Mohawk Trail State Forest

This was supposed to be the day that I ran a 50-miler at Wachusett. Instead, I took three full weeks off with no heart-rate raising exercise to minimize scarring on my face after I had a spot of basal cell skin cancer removed, which saved me from, you know, cancer (on my FACE!), but pretty much wrecked my spring training. So Jen and I tried out a 10-ish mile trail run along the Mahican-Mohawk Trail in western MA instead.

We'd run the "main loop" at Mohawk Trail State Forest before, as part of researching my guidebook Trail Running Western Massachusetts, but I'd never been on the section of Mahican-Mohawk Trail that leads west from the summit of Clark Mtn. and goes several miles over to the "village" of Drury, MA, near the top of the climbing along Rte. 2. I'd heard that the trail is really nice there, and we'd seen that some bridge work had been done recently in the woods just beyond where it crosses Rte. 2, and wanted to check it out.

We parked at the big gravel lot along Rte. 2 on the south side of the Cold River, crossed on the bridge, and headed right on the dirt road at the gate. The M-M Trail, which at present doesn't exist as an actual trail between here and just east of Shelburne Falls, officially starts at a trail sign where a hiking path leads left into the woods. About 2 minutes in, we arrived at a new trail junction. Since I had created the book profile for this site, a new link trail has been established connecting this spot to the Thumper Mtn. Trail (I'll have to go back and map it for the QR code map; look for a revised map soon!).

Crossing the meadow on the Mahican-Mohawk Trail. 

We followed the book route all the way around and up to the saddle between Todd and Clark mountains (note: the section through the woods just beyond the open meadow below Todd Mtn. is poorly blazed at the moment, and you will wonder if you are still on the trail; you are, just keep going). From the saddle we turned west and climbed up and over Clark Mountain and then got to the new (for us) stuff. 

After the grueling ascent to the saddle between Todd and Clark Mountains. 

The trail drops gently over the backside of Clark, traverses along the upper west slop a bit, and then drops steeply down some switchbacks. It bottoms out at and crosses Wheeler Brook (a tributary of the Cold River) beneath some conifers, then rises up a slope on the other side as it continues west. 

Hay-scented fern glade along the Mahican-Mohawk Trail to Drury.

From there the trail climbs to another high spot along a forested shoulder of the ridge, then drops again and traverses the slope to a series of new bridges and boardwalks along an old woods road network just southeast of Drury. Then the trail pops out at and crosses Rte. 2. We checked out the new bridgework on the the other side then reversed our run back to the Todd/Clark saddle.