Friday After the Storm - Main Problem.

Friday I was woken from a sound sleep at 6:00a.m. by a banging at my front door. It was my neighbor. He explained that the water main two houses down had broken and was gushing water; debris into the road. I ran upstairs and filled a bucket of water for flushing the commode with the last that the bathtub faucet had to offer. Lizzy woke up with the sunlight.  I explained to her that our situation had gone from bad to worse.  We pulled a Parmilat milk out of the cupboard and had bowls of cereal. Lizzy wanted to play more trump, so we did. Around noon, we decided to go on a photo safari at the Swimming River Preserve. I was glad Lizzy was going to get a chance to use the new lens I bought her, before we went on vacation. We decided to start at the Northeast trails. There is a high and a low trail, the low trail follows the river.

Lizzy and I headed for the high trail. The woods had been severely thinned out by the storm. The great pine trees that had met us at the top had lost their battle with the wind. We made our way to the edge of the high trails and could not believe the amount of trees that were no longer blocking our view of the river.

With no leaves and none of the trees we were used to, we decided it was a waste to try and find the old trails, so Lizzy and I decided to make our own. I pushed Lizzy to her limits when I asked her to take a short cut down the hill that overlooked what had been the lower trails. After making it to the bottom, we found the old trail that would have taken us down easily. At one point recently, the trail we were walking had been under water. We followed the river to where the old path crossed a stream. We found the old crossing bridge pulled from it's pilings and lying sideways.


Lizzy's 'Surviving The Storm'



Realizing that the stream was too wide to cross, we decided to head back to the high trails. When we got there, we found what appeared to be a marked trail. We followed it to the back of a school a half mile from where we were parked. We met a man on the trail there walking a dog. He explained that all of the water crossings had washed away in the storm. We continued down the trail to where it ended behind a house.

I asked Lizzy if she was ready to head back. To my surprise, she wasn't. She wanted to take the winding river trail to the lower lands. Walking down the trail, we took several detours to take in the views. Reaching what appeared to be the end of the trail, we were slightly disoriented. The plateau we were standing on was way to close to the water. The trails we used to take were gone. The storm had cut a new path for the river. We decided to head back to the car. We had a long way to go and the stream would still need to be crossed.




Lizzy's 'Hanging On'



We got lucky and found a thin part of the stream with two rocks barely sticking their heads out of the water. It led to a lot of mud and leaves, but short of taking the high trail back, this was as good as it was going to get. Lizzy hesitated jumping to the first rock, but confidently navigated the second to the slippery ground beyond it. We followed what could have been the old trail, but the swollen river kept it a secret from us.

We got back to the Escape and with no lights and no water at the co-op decided to go to Tinton Falls. On the way, we saw that the deli was open and grabbed a bite for lunch. We ate at the parking area for the falls. Exiting the car, the condition of the falls could be seen on Lizzy's face. The hurricane and the tides left none of the trails we had known. I decided to take her to the haunted bridge. There was not a lot of walking to do, so we crossed the street to the Crawford house and the Slave Burial Grounds.

The trails there go from pristine to nearly impassable, after the storm, they were somewhere in between. Lizzy and I found some neat berries and trees to take shots of. While walking back to the car a large deer ran across the path in front of us.

Arriving home, my road was closed and the water main was being repaired. The ex drove Emily to the co-op; Lizzy, Emily and I played trump with our light rations and read Poe before bed.