Listening to - Mitch Hedberg - PhilI fell asleep quite early last night and upon waking up felt revitalized and ready to go out and enjoy a beautiful fall day.
Hubbard County Park is located in Flanders which is technically the beginning of the South Fork of Long Islands Twin Forks. Almost all of the land before the Shinecock Canal has been turned into County Park land and an extension of the Long Island Pine Barrens.
After a nice 1/2hr drive out east with Buddy I arrived at the start of a wood road that marked one of the entrances to Hubbard County Park.
Walking down the road a bit you are surrounded by tall trees and the sound of many birds. I was looking for deer but I have a feeling buddy was being way to loud for any of them to stay still. Initially you are following the Paumanok Path which begins in Rocky Point and ends at Montauk Point, a nice 46.77 mile jaunt. About 1/4mile in on the wood road you can follow the Paumanok Path east and go over a nice bridge with a slightly obstructed view of the Hubbard Creek.
Backtracking back to the trail I discovered another area with a slightly better view of the creek.
About another 1/2 mile up the wood road you come to a clearing and the Black Duck Lodge. The Black Duck Lodge was originally built in the early 1800's by the Hubbard family and purchased by E.F Hutton in 1937. E.F Hutton was the founder of the E.F Hutton & Co brokerage firm. I believe today it is owned by the County and used as a launching point for studies on waterfowl behavior.
As you enter the grounds of the Black Duck lodge you can find a few interesting abandoned structures, such as this:
After passing the grounds of the Black Duck Lodge, the trail takes a slight downhill and the surrounding land turns to salt marsh. After about 3/4mi from the lodge you will hit Flanders Bay which offers great views across to South Jamesport (Not too far from Mattituck, where you more than likely send your engines to get rebuilt ;-) )
Before I hit the bay though I saw some swans and managed to get a picture before buddy scared them away.
Finally, I reached the bay and was rewarded with a beautiful light breeze and sunny skies.
There are many shells on the beach but most notably were the amount of horseshoe crab shells I found. Here are two of the larger ones that I saw.
On the eastern end of the beach the waters have raised and flooded some sea grass.
Heading westward you eventually come to Mill Creek which offers some nice views across the water.
This photo didn't come out how I wanted it to, but I think it's still sort of cool.
Buddy was getting jealous that I wasn't taking any pictures of him, so here's one of the pup sitting down in the tidal area. Lucky for me I wore my new waterproof hunting boots since Buddy decided today was the day he wanted to have fun in the water!
While I was on the western end of the beach I had heard and saw two aircraft in formation. A few minutes later they were flying over the beach at 1,000'! For some reason though I COULD NOT find them in my lens and missed an AWESOME shot of what looked like two old Stearman.
Overall it was a beautiful day to go out with the pup and enjoy a nice ~ 2.5mi walk.
3 comments:
Buddy sure looks happy!
Thanks for this great story about Hubbard. I have posted it at our web page: www.qualityparks.org with a link back to you so others can enjoy the story and photos. I must get back there and see the changing colors in a few weeks myself! - Mindy
I've created a blog spot for me at Quality Parks, and hope you can create a free account there and post this as a park blog. So for now I will take off of our web pages and hope you can post over there. Thanks, Mindy
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