I hear there is alot of that on either side of 72? Is that true. Haven't had opportunity to check it out.
Yeah. Rt. 72 cuts right through The Plains (the dwarf forest). But I was there last year and it's not quite as awesome as it once was as the trees are taller now. It's still awesome, but it's no longer as if you were Paul Bunyan towering over an entire forest. I think that's due to fire control. Maybe there are still parts of it that have shorter trees than others. I picked out particularly short woods to take my photos back then in the '70's. Here's how to get to where I took my avatar photo: Go west on rt. 72. Pass rt. 539. Then turn left on the wide dirt road, Sooy Rd., I think, the road to Jenkins, and go south on it. It goes through the heart of the Plains. I first learned about that road from the 1969 article in the NY Times travel section (available on here) which was my introduction to this wonderful place. There used to be a gas station or car repair shop or something to mark it on 72, but it is before you go west enough to hit rt 532 which goes south to Chatsworth (which has changed a lot from the days when I used to go down there, not long after McPhee's great book was written.)
I've got old, c. early 1970's, photos scattered around, including the Plains, like at the very beginning and the very end of this thread:
http://forums.njpinebarrens.com/threads/some-more-old-pb-photos-scanned-from-color-slides.7407/
Here's some more - including one of my good old VW Beetle (made it to 300K miles, and most of them NYC miles, before rust did 'er in) on Sooy Road.
http://forums.njpinebarrens.com/threads/i-found-a-few-more-pine-barrens-photos-c-1970-or-so.9133/
Here's my review of John McPhee's book on Amazon:
A wonderful book
By A Customer on November 9, 1999
Format: Hardcover
I live out west now. I just returned to the east for a visit. I drove down to the NJ Pine Barrens and I camped out one night in the Plains (the dwarf forest), no doubt in violation of millions of New Jersey rules and regulations. The benign peacefulness of the place, the smell of the pines, the sound of the wind, all swept over me. I used to live in Manhattan. I'd often make the 2 1/2 or 3 hour drive to hike and canoe and camp in the Barrens. I love that magical forest, the dark bogs, the open plains, the pure rivers, the endless sandy roads. John McPhee's book truly captures the atmosphere of this very special place in the world.
PS A year or two after I wrote that I got trapped in a very remote part of the Barrens when my rented car bogged down in the sand. Another Excellent Adventure. In retrospect.
Cool.
