Trail Tale: Dogwood Park, September 2010

Playground at Dogwood Park, Mariemont

This one is known as the "Green" Park to my boys since there are so many trees and plenty of grass surrounding the playground.  Or, it could be because the equipment is painted green.  Dogwood Park is within walking distance of our home, so it's kind of our go-to park when the kids get bored of the basement or backyard.  Plus, there is a Starbucks along the way.  We have hiked the trail which is tucked away in a ravine behind the playground a few times and once, savoring a couple hours to myself while the boys hung out at Grandma's house, I walked the creek bed beyond the trail and freaked myself out on the way back when I had trouble picking my way through the fallen trees and portions of the creek that were over ankle deep.  It didn't help that I stumbled across a leg bone of some kind. Deer? Probably.  Human? Nah. Dinosaur?  Maybe?!?  I also found myself face-to-face with a huge buck, antlers and all, who stared me down for several terrifying minutes despite my stomps, claps, and whistles before he ran away up the hillside.  Whew!


This is what I love about the woods at Dogwood--a literal slice of adventure cut from the thriving Village above.  These are like the woods of my youth, where at the age of 10, I once got lost for three hours.  I felt like I'd travelled to the end of the earth, but when I finally stepped out of the woods with tear-stricken cheeks, I was only in the neighborhood adjacent to my street and a (very) short walk back to the front door of our townhouse.


I think my boys found a little sense of that adventure during our hike today.  Come on, I'll show you.  From the playground, we descended the concrete steps...

 ...and arrived at the historic boathouse where Miles was thrilled to find a patch of gravel.

Walking away from the boathouse, there is a wide patch of grass lined with prairie plants and trees growing on the hillsides.

Along the way, there are a couple of paths to the right which lead up to the sidewalk along Wooster Pike in Mariemont.  When you encounter a cross path, take the trail to the left to enter the woods.

The trail will start to descend into the ravine and may be a little steep for the youngest toddlers.  The picture above gives you an idea.  Miles, at 23 months handled it well, with only a slip or two on the dry dirt. A few months ago, I simply carried him down the brief declines.  One of my impressions as we tromped along was that these woods are messy! 

Limbs Along the Trail

Everywhere you looked there were trees down and many limbs piled up along the trail.  The trails are kept clear, it's just that it looks like the wood is not removed.  This is good, I think, in maintaining the naturalness of the place.  Because it's quite a narrow ravine, all the hillside trees fall toward the center, crowding the bottom.  So, it's messy.  But it's a great place to strike up a conversation with the kids and observe how trees decay.  My two had fun looking for bugs

Can you find the little wormlike creature?

and grabbing handfuls of the brittle bark worn to dust. 

They even helped clear the path of some fallen branches.

After all the hard work, it was time to cool off in the creek.

Literally!!

 
I wasn't planning on letting the boys get all wet and I'm not so sure about the pollution levels in this creek, but stopping them was pretty impossible.  I have to say, it was fun to just let them go and explore and do what they were going to do.  I remember the freedom I used to feel exploring the woods this way as a child, with no regard for wet feet or possible poisoning from yucky water.  I, myself, though kept my shoes perched on the stones and a very careful eye on the boys.


My careful eye could do nothing about what happened next, however.  All of a sudden, I heard a rustle of leaves way up high.  Looking up, I saw the top of a tall tree beginning to fall and a scary wood crackling sound.  Although it was far away, this tree was tall enough that it could come close to crashing down on my older son.  "Marshall, do not move!"  He was kind of protected by the trunk of a tree that had fallen previously.  I was breathless for at least five seconds until I realized it was only a large branch breaking.  I could see the leaves of the tree trembling as the branch made its way to the ground.  We were no where near danger after all, but for a moment...ugh.


So now these woods had spooked me a second time.  I looked around at the "messy" forest floor and thought about the drought a few years back and how it seems we are still seeing results of that in dying trees all over the city.  In my neighborhood, it's common to see tree removal--and usually big, old trees that have rotted away.


The boys were wet, it was getting dangerously close to lunch time and after the tree incident, I decided we'd had plenty of adventure for the day.  So we made our way out, but not before finding some fossils in rocks along the way.

I'm no expert, but I believe this one is called a Crinoid.  Mariemont is full of fossilized rocks, in its woods and in structures built throughout the village.  Look for a future post on this topic, as it is one that has interested me in recent times.

After an adventure on the Dogwood Park trails, you can make your way back up the concrete steps by the boat house and have a snack at the picnic shelter

 and visit the restrooms located inside the lovely Bell Tower.



Since we did all that before our hike, I plopped the boys and their wet feet into the stroller and headed home!  The trails at Dogwood do not go very far, but you can still spend a couple hours having a big adventure in the woods.  Then, hit the Starbucks on your way home.