# Huntington State Park - Redding CT - 8/30/08



## gmcunni (Aug 31, 2008)

After a disappointing trip to Shelton earlier in the week i was happy to hear my 14YO son was interested in venturing out again on the weekend. I had heard of Huntington State Park before and it is only about 12 miles from my house.    CBCBD mentioned it to me as well and after reading up on it we decided to give it a try. My buddy Jon joined us too.

http://www.ct.gov/dep/lib/dep/stateparks/maps/huntington.pdf

We started off in the SW corner parking lot and decided (based on gut, not facts) that we'd take the BLUE trail.  My son studied the map and noticed a mention of ruins in the northeast corner so we headed off to find them.  We took the western side of the Blue trail and headed out.  First half of the trip was a lot of fun.  The Blue trail was mostly a fireroad with some hills.  there were little trails going off in all directions which were tougher single track stuff. We hit a few of them to get back on track when we got off course.  The trails are well marked with colored tags.  

We made it to the ruins.  Just before we got there my son OTB'd on a log and ended up with a nice contusion on his stomach.  Ruins were cool.  A chimney and some foundation. Haven't googled yet to find out what it used to be.  

We continued on the Blue trail but it changed dramatically in regards to terrain and difficulty.  Steeper hills and tougher single track with lots of rocks and roots. But we managed to get through it all and still had a lot of fun.  About 3/4 of the way we got took a short cut over the white and red trails to get back to the parking lot.

We ended up riding for about 2.5 hours.  Based on the distances listed on the map i think we covered about 6 miles in total.  

Fun ride, we will go back again to try the other trails.  Took some pix and video. will post the link when they are done.


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## Greg (Aug 31, 2008)

Nice! Glad to see you getting out so much given the injury earlier this summer. You definitely need a GPS so we can see your tracks.  Got a few rides behind you now so you should definitely be ready for tomorrow. Gonna be a fun time.


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## bvibert (Aug 31, 2008)

Sounds like a good time.  Glad you guys were able to get out and have a good time after the disappointing time earlier this week.


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## gmcunni (Aug 31, 2008)

quick and dirty pix + videos


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## MR. evil (Aug 31, 2008)

Was that you or your buddy on the Mets T-shirt?


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## gmcunni (Aug 31, 2008)

MR. evil said:


> Was that you or your buddy on the Mets T-shirt?




That is my buddy Jon. i'm behind the camera.


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## severine (Aug 31, 2008)

Great that you got out and explored some!   Now I want to know... did you hold the camera while riding or did you mount it somewhere?  Sounds like you're doing well with the riding.  Keep it up!


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## gmcunni (Aug 31, 2008)

severine said:


> did you hold the camera while riding or did you mount it somewhere?



 just held it in one hand while i rode.


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## Greg (Aug 31, 2008)

Neat vid. It didn't even occur to me that your bike was fixed, but I guess it is...


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## cbcbd (Sep 1, 2008)

Awesome, glad the trails work out for you guys!


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## GrilledSteezeSandwich (Sep 1, 2008)

Nice video..Beastie Boys rock!!!!


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## Gremf (Sep 6, 2008)

If that was your first time at the Hunt then you need to come out for one of my rides.

Did you hit any of the single track off the Glacial Erratic?  It's not really marked but it's well used trail and even on the map.

Funny thing about the Hunt, I have maybe 150 miles of riding there and I have yet to see this ruin.  Been to the old Mica mine, but never seen the Chimeny.

Here is a little vid I made of the ride from the Happening at Huntington:

The first riding scene is a little connector trail between the red and blue (just past the big cliff - actually goes behind it).

That roller you see us hitting is over in the big burn and then the last couple of scenes are on the rock and roll trail.

How do you imbed a Youtube?


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## severine (Sep 7, 2008)

Gremf said:


> How do you imbed a Youtube?


Use these tags around the numbers after the =

```
[youtube]6jtmdHwJpjU[/youtube]
```

Which then looks like this:


ETA:  Looks like a cool place to ride.  That rocky water crossing/bridge at around 1 minute is interesting - I'd like to try that sometime.


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## Gremf (Sep 7, 2008)

Thanks!  It's funny how every site does it differently.


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## gmcunni (Sep 7, 2008)

Gremf said:


> If that was your first time at the Hunt then you need to come out for one of my rides.



yes, that was our first trip to huntington. didn't really know where we were going but we had a lot of fun. will certainly return there again, soon.


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