Merry Christmas to all my Trail Head friends! Hope yours was enjoyable and relaxing and filled with good family, friends and food.

I made a quick jaunt down the highways and byways to New Jersey for the holiday. And despite the short visit, it was good fun.

Besides all the socializing with family, unwrapping of gifts, football, endless platters of food, beer and wine and all that stuff, one of the highlights was a refreshing walk through the countryside midday on Christmas.

Six of us struck off for a six-mile hike on the nearby Patriot's Path, a lovely walk through fields and farmlands and woods along the Raritan River through Long Valley.

This is exactly the New Jersey I used to know and and still love (I've been in Maine nearly forever, but I'm still a native NJer), not the much-maligned Jersey that most people hear about.

For several delightful hours we strolled along old paths and up the abandoned rail bed, never far from the placid Raritan River (one of the best trout fisheries in the state).

Through the bare branches of the oaks and poplars we could see the long mountain ridges rising up into the gray December skies; mountains that once impeded the forces of George Washington's army during the Revolutionary War.

Horses in the fields were cloaked in colorful blankets. A dark-furred marten scurried along the river bank, while a great blue heron posed statuesque on a gravel spit. Sparrows flitted about the trees. A sheep peaked at us warily from behind a barn. Wreathes with red bows lined a white fence. And a handful of overlooked balsam firs stood on their posts at a farmstand.

All the while the cool, damp air and brisk pace infused our bodies with spirit and energy, enough to carry back to the house and the dinner table and a continuation of the holiday-ing.

I'm back home in Maine now and trust that you are too. A bit weary and bloated but ready nonetheless to take on the coming winter. Well, I think there's a winter coming anyway.

At week's end I'll be shuffling off to Sugarloaf for the New Year's festivities. And you? What are your New Year's plans? Skiing, hiking, couch-potato-ing? And how was your Christmas holiday?

Starting out on the Patriot's Path.

Trout pool on the Raritan River.

On an old RR bed trail that stretches from NJ to PA.

Through the woods on the Patriot's Path.

Following the lovely Raritan River.

The delightful farmland and mountains of northern NJ.

Passing a colorful silo.

Christmas presents to myself (stuff you can only get in the NY-NJ-PA area): Pork roll and Yuengling beer!