US-11621 Copicut WMA
There are car parts strewn all over the "road" that leads into Copicut Wildlife Management Area in Freetown, Massachusetts. The road itself is something of an anachronism, a named dirt road that stretches at least three miles, nearly straight for its entire length. The road looks like it has been the recent target of artillery practice and I don't believe you are going to get all the way down it without a specialized vehicle of some sort.
Many have tried, many have failed.
The WMA is in several small slivers, wedged into other wildlife areas. As you walk down Copicut Road, you are walking through or near pieces of US-4698 Freetown State Forest, the Massachusetts Biomass Reserve, the Wampanoag Indian State Reservation, Miller Brook Conservation area, the Watupa Reservation Wildlife Conservation Area (WCE), and a WCE buffering the Copicut WMA. All of these are abutting areas, so no two-fers, though it's worth activating US-4698 Freetown State Forest while you are there since you will be walking right through it to get to the WMA.
See that parking area in the middle of the map? You are not going to park in that spot because you won't be able to get to that spot. Instead, follow Copicut Road from South Main Street (upper left on the map) until you reach this sign:
There will be a parking area to your right, and that's where you should stop. The holes on this road are seriously deep and hide nasty rocks and debris from less fortunate vehicles. Even the parking area here is a bit dicey...
From this spot you are roughly a mile north of the most accessible slice of the WMA. Walk along the road admiring the collection of auto parts until you reach this gate on the right:
This will be a marked trail on most map and it runs along the northern border of the WMA. You're still inside Freetown State Forest at this point and can turn south just about anywhere after the first quarter mile or so to cross over into the WMA.
The trail itself is lovely, contrasting with the road you just stepped off of, a typical utility road through a young New England pine forest. Roughly half a mile in, look for a subtle track on the left – it leads into the WMA. The trailhead is opposite a SE Biomass location marker up high on a pine.
(L) From here the trail is wide and easy; (C) Look for a small, subtle cut on the left, then (R) find markers for the WMA boundary.
I was happy to find a comfortable spot to set up on, and the bands were cooperating, so it was a relatively quick operation, 20 minutes or so to log 14 QSOs on 20m.
On the walk in I'd found a penny on the ground and picked it up. As I strolled through the graveyard of car parts strewn along Copicut Road I realized that my luck had been getting in and out in one piece!
Copicut WMA is in an area packed with several other POTA references, and if you are here for, say, Freetown State Forest or US-2430 Dighton Rock State Park, it probably makes sense to stop in for a quick activation. Dighton is a two-fer with US-0891 Taunton National Wild and Scenic River, so in just a few hours you could snag a Warthog by throwing in US-11678 Mill Brook Bogs or US-4699 Berkley State Forest, both all quite close to one another.
