Backpack Trail Guide

Trails / Massachusetts / Berkshires

Mount Greylock Hopper Loop: Money Brook, Wilbur's Clearing, and the Summit

Mount Greylock State Reservation (Williamstown, North Adams, Adams, New Ashford, Lanesborough)

This loop climbs Mount Greylock from The Hopper, the steep-walled valley on the mountain’s northwest side, and comes back down the Hopper Trail past the hike-in Sperry Road Campground. AMC Outdoors calls it “the best hiking/backpacking adventure you can do on Greylock,” and says it works as “an excellent overnight backpacking trip or very leisurely two-night journey.”

Backpacker, in a 1997 piece, said The Hopper holds “one of New England’s finest old-growth spruce forests.”

The hike

The loop starts at the Hopper Road trailhead (the DCR calls it Haley Farm) in Williamstown, which the DCR lists as accessible year-round. The DCR’s camping page lists it under “Campground DAY USE parking and trail access” and asks backpackers to give their overnight parking site when registering, so confirm overnight parking with the Visitors Center, (413) 499-4262. AMC Outdoors’ route follows the Money Brook Trail up The Hopper past Money Brook Falls. The DCR’s mileage sheet puts the AT 3.5 miles up and rates the climb strenuous.

Wilbur’s Clearing Shelter sits near the top, 0.3 mile from the AT on the Money Brook Trail and 0.5 mile north of Notch Road, per AMC Western Massachusetts. Western Mass Hilltown Hikers notes that Jeremiah Wilbur, the first European settler on Greylock, and much of his family are buried on the mountain. AMC Outdoors says the shelter’s closeness to the AT makes it busier than Deer Hill, and that its trailhead parking on Notch Road is day-use only.

From Wilbur’s Clearing the loop follows the AT south. The DCR lists 3.2 miles from Wilbur’s Clearing and Notch Road to the 3,491-foot summit, with its war memorial tower and Bascom Lodge. The mountain is crisscrossed by about 50 miles of trails, by Backpacker’s count, and the summit is also reachable by car from mid-May through October.

From the summit, the AT continues south 1.7 miles to the Hopper Trail junction near the Sperry Road Campground. The DCR describes Sperry as hike-in only. AMC Outdoors suggests an optional detour to the Deer Hill Shelter, which the DCR places on a trail 1.0 mile long between the Campground Trail and the Roaring Brook Trail. Western Mass Hilltown Hikers, who stayed there in 2023, describes a descent of about 700 feet over roughly half a mile to the shelter, “well worth the seclusion,” with Deer Hill Falls audible from camp.

The Hopper Trail then drops 2.4 miles back to the Hopper Road trailhead. AMC Outdoors notes that the old Hopper Brook dispersed camping area at the trailhead is closed.

For the full Appalachian Trail across the mountain, from Dalton to the Vermont line, see the Dalton, Mount Greylock, and Vermont line section.

Tips

Camping

Camping on Greylock is allowed only in designated areas; AMC Outdoors says it’s “prohibited outside of these areas.” DCR lists five lean-to shelters (Deer Hill, Wilbur’s Clearing, Bellows Pipe, Peck’s Brook, and Mark Noepel) open year-round, shared, with no reservations and up to 12 people each. Sperry Road Campground has 18 tent sites and 9 group sites, each with a picnic table, fire ring, and bear-proof locker, plus flush toilets, by reservation on ReserveAmerica during its main season.

AMC Western Massachusetts lists 4 tent platforms and 4 tent pads at Wilbur’s Clearing, with water on a blue-blazed trail in front of the shelter. It asks campers not to camp in the water source recharge area.

Inside Intel: Western Mass Hilltown Hikers recommends Deer Hill for its seclusion, noting fresh water, a fire pit, a bear box, and several tent platforms near the falls. AMC Outdoors calls Deer Hill lightly used and says it sits in a hemlock grove with a year-round stream just downslope.

Trail facts

The Lowdown

A tent platform at Wilbur's Clearing:

Wilbur's Clearing has four tent platforms and four pads near the top of The Hopper. See the backpacking tents reviewers recommend.

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Where this comes from

This page draws on the sources below, along with other guides and trip reports. Links go to the original pages.

Before you go: This page is based on published trail guides, trip reports, and reviews, along with official park and agency information where we could find it. It’s meant to help backpackers discover new trails, not to replace current, official information. Conditions, closures, permits, campsites, and water sources change, and some details here may be out of date or wrong. Confirm everything with the managing agency and check current conditions before you head out, and don’t rely on this page alone for safety or navigation. Backcountry travel involves risk.