Wild Goose Trail Festival

Generous cut-offs, unending trail beauty, rockin’ aid station and sweet swag… join at Wawayanda State Park in Hewitt, NJ this September for the Wild Goose! The 36 hour cutoff for our 100 miler make this a squatchtastic event for those chasing after their first buckle. There will be several events running on Saturday and Sunday, camping at the beach plus local vendors to make this a true Trail Festival! We are supporting our non-profit partner, Bigger Than The Trail with this Trail Party!

The Squatchayanda Trail Festival course has a little bit of everything – mellow doublewide trails, rolling singletracks, boardwalks and a bit of road. Here is the feedback we hear from runners who have gone on the course–if you live in Northern NJ or the Hudson Valley area, these trails are very mellow, not technical and relatively flat. For folks coming from NYC, Long Island, Brooklyn ect these trails would be considered moderate and much more technical than city-trails and rail trails. So in the context of northern/NJ – the Squatchayanda Trails are mellow, rolling and not very technical. For anyone not used to running in the Jersey Highlands or Hudson Valley, you’ll likely find these trails to be more challenging than a tow path. There is around 100 ft of elevation gain per mile.

WILD GOOSE 100 Okay, so what’s with the name, Wild Goose? We’re so glad you asked… one of the possible meanings of the park name Wawayanda is… WAWA= “wild goose” and YANDA= “the way of”…. “The way of the wild goose.” We couldn’t think of a better name for this hundo. You’ll no doubt see plenty of wild geese hanging out at Wawayanda Lake! This is a GREAT first hundo for newbies chasing after their first buckle. With a generous overall cutoff of 36 hours you’re not going to be chasing cutoffs – there’s only one cutoff for mile 92.5! We don’t care how long the first 92.5 miles takes you and we don’t want you to be stressed about your pace. A lot can happen over the course of 36 hours; only having 1 cutoff at mile 92.5 gives you every opportunity to finish this race and recover if any setbacks come your way. You’ll be well-supported at this hundo with a rockin’ aid station that will be open all 36 hours. The Volunteer Dream Team will help you get that FINISH, so don’t feel like you have to have a Crew with you. There is 11,275 ft gain and 11,239 ft loss over the 100.25 miles giving you an average of 112 ft gain per mile.