Sudbury Reservoir

February 2, 2020 Cloudy

Sudbury Reservoir is an emergency backup reservoir for the Boston area, as an alternative to the Quabbin and Wachusett reservoirs.

From the small parking area, there is a short trail to the left, about 1000 ft, to the Sudbury Dam. The Dam is closed off and inaccessible. We saw a sign for the “Sudbury Dam Historic District” and there is a small parking area for it. But we only saw one or two abandoned buildings and the closed-off dam, so there’s not much to see.

Turning right, there is a carriage road that hugs one side of the reservoir. The trail was wide and mostly flat. Since dogs are not allowed in the state park area, the trail was clean. We saw people jogging and families with little kids.

There are many large trees planted along trail, and a beautiful stone wall. The carriage road follows the reservoir on one side, and the other side borders a small hill called Pine Hill. There are different trails branching off from the carriage road to access the reservoir or to explore the hill. However, many of these side trails aren’t properly maintained. When we tried to follow one to Pine Hill, we quickly lost the trail and had to turn around.

We went in the winter and didn’t see a lot of wildlife. However, we noticed evidence of beavers and also heard and saw large birds.

This is an easy and pleasant walk to get outdoors.

• Enjoyable walk along a dirt road with trees lining both sides.
• Pleasant enough, but not much to see though.
• An excellent example of why they should change all the state parks that are forests to state forests, so there could be around 5 state parks left and this blog wouldn’t be SO BORING.
• There was just a bunch of hills and leaves and dead bushes. OK.
• It was just a regular flat path. I liked the side trail we tried to hike.

For more information: Sudbury Reservoir official site