The moment we began hiking the other day at the TriTown Forest Preserve, which spreads out over 532 acres in North Stonington, Preston and Griswold, the trail began going up, up, and up.

The path then descended, climbed again, dropped back down, and continued to rise and fall, over and over. By the end of a seven-mile ramble, Maggie Jones, Phil Plouffe and I had gained and lost almost 1,000 feet of elevation.

“This is very rugged terrain, with all kinds of nooks and crannies,” Maggie observed. Plenty of rocks and roots made for even more challenging footing.

Not that we were complaining. The preserve’s Blue Trail took us on a breathtaking tour into rocky ravines, around semi-frozen vernal pools, along tumbling streams, and over Rixtown and Lambert mountains, which offered expansive views of the surrounding countryside.

If it weren’t for the Avalonia Land Conservancy, southeastern Connecticut’s largest land preservation organization, we could have been gazing at a sprawling housing subdivision.

There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with neighborhoods – people need places to live. But major new subdivisions shouldn’t be built on land overflowing with wetlands, containing extensive native and colonial walls, and teeming with wildlife.

A survey by Connecticut Botanical Society and Carya Ecological Services identified more than 300 plant species, including 11 considered rare, living in the forest. In addition, a report by Robert Askins, professor emeritus at Connecticut College, called the diversity and density of forest birds “truly exceptional; no other Avalonia preserve comes close.”

These findings helped Avalonia obtain government grants and raise private funds to purchase the tract from a Tennessee developer in 2018. The acquisition guarantees that the land will remain a protected preserve, open only to hikers, photographers and birdwatchers. Since its formation in 1968, Avalonia has extended similar protections to some 4,000 acres in the region.

When friends and I hiked sections of the forest in 2018, and again two years later, we wound up doing a fair amount of bushwhacking because a trail network hadn’t been completed. Thanks to volunteers, 10 miles of well-marked paths now crisscross the preserve, giving hikers a wide range of options.

We decided to skip easy bypass routes and traverse the more difficult but rewarding Blue Trail that more or less follows the preserve’s perimeter.

Only minutes into the hike, we stopped to watch a mixed foraging flock of eastern bluebirds, yellow-rumped warblers, titmice and woodpeckers flit among branches of a tall birch tree, feeding on seeds.

Many different species of small birds tend to stick together this time of year to keep a lookout for predatory hawks, Maggie explained.

Not long afterward, the trail crested a ridge leading to the 500-foot summit of Rixtown Mountain, named for James Rix, a colonist who bought land west of Billings Brook in 1703. A few months later, Rix sold a portion of his property to Ebenezer Lambert.

After descending Rix Mountain, Maggie, Phil and I followed the trail up 543-foot Lambert Mountain. Rix and Lambert were among a group of settlers who struggled to grow corn, raise sheep, make charcoal and dig quarries, before eventually abandoning the land.

Native Americans had inhabited much of the surrounding forest long before the arrival of the Europeans; vestiges of their serpentine stone walls and cairns blend with those built later by the colonists.

We also passed a section of the “Old King’s highway,” a footpath that had been a major thoroughfare from central Rhode Island to Norwich and points west some 250 years ago.

The Blue Trail measures 5.2 miles; we tacked on a couple extra miles on other paths. The preserve has nearly 10 miles of trails – after so many ups and downs, what’s a little more distance?

We accessed the preserve via a trailhead at 116 Miller Road. There are other trailheads at 89 Miller Road, 306 Richardson Hill Road and 354 Rixtown Road – take your pick.

More information, including a map: https://avalonia.org/tritown-forest