Little Patuxent River LbNA #19030

Note: The Little Patuxent River letterbox is back in its original hiding place. The tree work has been completed. I have altered the clues slightly to reflect the slightly different ground truth at the hiding place. Enjoy! 3.29.20 — wood thrush

One of the most distinctive things about the “planned community” of Columbia, Maryland, is its system of paved walking paths that connect homes to parkland, recreational facilities and shopping centers. The journey to this letterbox takes you on a pleasant roundtrip excursion of less than a mile in the Columbia village of Kings Contrivance. You may choose to walk or bike. One characteristic of the pathway system is that the paths have many entrances, which are placed unobtrusively on ordinary streets or between the boundaries of two homes. You’ll begin your journey at a typical one of these entrances, in the Huntington area just south of Rt. 32.

Driving directions. From either the Baltimore or Washington, D.C., area, take I-95 to the exit for Route 32 west. Take the first exit for Broken Land Parkway. Stay to the left. At the end of the exit ramp, make a left turn onto Broken Land Parkway, and follow it to its end at a traffic light. Make a left turn at this light onto Guilford Road. Stay to the right, and at the next light, make a right turn onto Murray Hill Road. Follow this road to a left turn at Vollmerhausen Road. You will see a wooden sign for “Huntington.” Travel Vollmerhausen for less than a mile, to a left turn at Moonrider Lane. Follow until it ends at a “T” intersection with Green Moon Path. Park on the street near this intersection.

To the letterbox. Take your bearings at the intersection. You’ll see a stop sign at the end of Moonrider, and a fire hydrant across the street on Green Moon. See the paved path to the right of the hydrant? Don’t take it! Instead, look directly across the street to the similar path you do want (on the same side as the stop sign).

You will be heading south to begin with, behind peoples’ homes. After a short distance you will see a tot lot on the right. Make a left turn at the tot lot intersection. Now you’ll be heading east. Follow this path down hill, ignoring intersections with other paths along the way. Enjoy the wooded back yards of Columbia, and take special note of the many dark grey, lichen-covered boulders on either side of the path. This path will end at a “T” intersection with the Patuxent Branch Trail along the Little Patuxent River. Note the very large dark grey boulder next to a tree at this point. Make a right turn onto this gravel trail.

Special note! The Patuxent Branch Trail is a “rails-to-trails” trail that follows the early-20th-century B&O branch track built specifically for the now-defunct Guilford granite quarry. The railroad hauled granite from the quarry along the riverside, joining up with a larger branch track near the Bollman Bridge in Savage, and then over to the main B&O tracks (still in use by CSX) just east of Rt. 1. Had you turned left instead of right onto this trail, in about half a mile you’d cross an old railroad bridge that fords the Little Patuxent very near the quarry site. There are several very informative signs about the quarry and the railroad at the bridge. Beyond the bridge, and just across Guilford Road, is the quarry itself. Like many quarries, it met its end when water was struck and the quarry filled. Today it is a picturesque “lake” that serves as landscaping to the office building next door. It is guarded by a wooden fence marked with “No Trespassing, No Swimming” signs. It is very much worth making the side trip—perhaps on your way back after finding the letterbox—to take a look at the quarry from behind the fence. But do heed the warnings—the water is very deep.

As you walk along the Patuxent Branch Trail, you’ll see the Little Patuxent River to your left. There are many easy social trails that lead down to the riverbank. Explore them if you’d like. You’ll also notice those same dark grey, lichen-covered rocks along the trail. But wait! After a short time, you’ll start to see blocks of light-colored, very angular granite on either side of the trail. These are blocks that fell off the flatbed rail cars during their journey from the quarry to the main railroad line.

Walk until you see a fluorescent red-tipped marker pole on the right. Soon after this you will see a paved path headed up the hill to the right. Stop here and take your bearings. If the main path is at noon, and the path going up the hill is at three o-clock, then at one-o’clock you will see a large downed tree, roots facing you, that has fallen up the hill. Next to it on the right going up the hill are a five-foot broken-off trunk, and beyond it, the stump of a larger tree that was cut in 2018. The tree itself lies right next to the stump, going up the hill. On the right side of this stump is a small rock cave, made of rocks of the dark grey, lichen-covered sort. The Little Patuxent River letterbox, covered in camouflage tape, is hidden in this small cave.

You could take one of the social trails to the river to stamp in, if you’d like. There is no ink pad included, but we recommend bringing both black and light-blue ink or markers with you. Carefully replace the box under the rocks when you are through. Then simply retrace your steps back to the tree and large rock to get back to the paved trail you came in on, or walk past them if you would like to see the quarry.


We would also like to recommend the Wimpy Girls’ Columbia Petroglyphs series, part of which covers some of the same ground as we do here. You will be in for a nice surprise!

We hope you enjoy the Little Patuxent River letterbox and your walk along one of the pleasant pathways that crisscross Columbia.