5 Reasons, Four Ponds

5
Reasons why Four Ponds Conservation Area is one of my favorite places in Bourne.

• Biking - Recently I resumed biking after a hiatus of nearly two years. (My Silver Spring, Md. neighborhood was not very bike-friendly, to put it mildly.) At Four Ponds, there are four trails; biking is permitted on the two longest ones. They're absolutely awesome. There's enough topography to make it a challenge.
  
• Hiking - Two hiker-only trails wind around The Basin and Freeman Pond. This is the most scenic hiking in the conservation area.
  
• History - The Pocasset Iron Foundry was once located here. No buildings still stand, but each of the Four Ponds are man-made. At the lower end of each pond are the remnants of dams that are nearly two centuries old.
  
• Wildlife - I see a pair of mute swans almost every time I go by Upper Pond. With pond, forest and bog terrain, there are about 40 types of birds that nest in the area.
  
• Solitude - About every third time I go to Four Ponds, I run into somebody else. They're often walking a dog, and they're almost always in the relatively small stretch of trails around the ponds. Elsewhere, I never see anybody. For the vast majority of the bike-permitted trails, I'm the only one out there. I know I'm no Alexander Supertramp -- you can hear Route 28 traffic in the distance here sometimes -- but in some of these back areas, I've gotten lost several times in the last two weeks. It's actually a pretty cool feeling, but only because I found my way back before sunset.