Double Trouble State Park offers an outstanding example of the Pine Barrens ecosystem and a window into the Pine Barrens history. The park provides the protection and interpretation of over 8000 acres of significant natural, cultural, and recreational resources representative of the Pinelands National Reserve.

Its location and resource base afford an opportunity to introduce visitors to southern New Jersey's natural and cultural heritage. Both the natural environment, consisting of a high quality Pine Barrens watershed, and an extremely well preserved historic village associated with New Jersey cranberry agriculture and Atlantic White Cedar logging and milling industries are available to visitors at Double Trouble State Park.

Double Trouble State Park is open daily 8:00 am to dusk. 

Through the Carry-In/Carry-Out Program you can help us keep your parks clean and beautiful by carrying out the trash you carry in. Bags are provided throughout the site. Thank you for your cooperation and remember to recycle.

Several cranberry bogs in the Double Trouble Village section of the park are leased and maintained by local farmers. The leaseholder is on site daily; please use caution on the service roads around the bogs and reservoirs.

Unlike the days when the village's population of migrant workers would dry harvest the cranberries by hand over the course of several months, the leaseholder utilizes the modern wet harvesting technique of flooding the cranberry bogs and using machines to knock the berries off the vine. The cranberries then float to the surface of the water where they are corralled and removed from the bogs for processing. This wet harvest requires fewer people and is faster; it now takes less than two dozen people under a week to harvest the cranberry bogs at Double Trouble Village.

The harvest is open to the public to observe and usually occurs in mid-October. The public is not allowed to pick the cranberries or go into the bogs. Cranberries harvested at Double Trouble Village are taken to a central receiving station in Chatsworth and are not for sale at the park. 

The Double Trouble Village cranberry bogs are located between a quarter mile and a mile walk along dirt service roads from the parking area; no vehicles are allowed in the village. As this is a weather dependent livelihood for the leaseholder, there is never an exact start or end date; the berries are harvested once they are ready to be harvested. An approximate start date as provided by the leaseholder is posted on the Double Trouble interpretive center bulletin board and voicemail (732) 341-4098 after Labor Day. Please note that this is only an approximate date that can easily change at any time dependent on the leaseholder’s schedule.

Once the harvest has started, the voicemail message will be updated. The Double Trouble Village harvest takes approximately 4 days and the leaseholder usually starts working by 9 a.m. and works through mid-afternoon, usually reaching a breaking off point sometime between 2 and 4 p.m.  The cranberry harvest is not a demonstration or a festival – it is an actual harvest by the farmers who have been maintaining the bogs in the Double Trouble Historic District. Watching the harvest is self guided; there are no harvest tours and reservations are not required. Signs at the interpretive center in the park information building will direct visitors to the cranberry bogs. Various stages of the harvest may be observed, from the flooding of the bogs to the knocking of the berries, forming the famous cranberry “raft” as the floating berries are corralled to one side of the bog, and removal of the berries for shipment to the receiving station in Chatsworth.  (See Historic District Trails and Cranberry Bogs Map, for village bog locations.)

On harvest days that the Double Trouble interpretive center is open there will be scheduled tours of the early 20th century cranberry packing house that was used during the dry harvest era at Double Trouble village; there will also be a video of the dry harvest filmed at Double Trouble Village in the mid-20th century playing throughout the day in the interpretive center. 

Located on the eastern edge of the New Jersey Pine Barrens, Double Trouble Village provides a window into Pine Barrens industry with a complete company town, a sawmill, and a cranberry sorting and packing house.  Its natural resources are characterized by thousands of acres of undisturbed woodlands and the pristine waters of Cedar Creek.  This area has served as a focal point of human activity since the time of the native Lenape people.  Today it preserves some of the early industries that have shaped the landscape of the Pine Barrens while preserving its unique natural beauty.

The Double Trouble Historic District occupies over 200 acres and includes the village and surrounding bogs.  The natural environment of cedar forest and rapidly flowing stream provided both raw materials and water power for an extensive lumber industry from the 1700s to the 1900s.  As timber was cut, the cleared swampland created bog habitat ideal for growing cranberries.  A fruit native to North America, the cranberry was originally named the “crane-berry” because its blossom resembles the crooked neck of a sand crane.  Cranberry culture began at Double Trouble Village in the 1860s.  By the 20th century, the Double Trouble Company was one of the largest cranberry operations in the state.  With technological advancements and the change from the back breaking “dry” harvest of cranberries by hand to the mechanized “wet” harvest still used today, the large seasonal labor force of migrant workers who lived in the village was no longer needed.  Cranberry cultivation continues today in several bogs maintained by leaseholders.

Double Trouble Village was typical of company towns built in the Pine Barrens.  These isolated communities were entirely self-sufficient and totally dependent on the success of the particular industry.  The restored sawmill and cranberry packing house contain nearly intact equipment.  Those two buildings were the focus of life and work in the village, which also includes a late 19th century one room schoolhouse, general store, bunk house, cook house, shower house, maintenance shop, pickers’ cottages and the foreman’s house.  The restored sawmill and cranberry packing house are open during guided village tours, while the remaining buildings have been adaptively reused or are not restored and are closed.

The village was purchase by the State of New Jersey in 1964 to help protect the Cedar Creek watershed.  The Double Trouble Historic District was placed on the State Register of Historic Places in 1977 and on the National Register in 1978.

There are no picnic tables located in the park.  Cooking grills, fires, swimming, camping, and alcoholic beverages are prohibited.  Organized activities may require a Special Use Permit – contact the Island Beach State Park office at 732-793-0506 for details.

Download Double Trouble Historic Village Guide
Download Double Trouble General Information & Maps

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Double Trouble State Park is open daily 8 a.m. to dusk.  The interpretive center is open most weeks 10 a.m. to 3:45 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday; closed Monday and Tuesday.  Guided village tours, including viewing static exhibits inside the restored sawmill and cranberry packing house, start at the interpretive center.  As most of the tour is outside with walking on soft sand, participants should dress accordingly.  There are also wayside signs throughout the historic district recounting the ecological and cultural story of the area.  

Individual or group tours and hikes, school class trips, teacher professional development workshops, and Cub Scout, Boy Scout and Girl Scout advancement requirement programs may be arranged with the interpretive staff by calling 732-341-4098.

Download Double Trouble Scout Advancement Programs
Download Double Trouble Word Find
Download Build a Double Trouble Cranberry Scoop

The Cedar Creek watershed lies mostly in Berkeley and Lacey Townships and drains an area of 54.3 square miles.  Waterways within the Cedar Creek watershed include Cedar Creek, Webbs Mill Branch, Chamberlain Branch, Daniels Branch, Newbolds Branch, Factory Branch, Deep Hollow Branch, Huckleberry Branch, and several other unnamed tributaries of the Cedar Creek.  Cedar Creek drains into Barnegat Bay, and is part of the Barnegat Bay Watershed Management Area.

Like most Pine Barrens streams, the water of Cedar Creek is “tea colored” because of tannic acid from the roots of the cedars lining the river banks.  Ship captains reportedly filled wooden barrels with this cold water for their long sails in the Atlantic.  This pristine water gave Cedar Creek the alternate name of Clear Brook in the late-18th century.  Cedar Creek supplied both water power and raw material for several early industries, including lumber mills, iron furnaces, cranberry bogs and blueberry fields.

Double Trouble State Park was established in 1964 to help protect the Cedar Creek watershed and now features over 8,000 acres of Pine Barrens habitats.  From its headwaters in the Greenwood Forest Management Area to its mouth at Barnegat Bay, Cedar Creek provides the water required for cranberry culture and supplies a pure source of water for wildlife. Adjacent bogs and uplands provide examples of plants characteristic to the Pine Barrens.

Visitors to Double Trouble State Park can canoe or kayak Cedar Creek as it winds its way through the park.  There are three access locations in the state park:  at Dover Forge off Dover Road/CR 618, between Pinewald-Keswick Road and Lacey Road; at Ore Pond off Pinewald-Keswick Road/ CR 618, one mile west of the Double Trouble Village entrance; and at the White Bridge in Double Trouble Village.  Paddlers are permitted to carefully drive through the village to drop off or pick up their canoe or kayak.  There is no parking at the White Bridge.  Vehicles are not permitted at the Mill Pond Reservoir or around the cranberry bogs.

Tubing, rafting and swimming are prohibited at Double Trouble State Park.  Canoes and kayaks are not available for rent at the park.

Download Double Trouble Cedar Creek Access Locations

The Double Trouble Historic District has a self-guided, marked 1.5-mile loop nature trail and several miles of unmarked paths along sand service roads. Nature trail guides are available at the trailhead next to the cranberry packing house and at the park information building.

Download Double Trouble Nature Trail Guide
Download Double Trouble Historic District Trails and Cranberry Bogs Map

Double Trouble Village is an active cranberry farm. Visitors are asked to use caution around the bogs and reservoirs.  Vehicles are not permitted beyond the parking area except for canoe access at the White Bridge.  Horseback riding & mountain biking are permitted on existing sand roads only; mountain bikers and geocachers are asked to refrain from creating rogue trails.  No ATVs or motorized vehicles.  Pets must be on a leash (6 feet or less in length) at all times and owners must clean up after their pets. 

The Dover Forge Walk-In Area is located off Dover Road/CR 618 approximately 1.2 miles south of the intersection with Pinewald-Keswick Road.  The site of a former bog iron forge and cranberry bogs, Dover Forge has an unmarked 1/3-mile walking trail to a scenic overview of Cedar Creek. (See Cedar Creek Access Locations map for approximate location.)

Warning!  Ticks may be present year round.  It is advisable to take precautions and check yourself closely for ticks after visiting the park.

View the State Park Service areas open to hunting for 2009-2010.

Parts of Double Trouble State Park are open for hunting. For information about hunting, refer to the New Jersey Fish and Wildlife Digest or contact the park office.

• New Jersey Coastal Heritage Trail Route
• NJ Pinelands Commission
• Pinelands Preservation Alliance

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