Village Park in Swansea, MA

Village Park in Swansea is tucked away near the Swansea Town Hall and the library on Stevens Road and offers miles of hiking and mountain biking trails. Even though there are miles of trails, the paths often crisscross, making it the perfect local spot to bring a family. You can either try to hike miles, or, if someone in your group gets tired, you can easily take a trail that will lead back to the parking lot.

Getting to Village Park

If you’re not from the area, finding Village Park can be a challenge. We had to turn around a few times while we were on Stevens Road. Benny told me to pull into the library parking lot, but I thought that was a ridiculous suggestion. Finally, I relented and pulled into the library lot, walked in, and asked for directions.

Then, to my shame and Benny’s glory, the helpful librarian told me that to get to Village Park, all you had to do was walk to the end of the library parking lot. She also gave us a well-detailed map of the park’s trails. Can you guess who gloated about being right for the rest of the day?

So, we grabbed our backpack and started our hike. Benny was still gloating, so I refused to let him ride in the bag. The first path brings you by a field. When you park, go right in.

Abram’s Rock

Our first stop in Village Park in Swansea was Abram’s Rock. Now here’s a rock with an interesting colonial-era legend: According to the tale, Abram was a Native American who left his tribe to live with the colonists. King Philip wasn’t too happy with that idea, and tracked Abram down, finding him sheltering in these rocks. King Philip gave Abram an offer he couldn’t refuse: either be killed or jump off the 40-foot rock three times. He made the jump successfully twice, but died on his third attempt.

Side note: The resources I’ve found have stated that this is just a legend. If any local historian can verify that this did indeed happen, please comment below.

Walking along in Village Park

We found the rest of the park to be peaceful. There are numerous rocks, boulders, puddingstone rocks…whatever you want to call them. Because there are so many trails, we needed to refer to the map often. For this reason, I wouldn’t suggest newbies explore the park later in the evening. Make sure you have plenty of sunlight left in the day just in case you need to do a little bit of backtracking. Also, remember to bring your water bottle and snacks.

You see, a certain bear friend of mine forgot his snacks and had the audacity to ask me for some of mine. I couldn’t let him go hungry, so I gave him some of the trail mix. Then he asked for more and complained that he was tired. I was too tired to argue with him, so I put him in my backpack, even though I told him that he wouldn’t get a free ride due to his earlier gloating.

Rusty Car Trail

When we go on our adventures, we like to have a goal in mind to keep things interesting. Our goal was to find the namesake of Rusty Car Trail. Because the map was a bit confusing, we had to backtrack a bit. Along the way, we found these see-saw-looking things, named Thing 1 and Thing 2. I thought we had transported into a Dr. Seuss book, but we later found out that these contraptions are for mountain bikers. Naturally, Benny wanted to have a picture taken on these mountain-biking see-saw thingamabobs.

Finally, we found the Rusty Car. Can you guess what trail it was on? If you guessed Rusty Car Trail, you would be right! All the trees around the Rusty Car have grown, so this car had to be brought into the woods years ago. If anyone knows or has a theory as to how this car ended up in Village Park in Swansea, comment below and enlighten us with your local wisdom!

Waterfall and Pond

The park also has paths that lead to this small waterfall and pond. The waterfall looks like it’s man-made (Benny says I’m being species-ist when I say that…how do I know bears like him didn’t make it? How do I know female bears didn’t make it? He does have some good points sometimes…)

We stopped at the waterfall and tuned into the sound of the stream. After what seemed like only five minutes, we were on our way again, but after I checked out the time, I realized that 30 minutes had gone by.

We ended up walking a total of over 7 miles in Village Park. (Well, Benny may have walked 4 and 1/2.) When we returned to the car, we were tired, yet content with the satisfaction of knowing that we spent a good part of the day outside.

As I buckled up, Benny climbed out of the bag. He attached his seat belt, looked at me, and said, “I knew I was right about parking behind the library.”

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If you like local hikes, you should read about our following adventures:

• Ridge Hill Reserve, Dartmouth
• Hiking Simmons Pond in Little Compton
• New Bedford Harbor Walk
• Destruction Brook Woods, Dartmouth
• A Stroll at the Westport Town Farm
• Gooseberry Island in Westport
• Sandwich’s WWII Remains
• East Over Reservation, Rochester
• Natural Resources Trust of Easton
• Colt State Park, Bristol
• The Knob, Falmouth
• Blackstone Gorge, Blackstone
• Quequechan River Rail Trail, Fall River
• Lyman Reserve, Plymouth/Bourne/Wareham
• Lawrence Island, Bourne
• Meshanticut State Park, Cranston
• South Mount Sugarloaf, Deerfield
• Hiking up Mount Wachusett, Princeton, MA

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Check out our map of places we’ve been in New England!

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