I finished Wellesley today by going to a few conservation areas to hike. My first place of visit was the
Morses Pond and Cochituate Aqueduct Area. I accessed this area by parking along the side of the road around 99 Turner Road. It was a cold morning out, but not cold enough to deter me from my exploration.
The route I took here is highlighted below in black.
The road to the parking lot is usually open during the summer, but today the gate was closed and I had to walk along the road until I found the purple trail to head to the beach. The views of Morses Pond here were beautiful.
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| Ice House Pond |
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| Morses Pond Beach |
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| Swan in the pond |
From here, I headed along the shore to the main junction with the green trail, where I took this picture of the view below.
From here, I turned left to head onto Russell Road, and walked right along it till I reached the junction with the Cochituate Aqueduct, upon which I turned left onto it. Views of Morses Pond from various points along this trail, including at Pine Point and Pickle Point, the latter being being an outcrop shaped like its name.
At the end of the trail, I turned right onto Route 9.
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| Walking along Route 9 |
Along the way, I spotted the old St. James the Great Church, one of many Catholic churches closed in 2004.
When I finally reached the junction with Russell Street, I turned into it, returning back to the Cochituate Aqueduct Trail, whereupon I turned left to head back to my car.
The next place I went to was the
Centennial Reservation, the entrance being found at ~138 Oakland Street. I had to drive down a fenced roadway to get to the parking lot, much like that at the
Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge in Concord.
After taking a picture of the Elizabeth Seton Residence from atop a small hill next to the parking lot, I headed along the purple trail past the Bezanson Pond. to get to the viewpoint, which was atop a slope and had a decent view of the southeast.
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| Bezanson Pond |
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| At the viewpoint |
From here, I took a connecting green trail to head to the top of Maugus Hill, although the view here was pretty okay.
From here, I made my way eastwards along trails toward Oakland Street, passing by the
MassBay Community College campus on my way back to my car along the road.
The last hike in Wellesley was at
Rocky Ledges. I decided to illegally park along Yarmouth Road close to the trailhead into the Rocky Ledges area.
I walked the purple trail straight to the viewpoint, which had a decent view of the southwest.
From here, it was my original intention to head down the hill along the green trail, but the descent was so steep that I decided not to go ahead and went the long way around on the purple trail. Following the purple trail past the Elephant Rock on the Boulder Brook Reservation, I entered into the Little Rich Meadow, where there were beautiful views of the sky.
Continuing along, I entered into the Kelly Memorial Park, situated right next to the
Kathleen E Bates Elementary School.
Nearby is a sledding hill, accessed by turning left at the Fairy Rock, from which a great view of the field can be seen.
From here, instead of heading to the parking I decided to walk back to my car by walking straight through the Bates School to get out to Westgate Road, onto which I turned right to head back into the Boulder Brook Reservation along the green trail. Back on the purple trail, I headed right at the fork, choosing a shorter route to get back to Yarmouth Road. I was just glad that my car wasn't towed all this time, even though it was parked along a curve in a residential area.
Finally done with Wellesley, the town of Weston was next. My next destination was pretty close by at the
Regis College. There were several interesting buildings on this college campus, incuding an ancient looking tower.
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| Norman Tower |
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| College Hall |
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| Morrison House |
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| Eleanor Welch Casey Theater |
I then visited a few other interesting places before heading for lunch. I decided not to go into the
Golden Ball Tavern Museum because it looked like a typical house, and I'm not really into American history.
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Old Weston Library,
School Street and Boston Post Road |
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| Golden Ball Tavern Museum |
I decided to have my lunch at the Ye Olde Cottage Restaurant on 403 Boston Post Road. I wanted to have Eggs Benedict with corned beef hash once again
like I did at the
Gene Collette's Airport Restaurant in Fitchburg, but it ended up being a custom made dish of 2 poached eggs atop a bed of ham and corned beef hash, covered in hollandaise sauce, which was equally good as well.
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| Custom made eggs Benedict |
It was time to do some hiking again after lunch, and I went to the
Highland Street Forest. There is a small parking area at around 200 Highland Street, and from here there are some stone steps heading up to the viewpoint as shown below on the map.
From the view point, one can see Reeves Hill in Wayland,
Nobscot Hill,
Mount Wachusett and
Mount Monadnock clearly in the distance.
There was nothing much else to see here, so it was on to the next view, at the
Pine State Town Forest. I had orginally thought that the trailhead was on Lawrence Road, but upon closer inspection after not being able to find it, I realized that it was actually at around 200 Country Drive. From here, parking along the roadside, the route I took is shown below in pink.
The view at the supposed viewpoint wasn't as good, though, being surrounded by tall trees.
The next hike was to the top of
Doublet Hill. Parking at the end of Doublet Hill Road, the path I took is shown below in pink.
Walking past the water tower, I headed to the top of Doublet Hill, expecting to see a good view, but at the very top, there was nothing to see. Thankfully, I chose not to give up, following for a little while more, and one of the best views I have had so far came into view, the Boston skyline, which was really clear to see from here.
I highly recommend going to Doublet Hill if you happen to be in the area.
The next hike was at
Cat Rock. After parking at the ballfield at the end of Drabbington Way, the path I took is shown below.
Instead of heading up the right path, I chose to go straight up the hill instead. This was because everywhere was covered with dead leaves at the time of year, so it was hard to tell where the trails were. I ended up bashing up the hill, even trespassing as I went into a playground area at the top. The owner had to come out and tell me where to go for me to finally find the way to the top of Cat Rock Hill, which actually is a ski slope. From here, there are great views of the surroundings in the downhill direction.
It was upon heading down the hill and back to my car that I realized the I could have taken a much shorter path to the hill. Oh well.
The last place I hiked at today was at
Coburn Meadow. I parked at the end of Lantern Lane which is in a residential area. The dog barking at me from the home nearby made me a little worried that my car would get towed any time soon, but I decided to proceed anyway. The path I took is shown below in pink.
Unfortunately, there was nothing much to see at the viewpoint.
The last place I visited today was the
Cardinal Spellman Philatelic Museum, a museum of stamps in English terms. I missed this place while visiting Regis College earlier, so I came back after visiting all the other places in Weston. I was interested in this museum because I used to collect stamps when I was young. I wonder where my stamps are now. The museum had an interesting collection of stamps, including some German parodies of popular British stamps, the origins of the Ponzi scheme, old letters from the drowned towns of Dana, Enfield, Greenwich and Prescott, and even little stamp cases that people used to carry around in the old days. Pictures I took follow.
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| Old letters from the drowned towns in Quabbin Reservoir |
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| Origins of the Ponzi scheme |
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| Stamp cases |
I had hoped to see some stamps from Singapore, but did not see any, until I casually mentioned it to the caretaker, upon which see pulled out a container and found the Singapore section, which had a small collection of stamps. To my surprise, I recognized several of them from my stamp collecting days. My visit to the museum was finally complete.
Moving on, I headed to the town of Waltham, with the sun setting quickly. Here, I was still able to take pictures of 2 places, namely the
First Evangelical Lutheran Church and the
William F. Stanley Elementary School, before the sun finally set for good.
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| First Evangelical Lutheran Church |
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| William F. Stanley Elementary School |
From here, I had a pre-Thanksgiving dinner with meetup friends at
Shabu-Zen in the Allston neighborhood of Boston. This place is a fancy place for Chinese hot-pot, and I had the lamb and beef combo. All in all, I had a great time here meeting and conversing with new friends.
After dinner, we headed to a frozen yogurt place which was pretty much right next door, Mixx Frozen Yogurt on 66 Brighton Avenue. This place lets you make your own frozen yogurt with as many flavors as you like, the final price being based on the weight of your cup. My cup was no work of art, so no pictures, unfortunately.
We were supposed to have a karaoke session at
Doremi Karaoke, but as we had not made a reservation for 20 over people, there was a need to wait till midnight to get a room. I decided to head home instead, mainly because I had a long drive ahead of me, and I was going up Mount Monadnock in Jaffrey, New Hampshire tomorrow morning. With that, my eventful day ended, but apparently the others had a good time at karaoke.
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