Edgewood Oak Brush Plains Preserve

Jinx Thinks: 

We did the blue trail when we visited this park, and the trail was pretty narrow for most of the time. Since I’m young and still learning, that was pretty distracting to me, but overall I did like it. Plenty of sniffs and since the park is so big, we only saw a few people! 

Our Thoughts: 

We definitely struggled our first time there with finding the start of the blue trail. We ended up on a paved path and ended up connecting with the blue trail further along. We would suggest bringing your phone with you your first time or two here, it would be easy to get turned around, we ended up using Google Maps a few times to check that we were going the right way. The scenery was lovely and the trails themselves were easy to walk along, the terrain was nice and flat, just a little narrow in places with Jinx (he’s a big boy). We had seen on the way in that the trail straight up the middle was not actually a trail and was closed, that we had to choose to go left or right, but accidentally ended up coming back through that middle path on our way back to the parking lot. We only came across a couple of people, and a couple of other dogs. We saw a few mountain bikers but they stayed off the foot trail which was nice. From what we saw, the preserve was very clean.  Beware, we have gotten ticks from this park, even sticking to just the wide, paved trails!

Fun Facts & Sights to See:

• The middle path when you first come in leads to a large field that is used for model airplane flying by the Edgewood Flyers Club.
• Historical Fact: this park was the site of the Edgewood State Hospital, a former asylum that was commandeered by the War Dept. during WWII for battle traumatized soliders.  After the war, the hospital was transferred back to the state and became part of Pilgrim Psychiatric hospital for a few years.
• Things to spot: there is an old rail spur and fire hydrants left over from the property’s time as a hospital.
• Spooky: it is believed that the spirits of some of the former patients of the asylum are still here in the park. Some people have claimed to feel a cool breeze blow through them when they stand where the huge infirmary building used to be, and others have claimed to see misty figures in the trails.
• Things to spot: the paved path in the park is Old Commack Rd.
• Know Before You Go: there are no bathrooms here! And the only garbage can is at the entrance to the preserve, so plan to carry back any poop bags!