From Chesterfield, CT, drive south 3/4 mile on route 85 passing the beginning of route 161 on the right. Turn left on Turner Road and go southeast for a mile around the New London reservoir until you pass Ridge Hill Road on the left. The entrance, with parking for 2 or 3 cars in front of the green bar gate, is a little further on the left. Walk north on an old dirt roadway past open areas and up a rise. Just over the rise, look to the left at 300 deg. for an indistinct foot trail heading up the ridge. Take this trail, with a stonewall to the left and marked with occasional blue discs, for a clockwise loop.
Up, up, up you go and 10 steps to the right it's down, down, down you look! Ridge Hill Road approaches from the left also down below as you are astride its namesake. The road catches up as you pass a glacial erratic on the left just before the top of your climb. Descend a bit as the road takes charge of the ridge and join a path coming from the left - look back on that path to see another entrance gate on Ridge Hill Road.
Shortly, say 200 feet, go left at the trail junction, again at 300 deg. and with a stonewall to the left. Soon curve right into deep woods still watching for blue discs. Proceed slowly uphill passing a tree you can sit on to the left, a rockpile to the right, and through a stonewall. (You may wish to pause here for Chaney Ranch II.) Within 5 minutes you reach an opening in another stonewall which ends at a large rockpile to the right. You go left of the opening 3 steps and look low in south side of the wall. You have reached the high point of your journey but not the only delight!
Now, descend following the blue discs, pass through a wall with a large rockpile on the left, and in about 10 minutes reach the remains of the Chaney ranch. Here you may find several stone foundations. From about the trailside mid-point of the first big one on the left, hop over the stone wall to your right and find a Little Rocking Horse (see box #43) tucked low under a ledge behind a smallish rock and a few greenish branches. Afterwards you may wish to take a peek into the bunkhouse, but beware that it is sometimes filled with trash. When your curiousity is satisfied, continue south and then southwest on a path which takes you home. No more blue discs as you are now on the old ranch road. Uphill you go to a junction. Go left, 110 deg., down and around to your starting point.

From the eastern junction of Rte. 138 and Rte. 49 in Voluntown, CT, take Rte. 49 N just over half a mile to the left-hand parking lot at Doug's Place Picnic Area in Patchaug Forest. Head west from the big brown sign past picnic tables to pick up the blue blazes of the Nehantic Trail for a short, sweet pine-needle carpeted walk. Within just a few minutes at the spot where the blue blazed trail turns southwest, continue straight ahead on the path at about 280 for approximately 100 more steps. From the point where the blue blazed trail rejoins the path you are on, head east about 20 steps to a pine needle covered natural cavity on the north (left) side of a rotting stump. Look just below the sturdy root loop for your Thank-you roses. Then, for one more little rose, just take about 19 more steps at 35, and look under more pine needles in the right hand cubby hole. Now loop back for a picnic or continue on with the blue blazes to the next picnic area, the rhododendron sanctuary (Father's Day Flowers), Mt. Misery (Misery Loves Company), or beyond!

Note: these boxes are hard to get in the winter when the pine needles freeze solid.

See box #8, CHANEY RANCH.

Retired August 2007

From the hikers' parking lot (free even in summer) on the south side of route 156 (about 1/2 mile west of the long R ocky N eck exit ramp off of I-95, and across from Camp Niantic), take the blue-blaze trail west through a field and continue down towards Four-Mile River until you spot a blue blaze marker sporting a Cheshire grin. There to the SSE about a dozen steps away, you will find the 2 cats waiting for you sitting up in a four trunked tree!

It seems our cats only like the cat litter from one place - the A&P in Mystic. Every time we drive out of our way to get them their favorite dirt, we can't help but notice the giant boulder on the eastern edge of the parking lot that just cries out for a letterbox, So we finally put one in. It's just behind the cedar tree to the left of the boulder slightly buried under one small stone. Please rehide carefully so it doesn't get mowed over or removed, and think of our cats getting their dirt!

Fourth of July weekend 2006 marked a return to what had long been a Miner family tradition in the middle of the past century - the family picnic that used to be held at Pete's folk's house in Montville, CT - was held this year at our home in memory of what would have been Pete's mother's 99th birthday. Pete has spent many years researching his family's background and has a genealogy website, so we'd thought we'd also create a little historical letterbox series to mark this special family gathering.

To find the historical monument commemorating the first founders of Stonington, CT, take route 1 between Pawcatuck and Stonington to the light at Greenhaven Rd. Follow the brown public boat launch signs a few yards south, then right towards Barn Island a few yards more to park along the road just past the middle of the cemetery that is across the road on the left. Enter through the black iron gate and stop to read about Pete's first ancestor to reach this continent on the west side of the founders' monument. (Note the slightly different spelling of the name that was then in use) Standing in front of this inscription, approximately 45 steps away at 50 degrees, you may find this man's actual wolfstone grave, said to have been chosen by him from a broken ledge on his homestead and carved by his son in letters now barely visible. His wife's name is on the other side of the rock and those nearby table top gravestones make the final resting spots of his deacon son and grandson. From this area, continue north to a large cedar, then east along the stone wall to a boulder embedded in the earth not far from the stone wall corner. Two steps east from the top of the boulder should land you very near the actual spot of our "family relic", resting comfortably in a small cave in the wall behind a couple of whitish rocks and several smaller ones, about a foot off the ground. Please be sure to use the utmost discretion when removing and replacing these rocks, so that nothing out of the ordinary can be detected in this area.

About 75 steps due west will get you back to the founders' monument. From there, you may wish to explore a bit more of the cemetery, including the big old tree near the southern corner. A careful search behind one larger and one smaller stone in the fork of the exposed roots on the back side of the tree may yield you another tiny memento of your visit to this historic cemetery. Thank you for respecting all the details of cemetery propriety and helping to preserve our family relics!

We just couldn't get over how popular our A&P Rock letterbox turned out to be! Who would care to go letterboxing in a grocery store parking lot where we buy our cat litter, we wondered? Well. Apparently quite a few folks! So, thanks to our friend Hibiscus, we've found another place for some erratic letterboxing while grocery shopping, but this box will be between a rock and a slightly harder place.

Continuing west on Rte. 1 from "A&P Rock" will eventually get you to a place with the same name as the capital city of another state where I did my graduate studies in the late 70's. It has a nice little pedestrian walkway lined with sculptures, which, if followed in the direction of some good spirits, should lead you to a rock dedicated to Odziozo (or a very strong man depending on which legend you are following - see bronze plaque for details). Check under the mulched stone around the backside of the furthest back evergreen on the side of the rock nearest the grocery store for a little memento of your rocking shopping trip!

We were going to retire our old boxes at Chaney Ranch, but when friends asked us to leave them, we decided to add one instead! To find this galloping horse, just follow the original clues to the "sitting tree" and then continue to the first stone wall after that tree. Go left of the opening 5 steps and look low in southwest side of the wall.

Seems we just happened to have a little extra measure of "endurance" the other day when we went out 'boxing, so we couldn't resist tucking this tidbit into an already well packaged letterboxing meal! No, it's not meant to be a mental grinder, appeteaser, or hitchhiker - just a bit of added "endurance" for those who might want to get a bite more in their lunch box!

Well, we've planted A&P Rock, S&S Rock, even Galapagos Rock, so why not add another rock that was even more important to us to the collection? No, it's not the rock we were married on - that's on private property - but it is a rather distant second because it's the rock where we first thought about getting married, on Valentine's Day many years ago, when Pete first gave me a chocolate rose, and I first gave him a kiss!

We've dropped a hint in a nearby CT box, so everyone getting there after us and reading our entry will know where to go. Apparently we weren't the only ones to think of this rock as a good place to set up housekeeping, since the alcove at present contains a cupboard and a chair, and is rather close to a "power source". From the eastern end of the slanted king-size bedrock, cozy up to the large oak and look about 50 feet away at 100 degrees. The western cubby of a low-lying boulder hides our little rock pillow box!

1. Cross II:        To find this beautiful little Celtic Cross near the top of Mt. Ta-bor in the Os-we-gat-chie Hills, we recommend broiled yellowfin tuna, pink salmon with just a touch of roasted red pepper sauce and orange roughy en papillote. From the three-pronged utensil (make sure you use the right one!) and large split chunk of mahi-mahi near the top, take about 20 more steps southwesterly to a sizable crusty crabcake with a spot of orange carpaccio. Now locate the 2-pronged utensil lying perched to the left of a goodly portion of herb-encrusted filet of sole just 5 more steps due south. Look behind the magnetite sample embedded between the prongs for your first little treasure and please replace with care!

2. Angel II:        To find this little winged wonder, if you haven't already filled up on seafood, we recommend capellini (aka "angel hair") with pink vodka sauce, chilled cream of strawberry soup, or perhaps just a dash of iced pink champagne sorbet to clear your palate. Continue to take the "high road" along the smooth-sailing flatstone ridgetop until you see something that may remind you of dessert in the middle of the trail! ( It certainly did for me: raspberry panna cotta!:-) Whether it appears to you as a fruit-bedecked cupcake, tart, creme brulee, souflee, or hot fudge sundae, simply turn away and take 33 steps at 333 degrees to the edge of a large ledge of angelfood cake, devil's food cake, cheesecake, or whatever you might fancy! Behind another 3-pronged utensil standing upright you may note a large diamond shaped wedge of chocolate or shortbread balanced near the front edge of your cake. If you wish to partake, simply remove the gray iced crystalline wing tucked beneath, noting how to reposition it properly, and there's your angel!

3. Batty II:        To find you're still in the pink and not really going "batty", (as we thought we were when we planted this box 3 steps away from a sign marked the "END", only to find out that evening that another box had been planted just hours before within spitting distance of where we'd planted, so back we hopped on the carousel to move batty to a new spot!), pass up any slices of fruit you see on your left (oranges, lemons or watermelons), until two little pink signs on your right may remind you of the sweet smell of "SUCCESS" (in Spanish!) Just after the second one, you may permit yourself one last little slice of orange if it's right and followed by a well-rounded drink of water. Before you go over the edge, if no one is looking, just push away the lettuce and tomato from under the near end of the big long breadstick on your right, and - yes - you have now officially gone "batty"! Please re-hide this one especially well, as we really don't want people going "batty" by accident - they just might not understand how much these little things mean to us! Now, it's back to our first day fish - Wahoo!!!
Hope you enjoyed this little carving and culinary fiesta!

Inside the old lady who swallowed a fly
Parts rumbled and bumbled before she could die.
East from her last rest spot post swallowing horse
Can almost be seen a tomb covered with moss
And five feet to far end this bottled up rhyme
Could just save her still if you find it in time!

Although one old lady we couldn't revive.
Her sister nearby struggles hard to survive.
Sharp, wizened and wrinkled and sprawled in distress.
Just how she still lives here is anyone's guess!
She's come on hard times and her life's on the rocks,
But beneath her back bustle she flaunts a pill box!

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