Enjoyed the first snow of the year on this Halloween hike through parts of the Midstate Trail and Leominster State Forest!
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Hiking the Midstate Trail and Leominster State Forest
Hike Date: October 31, 2020
It snowed uncharacteristically early in Massachusetts this year and we took advantage of the incredible snow-covered fall foliage by hiking through the braided trails of Leominster State Forest and part of the Midstate Trail.
We parked at a large lot by Crow Hill Pond in Leominster State Forest. With the freshly fallen snow, we were immediately blown away by how beautiful it was. The newly dropped orange leaves of fall lay under a white blanket as snowflakes drifted down from the dusted trees in the bright morning sun. It was so beautiful and we hadn’t even started hiking yet!
Across the road, we started on Crow Hill Trail up a pretty steep slope 0.2 mi to the Midstate Trail. There, we turned left and quickly came to some ledges with a great view overlooking Leominster State Forest. With the late fall foliage glowing in the sun as the fresh snow melted off of them, the view was magnificent.
We followed the Midstate Trail over some ups and downs toward Wachusett Mountain. Walking through the rapidly melting first snow of the year was all the more magical knowing just how soon it would all be gone. The trees cast long shadows on the untouched snow as it turned to wet slush under our feet. Shortly before we reached Rt. 140, we got a great view of Mt. Wachusett ahead of us. The contrast of the pristine snow and the glowing golden leaves was like nothing we’d seen before.
The Midstate Trail continued across Rt. 140 and we followed it for a bit before turning around and taking a small side trail to the edge of Wachusett Lake.
From there, we retraced our steps on the Midstate Trail back to Leominster State Forest. Once there, we wound our way through the braided trail system to the top of Ball Hill before heading back to the parking lot. It’s just a flat wooded top of a rounded hill, but it was nice to add a couple miles and some more time in the short-lived winter wonderland.
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