Trail Tale: Avoca Trailhead, August 2010

I usually think of cabin fever as a wintertime occurrence, but the stifling August heat can also do the trick.  To avoid a scene like a WWF-style cage match in our basement / playroom--yikes, I decided to take an early, short hike at Hamilton County Parks' Avoca Trailhead off Wooster Pike between Mariemont and Terrace Park.  From the parking lot, he trailhead is located across the Little Miami Bike Trail and behind a small picnic shelter.  You can see it in the very center of the photo below between the two tall trees.

An informational sign provided by Hamilton County Parks marks the beginning of the trail which ends at the edge of the Little Miami River.

[A little Google searching led me to some historical information about the Armstrong family.  I placed a couple links at the bottom of the blog entry 'Fast Facts: Avoca Trailhead.' if interested.]


The trail starts with plenty of room and even terrain and turns into what looks like an old driveway for a few feet before narrowing down again. 

Along the way, we spotted a few splashes of wildflowers among the green, green understory.  Looking through the sun-dappled woods, I caught glimpses of some small, open prairies with patches of tall yellow flowers that could have been Wingstem or Brown-Eyed Susan.  If the boys weren't trudging along ahead, I may have been tempted to venture off the trail a bit to get a closer look, but then I would be breaking the code of conduct to stay on the marked trail and not disturb the wilderness!  I think, instead, I'll remember to bring my binoculars next time I hike (and some plant identification guides).  It would be fun to have the boys use the binoculars and try to find the plant in a book--if I could get them to stop long enough! 

About halfway into the short hike, I found a cool tree to add to my collection of cool tree photos.  Check it out:

It almost looks like an eye is peering at you from the bark--kind of eerie.  But no, it's a street sign lodged in the tree with the bark growing over most of the letters.  I wonder how it got there?  A person, most likely.  Or perhaps the river flooded after a storm and the rushing water hurtled the sign into the tree!  Okay, probably not.  Hiking always stirs my imagination...


Getting toward the end of the trail, the path becomes more congested and the plants tower above our heads.  You can tell you are quite close to the river when you reach a fork in the trail, as seen in the picture below.

Either one leads to the river, but the one to the left is a bit easier to navigate, even though the plants close in on you quite a bit.  There is a little patch of poison ivy stretching into the path as well.  And, it dips down just enough so that you have to watch your footing.  If I had a stroller, I'd probably park it near the fork in the path.  I ended up carrying my youngest, Miles (in football hold, of course) and grabbed Marshall's hand to steer him through the ivy. 


We suddenly encountered another hiker at the dip and she graciously stood back into the tall plants to let us bumble our way past.  The last time I hiked this trail, in the spring, the river was high and I'd say, dangerous if you are not careful.  But on this sweltering August day, I was delighted to find plenty of space to let the boys roam.  Their eyes were big at the wide beach of smooth stones before them and they each set out to toss as many of the stones as possible into the river lazing by.

In the olden days of cabrewing (ahem--canoeing!), this would have made a perfect spot for the crew to put down the oars and take a little "snack" break.  But today, I just enjoyed the beautiful scene, so deserving of it's status as a State and National Scenic River.  And, tried to keep Miles from getting too close to the flowing water. 

It was still before noon, but the humidity had already wet our brows and the boys were getting red-cheeked.  The hardest part of our hike was coaxing poor Miles to leave his beloved rocks.  He ended up in the football hold once more and we made our way back along the trail.  I noticed the canopy to this patch of woods and realized there were quite a few massive Sycamore trees providing our shade.  If my camera had not run out of batteries at the river, I would have snapped a few shots of their tall, wide trunks and papery bark--next time.


We ended our hike at the small picnic shelter, used the water pump to cool our faces, and gobbled up a quick snack while chatting with a friendly Biker...I mean, Cyclist--sorry guy, next time I'll get it right!  All in all a quick, enjoyable hike that I can come back to anytime I need to deter the boys from duking it out in the basement during a hot summer spell.