to the pines. Last year we collected over a quart of blueberries in less than an hour along the roads north of Washington and south of Hawkin Bridge, but damned if we could find any today. We managed maybe a pint of the small wild...

Urgent advice needed! [Resolved] Hi guys. Quick backstory: driving home this evening I saw this little guy standing on the side of the road, way too close to traffic. I swung around and pulled over, and for the next 45 minutes he stood there while I remained to protect him from traffic, and...

On the subject of vandals, which came up in the Hampton Furnace stone stealing thread: some of you may have read Beck's "Tales and Towns of Northern New Jersey," in which he mentions a mile marker on the road from Allamuchy to Johnsonburg reading "2 to L.G." The initials refer to Log Gaol, a...

My plan of this morning, hastily concieved over a glass of scotch the previous evening, had been to take Batsto River road south from Quaker Bridge, and come down the West side of the Batsto River to Batsto, then cross over and take Paradise Drive from behind the cemetary all the way up to 206...