Birdsboro Preserve & Waters

Date of Hike: Wednesday, April 29, 2015

Total Distance: 10.47 Miles

Avg speed: 2.11MPH

Avg moving speed: 2.39MPH

Moving Time: 4:22:51

Total Time: 4:58:05

Conditions: Sunny, 75 Degrees

Difficulty: Moderate, Difficult

I didn't go hiking last weekend since I had plans in the works and had to get ready for them but I made up for it later on in the week. I took some time off work and spent two nights camping at French Creek State Park starting on Wednesday the 29th of April through Friday morning of May 1st. I only hiked for two days but it was more than enough to keep me occupied and get a real good workout. On Wednesday the 29th, I went hiking at Birdsboro Preserve and Waters and to say the least, this hike was a good challenge and the most strenuous of the season so far. It's still early though, who knows where I may end up and what kind of challenge the hike(s) will pose.

I parked at the South Birdsboro Archery, Rod and Gun Club

Approximate address is:
470 Geigertown Road
Douglassville, PA 19518
GPS: 40.225036, -75.808338

Google Maps is a bit off as usual. Look for a dirt road on the northern side of Geigertown Road close to the marker. There are a bunch of "no trespassing" signs posted at the entrance but don't let them fool you, there's a parking lot for the gun club at the end of a short dirt road. Also look for trail markers for the Horse-Shoe Trail, a small pond, and there's also an old beat up trailer home alongside the entrance to the club. The Six Penny Creek is also right in the same area. If you don't want to park at the gun club, there's a small dirt parking lot alongside Geigertown Road about 50-100 yards west of the entrance to the club. If you want to completely avoid the gun club, you can also park on the northern side of Birdsboro Waters/Preserve. There are several areas to park on Haycreek Road in Birdsboro but you'll have to cross over a few cable bridges to get to the opposite side. 

To get to the trails, you will have to cut through the gun club property unless you decide to park in the northern end (in Birdsboro). To get a copy of the trail map of the area, click here. I don't like how small this map is so I zoomed in, took a screenshot, and printed it from there so that I'd have a full page to view the trails. 

At the end of the parking lot, you'll see this sign. The dirt road in the background to the right side will lead you to the trail head. Technically, it's part of the Horse-Shoe Trail. If you look at the bottom middle of this picture, you'll see a yellow trail marker on the wooden post.

This is the pond I was referring to which is alongside the parking lot to the gun club. 

Follow the dirt road towards the back of the property, there will be a building to your right side. To your left, you'll see the below targets which I'm assuming are for archery. The trail head is to the right side of the shed in the below picture. 

Entrance to the Horse-Shoe Trail at the gun club

I'm not sure if they're more common this year or if it's just because I've been out and about this spring more often than last year, but I've seen a lot of caterpillar nests just about everywhere I've been these last few weeks.

As you're walking along the Horse-Shoe Trail, you'll see several of these signs in the beginning part of your hike. Technically, you're not on the property of the Birdsboro Preserve for a distance after you hit the trail.

This marker is the indicator that you have now entered the property of the preserve.

The trail cuts off in two different directions once you enter into the preserve, I turned to the west.

Although there aren't any names for these trails, they've been marked with different colors which you'll see throughout your hike within the preserve and waters.

Somewhere in this area, the trail turns to the north.

As I was heading up the trail, I noticed some large rocks off the trail about 40-50 yards into the woods and went in the check them out. Now that there's more greenery in the woods, it's going to be difficult to spot things like these since they'll be hidden by the leaves.

Similar to the rocks at French Creek State Park, these look like they're poured concrete with a bunch of smaller stones mixed in with the much larger one. The preserve and waters are just north of the state park so it's no surprise to see the same type in the area.

In this area was another intersection in the trails where you had the choice to continue to the west on the Horse-Shoe Trail which would take you out of the preserve property, or north and east which would bring you to different sections of the preserve. I decided to head to the east with my first objective in mind.

The first challenge of the day and a warmup of things to come. Off in the distance was the first steep hill of the day to climb. Fortunately, this one wasn't too big but it got the blood pumping.

Most of the trails in the preserve and waters were in good condition, some of which were gravel and you could tell that at one time they were used for vehicles and might still be as I did note there were some tracks that looked relatively fresh.

Another set of trails intersect in this area where you have the choice to continue going east, south which would bring you back to the gun club, or to the north which was what I chose.

It's hard to tell from the pictures but this was a relatively large downhill slope.

Fern plants beginning to sprout, I thought this was pretty cool looking.

I'm surprised this picture came out ok, I was pretty far away from this turkey vulture and had my zoom lens fully extended.

This was one of the only areas throughout the hike where there was mud on the trail and it was a stretch of maybe 20-30 yards and was easy to walk around.

And one of the very few stream crossings you'll see throughout the preserve, at least on the trails that I was on.

Looking back at the stream crossing

It was a beautiful day for hiking, a bit on the warm side but that's just because of not being used to the higher temperatures after a chilly winter. 

Throughout this section of the woods I was in, I noticed a lot of trees and stumps that were charred. What I'm not sure of is if this was a controlled burn or if there had been a forest fire at one time. I checked the internet and all I could find was information on the forest fire at French Creek State Park in 2012.

I was approaching my first objective of the day, the Birdsboro Reservoir which was beautiful.

A log converted into an bench but it looks like it's been there a while. I've only seen something like this as one other place I've hiked and that was at Nockamixon State Park on the mountain bike trails.

Once you get beyond the reservoir and dam, the trail turns into a dirt road for a distance.

Alongside the dirt road, there's another stream and a few man-made waterfalls.

Once you get to Haycreek Road (closed to all traffic due to bridges being out), you're entering Birdsboro Waters.

Alongside Haycreek Road for a distance is this canal looking body of water. What it might have been used for at one time, I'm not sure.

 Another man-made waterfall

Once you get beyond the canal looking body of water (I was heading west at this point), the trail leads you alongside Hay Creek.

Apparently, this is supposed to be a trail crossing over Hay Creek. It looked like it would have been possible to walk over it as the water was shallow enough but carrying two cameras, I didn't take that chance. I didn't want to slip and end up falling into the water and ruining my equipment.

I continued west for a distance further and took a few more shots of Hay Creek along the way.

Eventually, the trail heading west came to a dead end and I had to turn back.

Why did I take a picture of a road? Unfortunately, the trail I wanted to take was the one crossing over Hay Creek at the shallow spot so I continued west to see if there was another crossing. After walking a distance, I decided it would be best to turn back. Instead of taking the trail again, I walked east along Haycreek Road. 

I continued east until I got to another bridge. This one was still intact so I was able to cross over Hay Creek. As you approach the bridge, there's an active quarry on the opposite side where you could smell and taste the dust it was producing which wasn't very pleasant but it was only for a short distance.

The road in this area is paved ad once you get off the paved surfaces, the trails are dirt roads.

I'm not sure what this is or was at one time but I would assume it was used for storing equipment when mining operations were in progress in this area. I took some pictures of the inside of this building but it was nothing but garbage and graffiti and not worth posting.

Unfortunately, the door in the upper part of this building was locked. I would have liked to see what might have been inside.

I was now approaching the second objective of the hike. This is an area called Trap Rock which seems to be a pretty popular area for rock climbing and bouldering. For those of you who may enjoy rock climbing and according to their website, there are almost 150 routes that range in difficulty from 5.0 to 5.14.

As you enter this area, there's a bolt fund donation box. Since I'm not a climber, I wasn't sure what a bolt was but have since looked it up and found that they're embedded into the rock and from there, carabiners with ropes are attached to them allowing you to climb the rocks. I'm keeping it simple here, climbers may have a better description. I wouldn't want to be the person putting them in, that's for sure. I'm quite content keeping my feet on the ground.

As you get past the bolt fund donation box, you'll see this quarry. If you look to the bottom right side of this picture, you can see that there were a few climbers, one of which was scaling the cliff. Please note that local authorities use this area as a shooting range. If they are there while you are, please be sure to vacate the lower sections of the quarry. More information can be found on the Birdsboro Climbing website.

The climber was a little more than half-way up, right side of the picture wearing a red hat.

There's also a trail that leads around the quarry with numerous other cliffs to check out (and climb if you're a climber).

Too bad there were power lines were in the way!

Looking down to the quarry area from the trail

As you circle around towards the back of the quarry, there a steep staircase leading down to the quarry level. Towards the front of the quarry, there's a fence blocking access to this area but it looks like you're permitted to walk back here as there was a trail made of gravel at the far end of the fence.

Once I was done at the quarry, it was back to the trails again. This was another area where the hiking got a bit tough. The hill wasn't as steep as the one I had been on earlier but it was larger making it a longer lasting climb.

At this point, I was pretty close to the northernmost section of Birdsboro Waters and also where I ran into yet another obstacle. I'm not sure what is/was going on here but there were trees cut down all over the place and looked to have been done with a tree excavator of sorts. What trees were standing within the area had gouges taken out of them. The trail, well, it was covered in trees which meant I had to climb over them.

I found this strange because according to the Keystone Conservation website, it states that "the Birdsboro Waters Forest Legacy property is a vast, undisturbed forested landscape of nearly 2,000 acres. It is the largest tract of unprotected land within the largest unfragmented forest in southeastern Pennsylvania." After seeing this, I think it's safe to say it's no longer unfragmented and I have to wonder why the trees are being cleared. Perhaps a prevention measure in the event of a forest fire.

Trail marker amidst the downed trees

Tracks from some sort of large machinery.

Once I got past the downed trees, the path opened up to this soft loamy soil roadway which was actually slightly difficult to walk on. It's similar to walking on a sandy beach at the shore.

On both sides of this dirt path, you can see the gouges in the trees from whatever machinery was clearing them.

At this point, I had reached the northernmost part of Birdsboro Waters and turned back to the south to my third and final objective. This was also about the half-way point of the adventure.

A little further down the trail were more downed trees, fortunately not nearly as many as what I had just been through.

Walking down a hill to my third objective, the Stinson Run Reservoir. While not as nice as the Birdsboro Reservoir, it was still a scenic place and worth the hike to get to it.

Alongside the reservoir is another dirt road.

I followed the dirt road southeast past the reservoir and stayed on it until I found another natural trail that ran alongside what might have been Stinson Run. It's not named on the trail map or Google Maps so this is just a guess.

I then made my way to Hay Creek and the opposite side of the crossing I had intended to use until I discovered there wasn't a bridge. I followed this trail northeast until I arrived at the bridge on Haycreek Road I had crossed earlier that day

View of Hay Creek from the bridge on Haycreek Road

I followed Haycreek Road southwest until I found the trail I wanted to return to my car on and continued southeast.

I returned to the Birdsboro Reservoir, this time on the opposite side from where I was earlier in the day.

Once I got past the reservoir, I took the same trail I had been on earlier (mostly) to get back to the gun club. It's safe to say that coming down this trail was easier than returning and was a good challenge as it was a pretty steep and long hill to climb.

The final stretch back to the car!

That was it for my adventure at Birdsboro Preserve and Waters. In all, it was an awesome adventure and I would definitely like to return to check out some of the trails I didn't get to see this time around. There's a lot to see and it also looks like some of the trails I didn't hike on could be a pretty decent challenge as well. It's safe to say that this hike has been the most challenging of the season so far. It was warm outside and I also ran out of water because I decided to take my two liter hydration bladder instead of the three liter bladder. It was silly of me but I thankfully didn't run out until the final stretch so I didn't cause myself too much suffering.  

Stay tuned for my next upcoming post, this is part one of a two day adventure I was on during my camping trip. Until then, happy exploring and happy hiking!

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Southeastern PA Hiking