Trail starts out pleasant enough.
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who do what they say they will do, and those who say they will do it.
-Vince Lombardi
Today, I decide to fill another gap in the Mass Central Rail Trail. This piece is close to Boston and runs about 2 miles, the same distance as the last gap. It’s to the east from where we live, whereas the last one was to the west. Still, it’s a good hour’s drive to get to where we start. However, the forecast is for temps in the 60s to low 70s, so we don’t have to leave at an ungodly hour.
I’ve been putting off this piece of trail because most of where we have to go, if we follow where the original railroad bed ran, will make us walk close by the actively used tracks for the Fitchburg Line of the MBTA Commuter Rail. We could go on nearby streets, in a serpentine path, to cover the same distance, but where’s the adventure in that?
The railroad right-of-way is quite wide, allowing for 2 sets of tracks. Having seen both ends of our path, I know there is plenty of space to avoid getting too close to any trains that go by. The tracks lay on top of a ridge of gravel, though, and I can only guess how walkable it will be too far off the rails. I’m also a little nervous because I don’t suppose the MBTA wants us there and they may make a stink when they find us strolling near rapidly moving trains. The Commuter Rail does go pretty fast. I don’t think it’s at all dangerous, or I wouldn’t bring Waldo (and what would then be the purpose of being there at all?), but you know how uptight people can be, especially when they think there are potential liability issues. But this isn’t the first time I’ve operated on the principal that it’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission. Well, perhaps it’s more accurate to say it’s more expedient, not better. Anyway, you can see that I am a little ambivalent about it.
Our journey begins at one end of a strip of tarmac that serves as parking spaces for a set of commercial buildings that run alongside the tracks. Phyllis, Waldo and I were there late last fall, when the weeds and leaves were all gone. I saw, then, what looked like a broad footpath that continued on past the end of the asphalt, going along what I was convinced was the original railroad bed. Today, at first, I couldn’t find it. There’s a solid wall of foliage that starts where the blacktop stops. But when I get close, I see, beyond the weeds, there is a narrow, dusty footpath, running on a dike, through a natural arbor of tall Japanese knotweed. As soon as Waldo sees it, he’s out on point at the far end of his leash and we’re off.
We don’t go a quarter-mile and the path turns to the north, where we don’t want to go, and to the south, to the railroad tracks. Just as we get there, still up on the dike, I hear a train bell dinging. Waldo and I stop and wait until its source, a slow-moving train, rounds a curve and comes into view. It’s going away from Boston, toward Fitchburg, and accelerating. There’s a diesel engine out in front and five passenger cars behind. Waldo isn’t bothered by it at all. It’s not as if that big noisy thing was a bicycle, after all. I wave and walk down to the tracks after it is gone. From here on, we will be near, but not too close, to the rails.
The walking isn’t hard for either Waldo or myself. We can easily maintain a good pace at the bottom of the ridge of gravel, a good fifteen feet from the rails. Much further away than that, though, and there are plenty of weeds that would make our walk a real slog. Waldo is very nonchalant about it all, sniffing and exploring his way along as if it makes perfect sense that we should be here. Knowing us, it does.
In about a half-mile, we come to Waverly Station. That explains all the dinging and the slow pace of the train. There is only one person at the station, waiting for the train going into Boston. I call out, “Hello!” and we continue on our way. The waiting passenger-to-be ignores us, absorbed in a book.
We pass one more station, Belmont, before we get to the end of today’s walk. All in all, three trains pass us, two going to Fitchburg and one to Boston. They all have the locomotive on the end of the train facing away from Boston, so the train going to Boston looks like it’s going in reverse. But diesel locomotives don’t really have a front and a back end and why turn something as huge as a train around if you don’t have to?
We are also passed by a pickup truck modified with wheels that allow it to travel on the rails, and some kind of big machine that is spraying some sort of liquid off to the other side of the tracks. I wave to them all and the guy operating the sprayer waves back. I guess I was worried about nothing from the railroad crew.
We did get some guff, but not from the railroad. Waldo and I walk along a driveway, where we turn around to go back to the car, and a guy in a pickup drives by and yells at us, saying that we’re on private property. “Cool down!” I call back. “We’re just walking.” Nothing more is said and we continue on our way without further ado.
Before too long, we get back to our car and head home. All said and done, it was just another walk on the rail trail.
And one more gap to receive a checkmark.
But then we have to walk alongside railroad tracks and trains.