It’s really nice to travel with other people who have no real expectations and are fine with my less than thourough planning methods. On this particular day I had decided to drive a couple hours into Connecticut to check out the ruins in the Spiderweed Preserve – something I had only known about for less than 24 hours and with painfully little information. All I really knew about it was there was some pretty ruins (of which I found two photos) and the trail was “A loop trail that starts with an upward hike.” Oh boy, before even getting there I knew my unfit self might be biting off more than I could chew but I was determined and so were my crew today.
It started out a bit sketchy as the GPS brought me to a construction company’s parking lot in the middle of nowhere and we were unsure if there was a path nearby. We decided, perhaps foolheartedly, to drag my poor Prius up that primitive gravel road and take a look further on. There was a bullitin board and gate not far up the road from the construction company and enough space for maybe three or four cars to park. The only problem was this parking area seems to have been washed out by the rains and there was no way at all i could park the prius there and be able to drag it’s weak ass back out of there. There was also no shoulders on the road and signs further up saying no loitering or parking. Not helpful. I drove to the end of the street which ended with a terrifying hill that was so steep going down it I could not see the road as I traversed it. There I was leaning over the steering wheel trying in vain to see something, anything, and hoping everything would be alright.
The end of the road looked like private property so we turned around and I did my best to park in front of the preserve’s gate as far off the road as I could get. It wasn’t great though and visibility was just as bad as it was on a corner. I just hoped no one ran into me or towed me while we were hiking and we all hopped out to see what was up.
The trail is indeed an upward hike from the start and we were all having a little difficulty. I was lagging behind the worse, huffing and puffing, and cursing myself out for being this out of shape. It continued on like this for a while until we hit the ruins which are maybe a third of the way up it, if that. And they were beautiful! Here was the remains of an old stone home slowly being reclaimed by the forest. We puttered around it in a bit of awe. It was very quiet and peaceful up here. I had fun taking photos and before we left we decided to go a little farther up the trail to see the first overlook and that was just as beautiful!
There was a lot more trail but the precarious position of the car and our own desire to go see other things in the area spurned us to turn around here. And by the sounds there wasn’t much up there but more hills and mediocre outlooks anyway. We were nearby another favorite haunt Gilette Castle, as well as Dinosaur State Park which I have wanted to revisit for some time now, but we ended up opting in favor of seeing a different set of even more impressive ruins twenty minutes away at Quarry State Park in Rocky Hill Connecticut.
