Koerber-Layne Conservation Easement Trails

Beginning at Dunbarton Elementary School, this trail network traverses a portion of the 200 acres of land protected forever with conservation easements by the Koerber and Layne families.

Dunbarton is located in N’dakinna, which is the traditional ancestral homeland of the Abenaki, Pennacook and Wabanaki peoples past and present. Abenaki people have lived in the place now called New Hampshire for more than 12,000 years. They are part of a larger group of Indigenous people who called themselves Wabanaki or “People of the Dawn.”

When Dunbarton was later settled by Scotch-Irish immigrants in 1752, the land that most of these trails cross was part of the “Parsonage Lot," land reserved to support the town’s first ministry. The Koerber trail (blue on map) wends its way through the woods 1 mile to Guinea Road, so named because Black families lived there in the late 1700s. The name "Guinea" likely refers to the West African region, which was a major source of enslaved people during the transatlantic slave trade 

Guinea Road leads to the Stone Farm, also protected by a conservation easement on its 200 acres, which was the town’s last working dairy farm. The Stone Farm features several impressive 200-year-old granite foundations and cellar sites on Stone Road. These mark the remains of the William Beard farm, which featured an expansive house and tavern built in 1793, which later burned in 1920.

Please note: If you plan to access the trails from Guinea Road by car, please be aware that for most of its length it is an unmaintained Class VI Town Road, and a high-clearance vehicle is advisable.