Look for signs of beavers as you walk along the narrow and tumbling upper reaches of the Sudbury River in Highland Park. The Betty Fitzpatrick Trail looks down over wooded wetlands and a stream as it connects to the boulder strewn Saddle Hill. Stone walls and old cellar holes hint towards past land use, and additional trail connections to Hopkinton State Park and Hopkinton Area Land Trust trails offer longer hiking opportunities.
Saddle Hill and Highland Park
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Full Description
SVT's Saddle Hill Reservation links Hopkinton State Park with Hopkinton Area Land Trust (HALT) property to create a network of conservation lands that protect important habitat while allowing hikers considerable opportunities for exploration. Parking is available at the HALT Sand Trail trail head, near the corner of Greenwood Road and Saddle Hill Road.
HALT partners with SVT to protect Saddle Hill. HALT holds a conservation restriction (CR) on the land, which ensures that it will never be developed.
SVT's Highland Park Reservation protects wetland and upland forest along the banks of the Sudbury River. A parking pull-off and trail head is located on Wedgewood Drive.
- The hiking trail in Highland Park runs east-west through the property, with bog boardwalks and a bridge crossing a swampy area in the center of the parcel.
- Look for signs of beavers during your visit to Highland Park. The river here is often raised by their damming.
- In Saddle Hill, boulders and outcroppings are common, with topography rising steeply from the central stream corridor to the southern boundary and southeastern hill.
- Keep an eye out for the remnants of an old stone foundation along the trail at Saddle Hill.
- A 2017 collaborative effort by local Scouts, HALT, and SVT served to link the Sands Trail with the Betty Fitzpatrick Trail and with Hopkinton State Park.
Directions
For Saddle Hill:
From the intersection of Southville Road and Cedar Street (Route 85) in Southborough, follow Route 85 south for 0.6 mile. Turn right onto Cedar Street Extension and go 0.4 mile. Turn left on Overlook Road. Follow 0.9 mile and turn left on Greenwood Road. After 0.7 mile, a small parking area will be on the left, just before Saddle Hill Road.
Get turn-by-turn directions from your home at Google Maps.
For Highland Park:
From the intersection of Southville Road and Cedar Street (Route 85) in Southborough, follow Route 85 south for 0.6 mile. Turn right onto Cedar Street Extension and go 0.5 mile. Turn left onto Wedgewood Drive and continue 0.2 mile to a pull off near an SVT sign on the right.
Nearby Nature Sightings
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Debbie Costine photographed this Jack-in-the-pulpit in Southborough.
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Debbie Costine photographed this skunk cabbage and shared a description taken from National Wildlife Federation's website: "The flowers appear before the leaves and are characterized by a mottled maroon hoodlike...