48 OGILVIE WOODS HIKE

KEY AT-A-GLANCE INFORMATION

LENGTH: 3 miles

CONFIGURATION: 2 loops

DIFFICULTY: Easy to moderate

SCENERY: Reforested farmland, swamp, and a fault zone created when continental plates collided to form the supercontinent Pangaea during the Precambrian-Mesozoic era

EXPOSURE: Mostly shaded

TRAFFIC: Light

TRAIL SURFACE: Packed earth, with rugged areas of loose gravel and exposed rock

HIKING TIME: 1.5–2 hours

SEASON: Year-round sunrise–sunset

ACCESS: Free

MAPS: Maps can be purchased at the Weston Town Hall and can also be obtained from the Weston Forest and Trail Association, www.westonforesttrail.org.

FACILITIES: None

SPECIAL COMMENTS: This forest is a veritable cornucopia of edible (and inedible) mushrooms.

WHEELCHAIR TRAVERSABLE: No

DRIVING DISTANCE FROM BOSTON COMMON: 18 miles

Ogilvie Woods Hike

UTM Zone (WGS 84) 19T

Easting: 307865

Northing: 4695299

Latitude: N 42° 23' 10"

Longitude: W 71° 20' 03"

Directions

From Boston Common, start out going south on Tremont Street 0.7 miles, then turn right to stay on Tremont Street. Turn slightly right onto Marginal Road. At 0.1 mile merge onto Interstate 90 west and continue for 10.3 miles. Take Exit 15 to I-95. At 0.3 miles exit left to I-95 north. Continue 1.9 miles and take Exit 26 to US 20. Turn slight right onto US 20 east and at 0.1 mile turn slight left onto US 20 west. Follow US 20 west 1.4 miles. Turn slight right onto Boston Post Road and at 0.7 miles turn right onto Concord Road. Continue 1.6 miles on Concord Road. Stay straight to go onto Sudbury Road. The entrance to Ogilvie Woods is ahead 0.4 miles next to house number 133.

IN BRIEF

Starting out in a benevolent plantation of pine, this hike becomes increasingly beautiful and intriguing as it ventures along a ridge formed by the collision of continental plates, and noses into a treacherous swamp-filled corner of an earthquake faultline.

DESCRIPTION

With 2,000 acres of protected open space, an extensive trail network, and active sustainable forestry and community agriculture programs in place, the quiet, former farming town of Weston is a national leader in land conservation and stewardship. In 1955 the town began acquiring large tracts of unbuilt land and established the Weston Forest and Trail Association to maintain trails and educate the townspeople about the forests and forest ecology. The strategy from the start was to buy “backland” and leave property owners with both homes and acreage with street frontage. The result is neighborhoods woven together by vast tracts of unspoiled land and miles of public trails.

From the parking spot on the shoulder of Sudbury Road, locate the trailhead near a small green Weston Forest trail marker and set out hiking north into a grove of pine. Traveling in a nearly straight line past a stone wall on the left, the trail arrives at a two-way junction. Bear right here, continuing slightly uphill on a wider path edged by pines and a smattering of oaks and other hardwoods. In May, blooming wild lily-of-the-valley (Maianthemum canadense) and starflower (Trientalis borealis) light the forest floor with their tiny white petals. When the expansiveness of summer subsides into autumn, clutches of violet-capped wood blewits (Lepista nuda) poke through the fallen leaves and pine needles.

Undulating northeast, this grassy fire road soon leads to a two-way intersection marked 8. Continue left, aiming north under shade cast by oak, hickory, and white pine. Being well into the woods now, you’ll hear none of the jarring sounds of suburbia. Nuthatches, chickadees, and other woodland birds twitter in the midcanopy, and occasionally a red-tailed hawk perches high on a dead oak limb long enough to attract a mob of crows. Otherwise, a velvety quiet settles.

As the trail descends through a void created by two ridges, note the bedrock. As extraordinary as it seems—so far away from Hawaii or Sumatra—the bedrock you see extruding from the slopes is volcanic. This “tuff” stuff is consolidated erupted molten rock and ash. This is not to say that a volcano lies under Weston; the source of the tuff is even more extraordinary. According to geologists, distinct sections of New England, including several in the Boston area, are pieces of faraway lands, including Africa and a chain of volcanic islands that once protruded from the sea above the South Pole. The volcanic rock crawling with Weston-hatched daddy longlegs and ants, then, is either of foreign origin or a local made product created when one plate of Earth’s crust rode up over another. All told, Massachusetts has experienced no fewer than three such momentous collisions in the past 500 million years. Although all lies quiet today, a certain amount of instability exists along the many fault lines that radiate from these points of impact. The Bloody Bluff Fault named for a bloody scuffle between sniping Minutemen and British Regulars on April 19, 1775, in Lexington, lies nearby.

Tumbling in stop motion, a stone wall crosses down one slope, lets the trail through, then climbs to the right. Ahead where the trail splits at another junction, hike left to head northwest under hemlock cover. Rolling gradually northwest in easy undulations over gravel footing, the trail soon reaches junction 4. A hemlock stands at the crook of the “V” next to an umbrella-shaped sassafras tree. Bear right, continuing alongside intriguing ridges.

Departing the fire road at junction 3, climb over the mounded chunks of microcontinents, crystallized volcanic ash, and organic detritus, to descend to the swamp below. In crossing this spot, you’ll find that flooding dictates the way. Allow dry footing to be the priority as you follow markers pointing right. The trail sidles along the swamp only temporarily; a moment later it edges back up onto the flank of another ridge. Ahead a sign bears the bone-chilling warning of quicksand in the lowland area beyond. The treacherous zone is an outlying tract of the Bloody Bluff Fault. For a cautious look, follow the trail down into the swamp, being sure to stop on the near side of logs serving as a makeshift bridge. The quicksand long ago trapped a horse that belonged to a farmer named Hans van Leer. Today, the animal’s bones lie buried deep within the mire.

On returning to the orange warning sign, hike uphill to the right and follow the path as it switches back over the top of the ridge traced earlier. The view looking southeast from this static mass is something like that of the view from the crest of a rogue wave.

Several paths feed in from the edges, but stay with the main trail as it continues straight along the ridge beneath black oaks. As it begins to taper downhill, the trail bows left and right. Choose the right-hand route to descend along a pit used as a rifle-training range during World War II. Mushrooms pop from the gritty ground. Some, for instance, the cauliflower fungus (Sparassis crispa), resemble a puff of dust rising from a bullet’s point of impact.

Beyond the military’s borrow pit, the trail levels off as it continues on its southwest run along the border of Weston and Wayland. Across the stone wall demarcating the town line, you can see a meadow through a thin wall of trees. At the T-junction ahead, bear right for a brief foray into Wayland, on land owned by the Sudbury Valley Trustees. Take a stroll around the periphery of the meadow, keeping an eye out for raptors or fox that might be out hunting rabbits or field mice.

Returning to the woods of Weston, continue straight on across the top of the “T,” heading east over acres that were once part of Hans van Leer’s farm. The fire road turned hiking trail travels alongside a ravine cut by glacial outwash during the formation of Lake Sudbury. Easing into the recess, the trail arrives at junction 2. Continue to the left, hiking over floodplain to return to junction 3.

At this familiar point, keep to the left to hike southeast into the southern reaches of Lincoln. The next junction comes quickly. Here, a trail marked with the red sign of the Lincoln Trail System bears left, but bear right to remain in Ogilvie Forest. Midway up a banking, the trail forks; stay right and continue climbing. At the top of the rise, passing a stone wall likely built by Hans van Leer and sons, the trail splits yet again. Bear left, hiking eastward under pines and hemlocks. Encountering the stone wall once more, the trail continues through a gap in the stones, reaches another split, and continues straight on.

To round out a tour of the forest, the trail forges northeast toward the Lincoln border, crossing another glacial-outwash plain to access high ground. Houses are visible through trees to the left as the trail arrives at junction 9. Using drumlins and eskers as stepping-stones through wetland, continue on the route as it heads right, traveling southeastward.

Just beyond the foundation of a house on the right, the trail forks. Stay right to curve southwest. Grit washed into a mound beneath glacial ice rises to the right, facing a stone wall. Descending from this esker, the trail dips then climbs another, crossing a stream in between. Arriving at a split a moment later, stay on high ground to follow the trail as it arcs southwestward.

The rich vegetation of the swampland and the shelter provided by the ridged topography make these woods a haven for white-tailed deer. Great horned owls roosting in evergreens are less easy to spot, but pellets of coughed-up mouse fur and bits of bones at the foot of the trees are a sure sign that they are about.

At the “V” of junction 6 and the unmarked junction that follows, continue straight, hiking downhill on a gravel-strewn slope. Junction 7 comes quickly; bear left here keeping on a southwest trajectory. Having escaped the swampy ruckus of the Bloody Bluff Fault zone, the trail now returns to a far tamer landscape. Docile white pine saplings and sassafras fill sunlit spaces, and the ground lies flat. Two fully oxidized vehicles of pre–World War II vintage hide under leaves to the right of the trail. Fast returning to their most basic elements, little of these machines is recognizable besides the light sockets and rounded fenders.

Shortly beyond the automobiles’ resting ground, the trail diverges left; however, bear right to continue southwest through the pinewood. On arriving at the next junction, turn left to return to Sudbury Road.

NEARBY ATTRACTIONS

Land’s Sake is a private, nonprofit organization devoted to land stewardship, sustainable farming, and forestry. The organization runs a full calendar of events year-round, including maple sugaring in February and March, and a Strawberry Festival in June. Land’s Sake’s headquarters is located at the Melone Homestead, at 27 Crescent Street, Weston. Contact Land’s Sake at (781) 893-1162, or on the Web at www.landsake.org.