Sat, Sept 26 (rain date Sept 27) 12:30pm – 3:30 pm with staggered starts.
Registration is required (and free) at https://portland.recdesk.com/Community/Program/Detail?programId=573
Come join the greater Portland community for a leisurely ride on the beautiful Air Line Trail! The trail is a mostly flat, gravel trail ideal for all ages and levels of experience. The ride is approximately 5 miles round trip. CDC recommended COVID-19 safety practices will be followed.
Some additional details:
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This event is open to all (you do not need to be a Portland resident).
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A credit card is NOT needed to register.
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You will have to create an online account with Portland Parks & Rec.
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You will receive your assigned start time when you register.
A study to determine the best route for the Newfield Corridor Trail has begun. Design and construction of the trail was funded by the 2015 Parks Bond, and assigned a budget of $4 million. This multi-use bikeway will be an extension of the Mattabesset Bike Trail southward from Tuttle Road to Veterans Park. (
It is that time in the season when you may have more cucumbers and zucchini then you can eat or put up. If you find yourself in this situation, consider donating your excess produce to our local food pantries and put it to good use. Details for Middletown and Portland are below:
For the past 4 years, the Jonah Center has organized work parties of 20-30 paddlers each to remove invasive water chestnut (trapa natans) from the Floating Meadows, the 1000 acre freshwater tidal marshland formed by the Mattabesset and Coginchaug Rivers.
Due to the pandemic, the Jonah Center has not organized large work parties. We have encouraged paddlers to go out solo or in small family groups. Bring a large plastic bag, gently pull up plants by the roots, place them in the bag, and deposit the plants near the informational kiosk in the boat launch parking area.
I’ve often wondered about espaliered trees, and they even figured in a short piece of fiction I once wrote. Espalier is the art of training dwarf trees to grow in a flat plane along a wall, fence, or trellis. They create an atmosphere of mystery, wonder, and an evocation of some kind of Garden of Eden. I’ve stopped to admire them at botanical gardens and occasionally at Ballek’s nursery in East Haddam. Because we see them in famous gardens, we tend to think of them as expensive or unattainable, as something no longer possible. As you will learn, you can easily grow an espaliered fruit tree for under $20 (under $30 if you choose a tree with four different types of apple or pear bearing branches) but you’ll need some simple hardware that might cost another $15. Or, you could just use bamboo, the way growers do. You will likely have fruit much sooner. I never bought an espaliered fruit tree from a nursery, but I did buy a very tiny birch that Nancy Ballek had pruned on dwarf rootstock that was highly contorted. Sixteen years later it is still 30” tall and about 40” wide. That demonstrates the power of dwarf rootstock. And that is the secret of espalier. 
Portland’s Air Line Trail Steering Committee has worked with private property owners to define a route that would extend the trail going west from YMCA Camp Ingersoll to Route 17. The committee is in the process of requesting formal easements from these property owners. This phase 2 segment will then require state or federal funding for final design work and construction. The proposed route (shown here) makes various turns that deviate from the original Air Line Trail right-of-way, due to sand and gravel excavations underway by Butler Construction. Completion of this segment will greatly advance the ultimate goal of connecting the Air Line Trail with Portland’s town center and the Arrigoni Bridge.
