6 beautiful Massachusetts winter hiking spots to tackle this season

New England Journey

Get out your mountaineering boots — and gloves.

Positive, the temperatures are falling, however that doesn’t imply you need to put your mountaineering boots away. Massachusetts parks present a lot of fairly trails for mountaineering and snowshoeing through the chilly months.

Forward, uncover six parks the Division of Conservation & Recreation (DCR) recommends for mountaineering whereas bundled up.

If tall bushes captivate you, head to the 6,000-acre Mohawk Path State Forest, the place the DCR says you’ll discover a number of the tallest recorded white pines in New England. In line with the DCR, one significantly gorgeous spot within the woodlands is a 2-mile round-trip path referred to as the Nature Path Loop, a reasonably strenuous hike that features an open meadow loop. To get to the path, start on the headquarters positioned on Chilly River Street in Charlemont, hike up the highway, and switch proper towards the group camp web site space. Then proceed down the highway and observe the Nature Path on the left and thru the woodland to the higher meadow. The Nature Path Loop will start in your proper.

The DCR says the paths at this 1,843-acre park are nonetheless simple to stroll after a snowfall, and the terrain across the Pond Loop Path is particularly flat and simple, which makes for excellent snowshoeing. The path cuts by means of forested uplands, fields, and alongside the sides of Leach Pond. Whereas on the park, search for the historic Ames Mansion, inbuilt 1910 by Blanche Ames, an artist, feminist, creator, and inventor. The mansion has been featured in a number of motion pictures, together with the 2016 “Ghostbusters” remake with Melissa McCarthy and Kristen Wiig. The park’s headquarters is positioned at 259 Massapoag Ave. in North Easton.

Former presidents Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and Woodrow Wilson all handed time fishing, tenting, and looking on this Carver spot with winter-friendly trails. Discover the two 1/2-mile East Reservoir Path, which the DCR calls flat, well-marked, and snowshoeing-worthy. Maintain an eye fixed out for swans, otters, foxes, and squirrels.

Saddleback Hill within the 2,575-acre Middlesex Fells Reservation gives a phenomenal winter view of Spot Pond that’s not out there to hikers in the summertime, when the oak bushes are coated in leaves. To succeed in it, drive to Stoneham and take the Wholesome Coronary heart Path. It’s an easy-to-moderate hike fashionable with snowshoers that strikes guests previous wetlands, by means of sections of the Fells, and over Whip Hill. You possibly can park within the dust lot at Greenwood Park at 170 Pond St. Alternatively, you possibly can hike a simple, 1-mile loop alongside the Spot Pond Brook Historic Path by starting at 1 Woodland Street in Stoneham, parking in so much subsequent to the stone home positioned on the intersection of Pond Road and Woodland Street.

This park, stuffed with Nineteenth-century gardens, trails, rolling meadows, and tall pines, has attractive views of the Merrimack River which might be good to take a look at after a snow, in keeping with the DCR. Try the Merrimack River Path, a 2-mile, reasonably tough hike that travels to a reasonably vista close to the Helen Moseley Home web site. The Moseley household owned the 480-acre horticultural and agricultural property from 1900 to 1985. Discover the path by coming into Hedge Drive on the park gate in Newburyport.

The Quabbin Reservoir consists of 56,000 acres of protected watershed and supplies ingesting water to 40 % of Massachusetts residents. It’s additionally an ideal place to hike. There are trails for hikers of all ranges, and the pathways alongside the park’s predominant highway between the center and east entrances supply spectacular views of the Quabbin, in keeping with the DCR. The reservoir is positioned at 100 Winsor Dam Street in Belchertown.