The Grills
Posted By auntie on November 19, 2012
4.6 miles ★★★★
wow, first time back here in ages. the storm did huge damage here, including taking out a bridge. almost. it was still sorta there, albeit kind of twisted, so i crossed it anyway. ran into a couple of hunters, too. i still really like this property, and it looks like work has started on the former polly coon bridge over the pawcatuck river that will link this property to the hopkinton grills.
now that’s what i call high water!
this was in the middle of the trail, not at all close to the river. the grills has over a mile of frontage on the pawcatuck, and that must have been some ferocious flooding to put this canoe where it did. the damage was everywhere.
yeah. i crossed it.
as you can see from this photo, a tree basically took out a bridge on the trail. it was right at the beginning, and i was loathe to turn around, so i gathered up my courage and crossed anyway. believe it or not, it was quite steady. the tree added stability. i admit it wasn’t the smartest thing to do, but it really was quite solid. the bridge was well-made, and didn’t come apart at all. i’ll bet they will be able to remove the tree and set the bridge back and it’ll be fine.
scenes like this are why i come here. it is so beautiful along the river. i have linked the shot, above, to a larger version, as the tiny size of these panoramas as they fit into the blog format really doesn’t do them justice. click to embiggen.
signs of progress at the polly coon bridge site
i always check hopefully to see if any progress is evident at the site of the former polly coon bridge. when it is finally done, it will link the westerly grills property with the hopkinton grills property across the river, and essentially double the size of the preserve. i’ve never walked on the hopkinton side, mainly because there’s no parking area or formal paths yet. the westerly land trust and the hopkinton land trust are both working to get this done, and it looks like something’s actually happening. yay! of course now they’re going to have to spend some of their resources to fix that other little bridge and get the paths cleaned up.
you can find out more information about the grills at the westerly land trust website, and the grills trail map is available here.
Nice pictures. I saw that canoe today and there has to be a story there. It is too far above the river even
at high flood waters and it is too far from the river to have been left and too far from parking lot to
gain entry to water? A mystery to me.
BTW, There is access to the Hopkinton Grill Sanctuary at the intersection of Chase Hill rd and Rte 216. there are maps of it at the kiosk, but I haven’t made it to the Hopkinton side of the Polly Coon Bridge yet. The trails aren’t marked.
cool! i didn’t think there were any maps. i will have to check it out soon. thanks!
Nice photos! I’m wondering if you mind if I use your picture of the old Polly Coon Bridge in the Wood-Pawcatuck Watershed Association’s next newsletter. Someone wrote a short article on the new bridge for us, but I have no pictures of the site to use. Thank you! Please contact me at heather at wpwa.org