The Cackling Tunnel
New Jersey

 

 

 

 

This rail tunnel, which was blasted through a picturesque mountainscape in the mid-19th century, has been abandoned for nearly a hundred years. The right-of-way is completely overgrown, showing almost no trace of the four tracks that once met here. Nor is there any remnant of a station.

While each of the two tunnel segments is dangerously caved in, the large piles of masonry and rocks in the Eastern corridor make it nearly impassable. Large boulders dangle from the wrecked ceiling, waiting for the right moment to crash onto the mounds below. There are deep gashes even in the tunnel's sides. Following the tunnel's route on top of the wooded mountain is disorienting, but the sudden plunging holes in the forest floor where the ceiling broke through will indicate its course.

The southern end of the tunnel is flooded, an invitation to a refreshing swim. For a moment it seems that others have already followed this invitation and are now splashing around a deep pit in the tunnel's middle, their muted laughter drifting towards the southern portal. But the sound is coming from beneath the treacherous boulders and perhaps this invitation isn't so welcoming after all.

And after a few minutes of listening, it becomes clear that the tunnel is completely desolate. No one has been here in a very long time; what sounded like laughter is only the water falling from the ceiling, its dripping distorted into the cadences of children's voices. Deep inside this still and desolate forest, the tunnel plays alone, alive and cackling to itself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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