Mercy Woods

A blaze along the Yellow Trail

I'm going to start with one of my favorite hikes in the state -- Mercy Woods -- which is administered by the Cumberland Land Trust. But first, a word about Land Trusts in Rhode Island generally -- each township has its own, though there is a shared goal of conservation of the land. The trusts have the ability to acquire land from private owners, as well as the responsibility to ensure that the land is preserved and conserved. You can learn more about how this works at the website for the Rhode Island Land Trust Council, which I'd recommend as the best place to learn about how this process works.

Mercy Woods takes its name from the Sisters of Mercy, a Catholic order devoted to caring for "people who are poor, sick, or undereducated." The Order's establishment in Cumberland, Rhode Island lay in the midst of more than 200 mostly wooded acres, including a high ridge overlooking the Diamond Hill Reservoir.  In 2018, in fulfillment of a longstanding wish of the community, 229 acres were transferred to the Cumberland Land Trust. At the same time, the town, with help from outside grants, was able to lay out a fine system of trails that circles and criss-crosses this newly-conserved land -- and it's one of the most beautiful trail systems in Rhode Island. The distinctive plastic blazes with their directional arrows are well-placed, making the trails easy to follow; as an additional bonus, part of the system intersects with the Warner Trail, a 30-mile trail that goes from the nearby Diamond Hill preserve all the way to Canton, Massachusetts.

So where to begin? The ideal starting point is a small parking lot on Sumner Brown Road just off Rhode Island Route 121. From there, you'll see a large grassy field; across the street is stone plaza which was originally a religious shrine. Start from the kiosk at the parking lot, where you'll be able to get a trail map, and head out on the Yellow Trail. The trail system is fairly straghtforward -- Yellow makes an unbroken inner loop around the property, while blue makes a larger arc around the eastern side. At variety of points, red-blazed trails, like spokes of a wheel, connect the inner yellow loop to blue. There is also a short purple trail -- white blaze markers with purple arrows -- known as the Grape Trail, which crosses over the hilltop and passes through grape arbors gone wild as well as open fields.

My recommended route continues along the Yellow trail, through forests of pine and oak, and crossing a small field near the hilltop. Shortly after this, take the Blue trail to the right; it follows stone walls and then ascends steeply to a ridge-top, from which in the leafless months there's a good view of the Diamond Hill Reservoir. As you descend the other side, you'll come to a cart-path where the blue blazes send you to the left; I prefer to go to the right where, after a gradual descent, you'll take the left-hand  fork in the road. 

The Warner Trail near Diamond Hill Reservoir

Look there for the small white discs that are the blazes of the Warner Trail -- these will guide you over a series of rocky ridges overlooking the reservoir, after which the trail winds around the hillside and re-joins the Blue trail. Continue on Blue, crossing Sumner Brown road, to where it rejoins the yellow trail near a large stone cairn; take yellow to the right and you'll soon find yourself back at the stone plaza across the street from the parking lot where you started. The great thing about this trail system is its variety -- you can take as much as you want of yellow or blue, and then cut over to the other loop via any of the red trails. The last of these red blazes (taking the recommended route) branches off from yellow through some lovely rocky forest to a small turnout off route 121; you can walk along this to return to the edge of the large field where you began.