Starting at Willow Road and ending at Bluff Head, Guilford. 8.9 miles to finish trail,10.6 miles to get to parking- 4.5 hours.

The second half of the Menunkatuck Trail was much more enjoyable. It is primarily in the woods with only a small portion of walking on blacktop. The trail is a mix of terrain from rocks, dirts roads, muddy areas to grass. We had gorgeous weather today: low humidity and temps in the 70s. The mosquitos were not a nuisance the whole trail, but where they were bad— they were really bad. There were several sections that were very quiet and serene and one that you could hear shooting at. (Never a good feeling to hike near a shooting range).

Overall it was relatively flat, but this trail does have a few zingers for hills that got the back of our legs burning. There was beautiful moss, mushrooms, and quartz along the entire trail, so it made for a beautiful hike. Because of the time of year there were also lots of acorns and some had some pretty colors on them including stripes and solid black.

The trail is well marked and well groomed. There are a few muddy areas and some streams, but most have bridges or rocks to make it easy to cross. One weird thing is Bryan found a pipe in the middle of the trail. Since it could be an ankle breaker or a bike flipper, it seemed extremely odd. We did encounter two trees that had fallen across the trail that made for an interesting moment. It looked like it would be easy to climb over but the way the two trunks are positioned it was actually easier to go under. This is not the norm for me, and you can see the look of confusion on my and Dana’s faces thanks to Bryan sneaking in a photo of us while he held my phone.

The trail ends about a mile and a half before the Bluff Head Parking lot, but it is an easy and pretty section to end the hike with.

As much as I complained about the first part of the Menunkatuck Trail, it will be cool, once we finish the Metacomet, to be able to say that we have walked from the south to the north borders of CT.

Adventurers included: Bryan, Dana, Jes and Dogo