Hampton Furnace Environs

bobpbx

Piney
Staff member
Oct 25, 2002
14,153
4,257
Pines; Bamber area
I was in this area today. It made me sick seeing all these closed roads. They do it because they think the woods will be destroyed. Plastic signs barring access at all the orange symbols, and I left out several. Who the hell is going to drive a vehicle into Skit Branch, the Batsto, or Deep Run?

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Jon Holcombe

Explorer
Dec 1, 2015
967
1,934
Medford
I was in this area today. It made me sick seeing all these closed roads. They do it because they think the woods will be destroyed. Plastic signs barring access at all the orange symbols, and I left out several. Who the hell is going to drive a vehicle into Skit Branch, the Batsto, or Deep Run?

View attachment 19623
A few years ago, it was getting dark, and i was parked on Hampton Road by Deep Run and a guy drove up asking me if I could pull his buddy out. I carry tow ropes and a recovery hitch so I followed him a to road that leads to one of the old bridges on the Batsto. There was a sizable group of young and old, and they were clearly joyriding and partying. One of them had driven into a collapsed area on an old "dike" by the river and was hopelessy stuck.

I would never have driven into that area, plastic signs or not, but they did. I pulled him out, but it always bothered me that they had no common sense, and in my opinion, no business driving where they were driving.

That is the problem. People have no respect for the forest, and don't care if they further degrade an access road to the Batsto. The roads are fragile and once they collapse, it will be that much harder to hike to the river.
 

bobpbx

Piney
Staff member
Oct 25, 2002
14,153
4,257
Pines; Bamber area
No matter Jon, you simply can't punish the rest of us for what bad actors do. If a highway sees an increase in drunk drivers, should the authorities close the road? These roads have been our solace and recreation for many years, nothing excuses closing them. Fix the other problem; those that abuse them. I have used all those roads in that area for years surveying plants. The little plastic signs are an obnoxious affront to a freedom now removed.
 

Jon Holcombe

Explorer
Dec 1, 2015
967
1,934
Medford
No matter Jon, you simply can't punish the rest of us for what bad actors do. If a highway sees an increase in drunk drivers, should the authorities close the road? These roads have been our solace and recreation for many years, nothing excuses closing them. Fix the other problem; those that abuse them. I have used all those roads in that area for years surveying plants. The little plastic signs are an obnoxious affront to a freedom now removed.
A highway is intended for high volume traffic Bob. If cars were driving off the Garden State Parkway into the forest the drivers would be ticketed. If people are drunk they get ticketed. I am 69 years old and hike into the Batsto all the time. With a pretty heavy backpack and often hip boots or chest waders.

If I were disabled I would obviously not be able to walk along, and into, the Batsto River anyway. Maybe we should provide wheelchair access to the river, and asphalt the roads all the way to the river, and post historic markers. I not trying to be absurd or disrespectful. That happened at an athletic field where I've been running over 24 years, the state asphalted a near mile long cinder stone track because the township was sued for wheelchair access. In the 15 years since it was asphalted I've seen one wheelchair, but now I have to run on asphalt instead of dirt and stone.

The highway is easy to patrol, because that is where the cars and cops are. The forest is very difficult to patrol (but it still should be). The highway is easy to maintain because it is asphalt. The forest is obviously nearly impossible to maintain, but nobody has suggested we will not be able to drive on most of the roads. The rationalization that "people have been driving anywhere they want in the forest for two hundred years" makes no sense because the first hundred years they were using horses or wagons. And there just weren't that many people to drive into Wharton.

Now there are caravans and "jamborees" mudding and spinning tires and tearing up not just the roads but going into wetlands and off the roads.

America is the land of the free, which means people are free to be total idiots and assholes and throw common sense to the wind instead of respecting the environment.

I am assuming that if you were hiking into the Batsto, a few minutes extra did not deter you from going there. I admit that it would a lot more convenient to drive partway into deep run, or drive up the road to the Skit instead of hiking in from the marker, but people have torn up areas back there so I hike in the dark if I want to go there badly enough.
 
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Jon Holcombe

Explorer
Dec 1, 2015
967
1,934
Medford
Some of us cannot hike so far anymore and therefor have a need to get closer.
I would like the road to the biggest Friendship Bog to still be open but the road is now gated. So if I want to get to the "trailhead" of the bog I have to hike a mile or more in the dark, then cross a collapsed dike that requires hip boots just to get into the bog itself. Then I have to bushwack through briars and thick brush if I want to get to the southeastern edge of the bog.

It would be nice if the state opened the road, and rebuilt the dike to a long abandoned bog so I could have easy access to take pretty pictures at sunrise. But there is absolutely no way that is going to happen until Bill Gates or Warren Buffet gifts a billion dollars to Wharton Forest. And there was a ranger station at every bog, and 200 man full time maintenance crew working on roads and bogs and dikes and 25 Park Police with fully equipped vehicles patrolling the sand roads keeping the morons at bay.

I wish that road was still open and I have only hiked there a couple of times since it was closed. I just have to accept the fact that the road is gated.
 
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bobpbx

Piney
Staff member
Oct 25, 2002
14,153
4,257
Pines; Bamber area
Jon, you have gone over to the dark side, likely because you don't have the history of traveling the pines in your blood like most of us on this forum do. You gave in too easily, and I see you are set in your ways now. So be it.

Nobody should be revealing sites of endangered plants. I'm absolutely certain there are no signs telling the public what's on that road. If you somehow found it on your own, fine, but if you were told that by a Conservation Organization, that is not good.
 

Jon Holcombe

Explorer
Dec 1, 2015
967
1,934
Medford
Jon, you have gone over to the dark side, likely because you don't have the history of traveling the pines in your blood like most of us on this forum do. You gave in too easily, and I see you are set in your ways now. So be it.

Nobody should be revealing sites of endangered plants. I'm absolutely certain there are no signs telling the public what's on that road. If you somehow found it on your own, fine, but if you were told that by a Conservation Organization, that is not good.
I will edit post #7 in case you think I have revealed a location that someone might find, although I tried to keep it vague.

I've been reading this forum, and exploring the pines for 9 years. Maybe you've been doing it longer and you believe that makes your opinion valid and mine isn't, fair enough.

I like to make up my own mind, based on personal experience and information. I've spoken to hunters, people that work for the Pinelands Commission, Nj Conservation Foundation, the PPA, volunteer at Whitesbog, etc. A lot of those people have been exploring the pines for decades and have the pines in their blood too.

I am not on the "dark side". I have a different opinion than you. You said seeing the plastic markers made you sick and I explained why I think it's alright.
 
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bobpbx

Piney
Staff member
Oct 25, 2002
14,153
4,257
Pines; Bamber area
I am not on the "dark side". I have a different opinion than you. You said seeing the plastic markers made you sick and I explained why I think it's alright.
Well it ain't alright. Many of those roads they closed had no obvious damage to them. No reason to go crazy like they did. Seems like a revenge action to me, fostered by PPA and NJCF. That one volunteer at Whitesbog you spoke with must have carried a lot of weight with you.
 

enormiss

Explorer
Aug 18, 2015
574
365
Atco NJ
I am not on the "dark side". I have a different opinion than you.

Your not on the dark side, I don't even think you have a different opinion...

I would like the road to the biggest Friendship Bog to still be open but the road is now gated.

I just have to accept the fact that the road is gated.

You / We don't have to accept it. Gates and plastic signs don't keep the morons out, only us
 

Tony

Scout
Jul 30, 2015
68
43
72
Folsom
I will edit post #7 in case you think I have revealed a location that someone might find, although I tried to keep it vague.

I've been reading this forum, and exploring the pines for 9 years. Maybe you've been doing it longer and you believe that makes your opinion valid and mine isn't, fair enough.

I like to make up my own mind, based on personal experience and information. I've spoken to hunters, people that work for the Pinelands Commission, Nj Conservation Foundation, the PPA, volunteer at Whitesbog, etc. A lot of those people have been exploring the pines for decades and have the pines in their blood too.

I am not on the "dark side". I have a different opinion than you. You said seeing the plastic markers made you sick and I explained why I think it's alright.
I been riding in the pines for over 54 years nothing has changed the plants and animals are still there.
 
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