Starting at 151-199 Okenuck Way, Shelton and ending at 241 East Village Rd, Monroe, CT ~ 6.01 miles and 2hrs and 59 mins

The second part of this trail was pretty fun. It starts off with a short road walk, but when we arrived at the woods it instantly went up, up and up. The majority of the trail is wooded, but it does have a couple of sections of road walk and a rock scramble to contend with. I found it odd that for all the warning signs for the rock scramble on the first part of the trail (which was easy), that they didn’t have any for the rocks that you need to climb on this section (which did require both arms and legs to climb.) There are also some small water features along the way. Unfortunately many were dried up due to the lack of rain.

The trail is a little confusing at times. It is well marked, but only if you are coming form the opposite direction. For those going the same way we traveled, look for the lobster claws and broken shells on the side of the road to know where to duck back into the woods. Assuming those are carried away you could also look for the tiny blue arrow that is painted across the street on the curb.

The last quarter mile or so of trail is an overgrown section with prickers on both sides, so I would advise wearing long pants through this part.

We had the pleasure of seeing a large white-tailed doe and later two fawns (not sure where their mom was) frogs, fish and a giant spider. Other notables included:

• Wineberries
• Tulip Poplars
• Common Selfheal
• Black-eyed Susan
• Steeplebush
• Euonymus
• Barberry – beware the prickers!