Park Unit 134: Great Egg Harbor Wild and Scenic River

In the depths of quarantine, we decided to take a drive to south Jersey to visit Great Egg Harbor Wild and Scenic River. New Jersey has opened some of the parks with the requirement of socially distancing. This is the only park unit in New Jersey that we hadn't yet visited and it was a beautiful spring day - and Mother's Day so it felt good to get out for a little while. The River gradually widens as it picks up the waters of 17 tributaries on its way to Great Egg Harbor and the Atlantic Ocean. Established by Congress in 1992, nearly all of this 129-mile river system rests within the Pinelands National Reserve.

We grabbed our masks and headed south to the Warren F. Fox Nature Center in Estelle Manor. The Nature Center was closed, of course, but we drove past the cemetery (that was surprisingly crowded) to the parking area by the river. We walked to the river and took in the view and then we drove further along to hiking trails. We explored a few different trails, discovering a frightening mound of wasps, and the historic remains of a power plant that used to be on the river's edge in the 1920s.
There was a lovely boardwalk through the swampy area as well. There are many miles of trails here and you could easily spend a whole day exploring.

Some kind of nasty wasp nest. We ran in the other direction as fast as we could!

It felt good to be outside and we saw very few people, thankfully, so we didn't have to wear our masks that much. It felt like home, and like Long Island. As we do so often, we thought about the reputation of New Jersey stemming from the sights by the airport, and that most people wouldn't believe how beautiful it is in other areas!