My son had a hockey practice just down the road from Allaire State Park one evening, I figured I could get a hike in while he practiced. His practice was at 6, I was only doing a little under 3 miles, flat terrain, nothing too difficult. Lesson learned, give yourself a little more time than you think you actually need. I walk at a pretty good clip, I needed to start a little earlier. For this hike, I walked the Brisbane trail, which is listed at 2.8 miles. To get to the trailhead, I drove past the main entrance on Atlantic Avenue to a pulloff down the road a bit on the right.
The trail started off as a concrete trail that you will share with bicyclists, joggers and lots of other people, as it heads towards the main entrance to the park. When I started, the sun was still up, and it was a gorgeous evening.
You will walk by the meadows of Allaire State Park, and be heading in a direction towards the old village. The trail, though, crosses Atlantic Avenue, and eventually turns into the soft surface of sand and dirt.
While there are lots of people using the park and visiting, I did not see many people when I headed off into the woods after crossing Atlantic Avenue. (I walked the trail clockwise.) There was one brief section in the northwest “corner” of the trail where the trail meanders close to and along the eastbound side of Route 195. It is at this point that there is a fair amount of noise from the traffic along 195. Once the trail heads southeast, you will lose the car noise and go back to solitude.
Once the trail curves southwest you will be in the home stretch. It is at this point that I noticed it was starting to get dark. As in, seriously dark. While the sun wasn’t fully down yet, it was certainly below treetop level. I picked up the pace. You can tell in the following picture, I’m still in the woods.
I eventually made it back to Atlantic Avenue. The following picture was only taken about ten minutes from the one above, but I’m out of the woods and close to the lot. I was trying to capture the fireflys that were out.
This was a great hike and a great park to hike in. There are lots of other trails, though certain sections of the park are heavily used by mountain bikes. Parking in the pulloff will save you park fees in-season. The trail was well marked and easy to follow – trail maps are available online.
Hiked: 7/18/2017