Hop Brook Lake: Navigating Memory Lane

Memory is not a navigation tool.

Back in February, while in my home state of Connecticut, I had a few free hours and decided to spend them at Hop Brook Lake. Run by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the 536-acre Hop Brook Lake Recreation Area in Middlebury (plus Naugatuck and Waterbury) is only six miles from where I grew up in the 1980s and early ’90s.

Whenever I’ve thought of Hop Brook in the decades since, it’s first as a middle schooler watching my brother’s high-school cross-country races there. I recall a herd of runners passing by, disappearing into woods, and eventually appearing across the lake, one by one, at breaks in the trees. Secondly, I recall snippets of running my own cross-country races there as a freshman, taking off down the park road and then onto trails around the lake.

I was curious to revisit the spot three decades later, maybe see some birds, and walk around the lake. I expected some dormant memories would awaken and fill in the gaps as I (slowly) retraced my steps. However, Hop Brook proved both bigger/more rugged and smaller/more developed than I remembered, and the gaps in my memory widened, sending me down a rabbit hole.

While park facilities were closed for winter, you can park at the gate and walk, run, and hike on the paved roadway and trails. Many people, and a few dogs, were doing so on this weekday afternoon. One cheerful older gentleman told me he’d already walked there that morning, but then his friend called, and they decided to go walk together. It’s a popular spot.

The Birds

New England weather was unpredictable this past winter, far warmer than average (ahem…climate change), but occasionally very cold just a day or two later. I didn’t know what to expect for wintertime birds, and though I’m sure they were there, I have no recollection of seeing or hearing any during fall high school meets decided before. eBird promised some though.

Setting off down the park road, I immediately saw several Mallards swimming in Shattuck/Meshaddock Brook.

Continuing along the brooks and meadow, I heard Song Sparrows and briefly saw a White-throated Sparrow rustling through leaves on the ground. I also saw a White-Breasted Nuthatch, several American Robins, a Downy Woodpecker hammering away, and briefly a Blue Jay.

The highlight was the four Hooded Mergansers swimming in Hop Brook. I find Mergansers fun to watch, gliding smoothly and continuously, usually paired off.

All in all, a brief overview of birds, but a nice start for a walk. An eBird checklist for this spot just days after my walk recorded more than 18 species including Common Mergansers, a Belted Kingfisher, and Carolina Wrens. Not only did Hop Brook offer up birds, it offered a clue that my memory might be incomplete. Despite being right in the name, I’d forgotten there was a brook.

The Trails

I’d come to check out the trails around the lake I did remember though (or, as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers calls it, the 21-acre recreation pool).

I had looked for a trail map beforehand, briefly. I love maps, and I love knowing all my options. But with limited time, I figured a map wasn’t essential. Hop Brook Lake Recreation Area is not large. It has a paved road through it and a dam at one end of the tiny lake.

See the picture below? I planned to walk around the lake, connecting its two sides by the dam. That’s it. You barely need a sense of direction for such a route—it’s a small circle—and since high school cross-country races are around 5K, I wouldn’t be heading far.

As I approached the lake, I found a network of mountain biking and hiking trails extending east. Without a map to link up a more interesting route (darn it), I only veered off shortly on the Overlook Trail and then back down to the lake’s beach. In summer the lake is open for swimming—except when it’s frequently closed for high bacteria levels, especially after heavy rainfalls. If you’re into fishing, bass and panfish reportedly are found in the lake, and its feeder streams (like Hop Brook!) are stocked with brown, brook, and rainbow trout. It’s a popular recreation spot, when water quality allows.

With the lake on my right, I confidently continued my clockwise circumnavigation, headed off the paved roadway again, and easily found trails rising over the saddle by the dam and its spillway. These singletrack trails (Spillway, Saddle, and Log Broom) weren’t long, but were more rugged and picturesque than the paved road, which I enjoyed. They also were quiet and absent of other people, which I also enjoyed.

I knew these were not the trails I’d run in high school though. I recalled staying down low with just a smaller, wider hill or two, and wondered if that trail had since disappeared into marsh or if it went behind the hill I was climbing. No matter, I climbed up the embankment and over to the dam.

And then I was at the dam, and I could not figure out how to get around the lake. The tiny little lake. I could just walk across the dam, and did so briefly. But I remembered running around the lakeshore, and I was certain I’d remember running up and across a 97-foot-high dam in the middle of races.

Had the trails or outlet changed in the past three plus decades? Probably. But they should still connect somewhere. Could I just go down the rocky embankment and make my own connection? Only if I wanted to disobey the warning signs which clearly said keep off. And even if I did, I knew that hordes of cross-country runners wouldn’t traverse a pile of jumbled, ankle-twisting rocks.

I surveyed the scene. Considered my options. I just wanted to go right over there! But the signs clearly stated to stay off these rocks. I could easily run across the dam to the main road or the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers parking lot and figure something out, but those options didn’t feel right. I was certain I was supposed go around via the shoreline, not cut through an official-looking parking lot.

So, being the rule follower I am, and not wanting the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to find me on their “stone slope protection area,” I backtracked to the singletrack, back over the hump of land, and to the park road.

Confused and a little annoyed that I hadn’t made a loop, I headed back to the car. On the way, I saw a map posted on a building (also below). Again, I love maps. But despite this one’s clear design and info, things remained muddy after reading it.

I’d read online mentions of folks walking around the lake. My own memory said I had run around it, and that I had watched others do so. But this map showed trails from both sides ending at the very rocks the signs said to stay off. The map confirmed I could have walked across the dam, through the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers parking lot, and down North Borrow Trail to the other side of the lake (dammit). But I was fixated on running around at lake level. And frankly, the other option didn’t feel right. It wasn’t what I had done before, what I’d come to do.

The Recall

My walk ended up being longer than the 5K route I envisioned, yet felt unfinished. I needed to know how I had circumnavigated the lake. (Was this how Magellan felt? Probably not.) So, I asked my best friend from high school if she remembered the racecourse. She did not. Next, I asked my older brother what he remembered, figuring someone who ran there for four years would immediately recall specifics. He wasn’t certain and needed to think about it.

In the meantime, I searched online and confirmed that high schools still run cross-country races there (I had that part right!). I even found some videos showing kids finishing cross-country races in the meadow near the brook with the mergansers. But, overall, results were scant. Nothing about the cross-country course itself, not even its distance. I learned far more about the annual spring Hop Brook MTB Race, which sounds popular.

Digging deeper, I found and emailed a local cross-country coach, who kindly sent me a map of the current course. It does not go around the lake. However, he recalled that the course changed around 2001, and it used to go around the lake. I knew it!

Via the dam.

Wait. What?!

Then my brother got back to me to say, yeah, the course ran up the dam and around the lake.

What again?!

Apparently, I had run around the lake, but somehow I’d erased the literal high point from my memory. How? I remember the anxiety of lining up before a race start. I remember feeling like vomiting. I remember the immense relief at the finish. The middle—eh, a few visions of ground and trees, trying to pass runners (or at least not be passed) on a small hill. No run up to and across a 97-foot-high dam, though, apparently, I did this more than once (maybe via Spillway Trail?).

I searched, yet again, and found an article describing a 2000 high school race. Among other info (including that my alma mater won this meet), it included this revelation:

They disappear through the woods, down the lake towards the Hop Brook Dam at its end. Minutes later, three tiny silhouettes stride across the top of the dam, then disappear again into the woods on the far side of the lake. A break in the trees, directly across the lake, flashes Holy Cross in the lead, Richnavsky 10 yards back, Watertown faded to 20 yards behind him. Nobody else is close.
—Register Citizen, October 5, 2000

Some pieces fell into place, and it felt like my vision began to clear. I started to remember (or is it reimagine?) waiting to see runners appear and cross the dam, their small silhouettes above before they descended into the woods, emerging across the lake through the trees. Then I tried picturing myself running across that dam; I’ve made it the top and it’s downhill from here. It must have felt good, as summits usually do, or least offered momentary relief from the anaerobic pain of racing. But I don’t remember any of that.

Memory can feel muddy, squishy even with facts. We remember what we’ve remembered before, even if we remember it wrong or incompletely or decades apart. Even when corrected, it’s hard to separate what we recall from what we reimagine, revise. When the gaps in my memory widened, what filled in those spaces?

Maybe I blocked the details out due to race pain. More likely because I’ve run many other miles and hills in the decades since, and I don’t remember most of them either.

I know there was a hill, a lake, trees. I know I ran, it hurt, and I was glad when it was done. I know maps are invaluable. Those things remain true.

I also know not to rely on memory for navigating memory lane.

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