Treks and Adventures
I got out for a short exploratory hike in Forest Park this morning. I first went down Springville Rd. to where it becomes a neighborhood. Then went back up on Springville Rd., Leaf Ericson Rd. and then the Hardesty Trail that was a new one for me. I found a number of user trail coming off of Springville Rd. and Nieghborhood along Springville Rd. place that need further exploring. The hike was only 3 miles with 780 ft. elevation gain in 1 hour and 40 minutes.
This time out I started at the upper Salzman Rd. Trailhead. Many of the trails in this section I have not been on in a long time. I started off going down Firelane 5 to Leif Ericson to get to the Maple Trail. From the Maple trail I switched on to Salzman Rd. and followed it down to the Lower gate. I then took Firelane 4 up to where it connected with Maple Trail and followed it up to Firelane 3. I then connected with Wildwood to Salzman and then back to my car. I covered 8.5 miles with 1450 gain in a leisurely 3 1/4 hours. The hike started out dry but kept getting wetter and wetter. I got back to my car before the worse came in.
I got out to hike some trails in Forest Park that I had not been on in many years. Part of the exploring was to see where a couple of fire lanes came on at. By the numbers – 11 miles, 2450 ft. total elevation gain and on trail for 5 hours.
I had planned on making this a conditioning hike on trails in the center section of Forest Park but once I went down a couple of new trails all training went out the window and exploring took over. I still got in 7.5 miles with 1850 elevation gain in 4 hrs. of trail time.
There was a break in the rain today so I went over to Forest Park for a hike. From Germantown Rd. Parking I did a route of Wildwood Trail south to Waterline Trail and went down Waterline and Tolinda Trails to Germantown Rd. Then back up Tolinda and all of Waterline up to Skyline Blvd. Then back down to Wildwood and hiked it over to Springville Rd. and down to Leaf Erikson Dr. and back to my car. Manage to cover about 8 miles with a 1700 ft. of Elevation gain. Tolinda and Waterline Trail area more rustic and more interesting to do. Wildwood and Leaf Erikson you can pick miles but are boring. There is a nice large grass area at the top of Waterline Trial by the water tower but there is no parking for it off of Skyline.
