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Rowland Park LbNA #36833

Owner:Rick_in_Boca
Plant date:Nov 3, 2007
Location:
City:Monmouth Junction
County:Middlesex
State:New Jersey
Boxes:1
Found by: The Humming Harkies
Last found:Sep 24, 2011
Status:FFFFaU
Last edited:Nov 18, 2015
This is a nice woods walk on a cool, crisp, fall day.

Description:


Difficulty rating: 2 - Straightforward clues allow this box to be easily found. May require some alertness to find the letterbox.

Terrain rating: 3 - Bushwacking required. All terrain is off-trail, relatively flat, and less than a 1/2 mile round-trip hike is required. Wet, swampy terrain in spring. Some thorny vines (wear long pants this time, Joe). Not suitable for small children.

Directions:


Just 5 minutes from NJ Turnpike Exit 8A.
About 1 hour from New York City and Philadelphia.


From Route 1:
Follow to the New Rd in Monmouth Junction. New Rd is approximately 10 miles South of where Rt 1 and Rt 18 meet. Take the jug handle and go across Rt 1 to the East. The jug handle is just after the Monmouth Mobil, Red Roof Inn, and just before an Exxon station. Follow New Rd going SouthEast. Go through 522. At Ridge Rd take a Right and then a Left to continue on E New Rd. Go over bridge and past Sondek Park on right to the end. Make a right at the T onto Friendship Rd. When Friendship Rd comes to a T, make a Left onto Broadway Rd. Continue on Broadway Rd (approx ¼ mile) past Rowland Rd to Park entrance on the Right.

From Route #130 - points South -- Bordentown area:
North on Rt. 130 to about 1 mile past Cranbury and just past Dey Rd. Left at traffic light onto Broadway Rd. Go West on Broadway Rd 2.4 miles to Park entrance on the Left.

From Route #130 ­ points North -­ New Brunswick area:
South on Rt. 130 several miles past Dayton area. Right at traffic right onto Broadway Rd. Go west for 2.4 mi to Park entrance on the Left.

From NJ Turnpike:
Take exit 8A and follow signs for Rt 130 South. Head West on Rt. 32 for 1 mi. Get in Left lane to turn onto Rt. 130 South. Left at traffic light onto Rt. 130 South. At the second light on Rt 130, turn Right onto Broadway Rd. If you pass Dey Rd you have gone too far. Continue on Broadway Rd 2.4 miles to Park entrance on the Left.

Clues:


Enter park and drive past the soccer fields, back into the ball fields parking lot, and drive by the baseball fields. Field 5, field 4, field 3, playground, flag poles. Your goal is to go to the forested side of Diamond 3, to the South. Park on the West end of the lot and walk around. You don't want to try going through the fences and risk falling into the detention basin, and there is no path going around on the East side.

Walk around Diamonds 4 and 5 to the West and walk along the woods behind the diamonds until the US Flag is due North of your location, on the South side of Diamond 3. Standing behind two ball fields, midpoint between two concrete outlets, behind the wooden fence containing the detention basin, look South.

From the edge of the grassy area, look for a stake with a little orange flag on it. This is what may have been a path (you can tell because of the litter). To the Left not so very far back in the woods are the basement remains of an old structure, filled with water.. Careful not to let children fall in. I'd leave them home if I were you, as this is a nice peaceful, quiet walk. If there is no little league announcer in the background, that is.

Bushwack South through low brush 40 paces (80 steps) towards the brook, following the faint path to another stake with an orange flag, and a fallen tree on the Right. From the base of the fallen tree with the stake on your Left, walk Five paces to a tree with a large hole in its base at 260 degrees. Continue another Fourteen paces to a largish oak (? not quite sure - it is Fall) tree at 260 degrees. Pretty much West-SouthWest.

Twenty-four steps to the mound. Several mounds will be on your Left as you walk through this swampy area, with the canal on the other side of these mounds. When you get to the canal, our mound is on your Left with four trees on it. On top of the mound, just to the Left of the largish tree, about 1 foot away from the tree, under rocks and leaves is the wading bird. It is on the East-NorthEast side of the tree. You can sit up there as the mound is rocky and not too wet, and look at the brook as it streams along.


Background:


Part of the Broadway/Friendship Rd Conservation Area purchased by the Open Space and Recreation and Farmland and Historic Preservation Trust.

In 1733 this tract of land covering thousands of acres was owned by the Rowlands, an influential family of Welsh settlers. The property splintered over the years, being sold off parcel by parcel, until only about 80 acres remained. Eight generations of Rowlands have lived in South Brunswick.

An encampment of Continental Army soldiers stopped on the land for a night or two on June 25 & 26, 1778. Two antique bayonets were discovered on the property in the 1950s.

In the 1860s and 1870s, the area became known as Monmouth Junction, named for the junction of three rail branches, the New York division of the Pennsylvania RailRd, the Rocky Hill and the Jamesburg and Freehold.