Merrill Creek is a 650 acre reservoir surrounded by a 290 acre Environmental Preserve with an additional 2000 acres of woods and fields.  Its main purpose is to store water that can be released into the Delaware River, to make up for the evaporation water usage at certain electric generation units in the time of low flow in the river.

The building of this site has created a beautiful setting, a setting, where one can experience many opportunities for water and/or land recreation along with learning about the Environment!  NOTE: One nice feature of this site, there are several parking areas located all around the reservoir with fairly easy access to the various locations.  There are two parking areas at the main entrance, one for the Visitor Center the other for the boat launch with plenty of room for boat trailers.  There is a small parking area just beneath the main dam, giving a breath taking view up the huge rock wall of the dam.  Fox Farm Road has two parking areas, one giving access to top of the dam coming from the west, the other giving access near the intake/outlet tower.  The tower area gives the visitor great reservoir views, it also provides and scenic panorama looking west off the top of the mountain, with views of the Delaware Water Gap and the Wind Gap continuing into Pennsylvania.  All these access points makes this a truly Family friendly visit for all ages to enjoy!!

The site is open seven days a week, dawn till dusk.  The visitor center is open and staffed weekdays 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Weekends 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. I can’t emphasize enough what a great place to visit!!  By yourself or with a large group the Visitor Center has many photos, artifacts, natural scene settings and exhibits!  There are many well marked trails which offer the visitor some great outdoor opportunities to see wildlife and some very beautiful scenery!

See for yourself at http://merrillcreek.com.

Well, let us begin our visit.  We will be following the black trail, which is a large loop around the reservoir, 5.5 miles.  We begin at the visitor’s parking lot near the Environmental Center, from there we will be heading south along the east shore.  We are going to cross over several dams and we are going to literally walk down one side of the main dam and up the other side giving us some interesting views. Keep in mind, this reservoir is atop a mountain, you will be reminded of that several times with some great panoramas looking west over Warren County’s rolling terrain.

Please visit my Flickr site for you photo tour – https://www.flickr.com/photos/charliefineran/albums/72157650292767696

Enjoy Your Open Space

Charlie Fineran