Rockwood Park is a 2200 acre oasis in the heart of Saint John. Of the ten little lakes, I think of Lily Lake as the primary one, right at the first entrance.
Dad would would come home from work and drive us out here before supper in the summer some days when I was pre-school. A cool splash helped us sleep better on hot nights.
This incredible sculpture commemorates the victims of unsafe working conditions in our industrial city.
Places like Reversing Falls were not constructed without casualties.
Mourn for the dead. Fight for the living.
It is in French and English. New Brunswick is the official bi-lingual province.
The smooth board-walked trail surrounding the lake is multi-use for hikers and cyclists.
This slightly off trail park bench has to be my favorite.
There couldn't be a sweeter, quieter spot to enjoy a book in fresh air and daylight.
The fork on the left leads to Fisher Lakes.
This is the tiny (0.3 km) Cliff Trail that runs above the north side of the lake.
Above the Cliff trail, the main Look Out point (which should probably have the plural s as there are two) is easy to find.
I'd read good reviews about this trail on the internet and then a I man met on the Sheldon's Point excursion swore it was his favorite trail of all time.
This was a bit further out of town. There is the salt marsh from Irving Nature Park to the left as I ride out of town, following the stacks of Coleson Cove outside of Lorneville. Make sure you take the Lorneville exit. I was travelling without a map and google maps don't work very well for me and I was lucky to take that exit by the simple urge to get off the highway.
There is the power station. You are basically there at this point. Just turn up the gravel road on the right.
Here's a link I wish I'd found before heading out. It's a better source of information than the AllTrails app and gives you a good idea of what to expect.
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This beautiful lookout point was rather scary. The vertigo put my knees into lockdown.
Hey! Is that another split rock? It's a deep crevice with a rope to help you climb down. I wondered if it was a tunnel to the beach or just a dark cold narrow crevice. A lady I met out at Cape Spencer told me her son had gone down that rope and found nothing but darkness. I am glad I passed.
You will see plenty of split rocks on this trail but this one sticking out in the water, splitting the bay, gives the trail its name.
If you download the picture below and blow it up, you will see what looks like a dead dog. It's not. As I squinted for a better look, it raised its head and looked back at me. My heart pounded. What if it was wild? Remember, we are several miles from any residences. Most of the road past Lorneville is industrial. Few, if any, people live near there.
The dog settled back to sleep with a sigh. Still, I moved on quietly so as not to aggravate it, just in case. So, how did it get down there? There was no easy access to that shore. What was it doing there? What was it living on?
Boxer shorts don't just fall out of your pants. What were they doing there? The trail was marked well enough without them.
Murder victim and dog who would not leave without its master? I considered a few dark possibilities and added new potential worst case scenarios to the risks of hiking alone in remote isolated places where people can just disappear.
The Musquash Head Lighthouse
This is a warning to take seriously. I took my picture and moved away. Fun fact: the foghorn was invented in Saint John, New Brunswick.
Split Rock has a lot of climbs and descents and my legs were feeling it. I took the easy 3.2 km dirt road return for the complete loop.
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