Leslie Run, Laurytown And The Lehigh River Gorge. And Snow!!!

Often in life, things don’t turn out as planned,  but you got to make the best of the situation.  Had two setbacks today but didn’t let either ruin my day.

I had decided to hike the Lehigh Gorge with a friend.  I was going to drive down the dirt road that runs along Leslie Run and then hike up to the point where the Hickory  Run creek enters the river. This is where I first saw the river when I camped in Hickory Run Park as a cub scout.

We got to the Leslie Run road and found it closed to motor vehicles. It is a little over a mile to the river  so we decided to walk down anyway. I got out of the car and realized I forgot my camera memory card.  Didn’t let these setbacks stop us and hiked down along the beautiful Leslie Run. There is a beautiful water falls on the creek and I decided to wait until the return trip to take some pics since.  And, along the way, in a hollow near the falls was a pile of snow!  And it wouldn’t be the last snow we found today.

The dirt road crossed Leslie Run over an old bridge. The road lead to a train station which had stops for a number of railroads over the years.  the oldest reference  I could find was regarding it’s use as a stop to get to the Middle Coal Field Poor District Alms House, which I did not know existed until today.  i am learning a lot of cool stuff writing this blog. Found another  informative article on the Alms house and this will be for another blog . A great read for local history buffs. 

But back to my hike. We walked by the ruins of  some old concrete probably associated with the long gone train station and up to the path of the Lehigh River Gorge trail, We didn’t have time to get to the Hickory Run creek but did explore the ruins of one of the locks from the old Lehigh Canal.  The upper portion of the canal from Jim Thorpe to White haven was destroyed by floods in the early 1860’s . And on the bottom of the old locks we again found the remains of more of the dreaded white stuff, snow.

We hiked back but by now my IPhone battery was about exhausted from taking photos and I couldn’t get that picture of the fall on Leslie Run, But there’s always next time.  On the way back found an old abandoned cemetery and I am wondering it it could have been associated with the Middle Coal Filed Alms house. If anyone has any information please feel free to share it. I love exploring our area and it is even more interesting when you stumble on some long forgotten place. 

Here is a link to some more photo I took with my IPhone today.  https://keepyoureyespeeled.net/photographs-5/nggallery/blog-photos/leslie-run-to-lehigh-river-april-19-2015#gallery/017a6177fb0c480decffe859d2d50cf1/1937