The next day was the second of two perfect autumn New England days, and we set out early to tackle this longer section (for us) of the trail. We headed to the southern end of the section, Farmington, to hike approx. 5 1/2 miles north and end at the same parking area on Rt. 44 in West Hartford where we'd begun our hike the day before.
This trail improbably begins in the most atypical of places -- right off a very high trafficked area, just across the street from the monolith collection of facilities that is UConn Health Center. At first glance you'd never think this area had a trail hiding behind the trees, and I'm guessing this was probably something added with the creation of the New England Trail.
I'm not going to lie, I wasn't all that impressed with the first part of this section, as it was mainly a road walk past really nice homes. This was great for getting a glance at rolling green lawns and gated mini-mansions, but it didn't feel much like a hike. It also didn't feel very welcoming, as it was apparent that numbers of residents were perhaps not thrilled about the trail running nearly through their yards, and had installed extra fencing in places.
But after a while the trail turned into the woods and away from the neighborhood. We headed across a road and into a woods that were thicker and surprisingly green. While much of the foliage was approaching peak, in this quiet forest more leaves had not yet turned. Things were much quieter away from the hustle and bustle of Route 4.
After a bit you head into a steep meadow, passing under power lines, and the trail is a bit hard to follow. It's also pretty overgrown and we found ourselves pushing our way through certain areas, wary of ticks (we were unscathed, though).
Eventually you climb up to the Killkenny Rocks, a flattened out rock place where you can look down onto the top of trees and feel a little bit like you're owning your surroundings. I wonder what the story is behind the name?
Heading down from the rocks you cross some mountain bike trails in several places. In fact, I believe we saw some makeshift ramps bikers had built.
For a time the trail heads up along a ridgeline again and you can see out through the trees at more mansions built until the hills of Avon in the distance.
After a while the trail winds back down and into the woods again, and there's not too much of interest to note, until you get the stream. We'd hiked this section of trail once before and knew that the stream signified that we were reaching the end of our day.
Sure enough, before long we came out of the trees and near Rt. 44 and the West Hartford Reservoir. I'm not going to pretend this was my favorite stretch of trail ever -- aside from the Killkenny Rocks, it didn't have too many distinguishing features.
But we'd completed another section. Fall commitments, cold weather and the holidays were fast approaching. Our 2022 hiking days were drawing to a close. But we knew we had at least one more good hike to get in before we settled down for the season.
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