A few weeks back, one of The Pres’s friends asked him to come along on a stream walk at Ceres Park (which we had an awesome time hiking at last summer). My wife couldn’t make it so, I took him along. We all know how much I hate the outdoors and hiking and nature and that sort of thing, but sometimes you just have to sacrifice for your kids.
Of course, I didn’t bother to ask questions, and it turned out this with a hike in a stream. Despite our lack of bathing suits, we had a blast! Also, we saw a beaver!
The whole thing was run by the Gloucester County Nature Club.
This awesome group “is a private, nonprofit 501c3 organization of people who share a common interest, curiosity and love for the natural world. The Club strives to promote sound conservation practices and to educate others about nature and the environment.” My type of people.
They run two hikes/activities a month, one for families and one that’s open to anyone. The hikes are free (unless there is an admission fee to the park) and you don’t have to be a member to attend. However, if you can make it out to their events, you should totally become a member, it’s only $20 or $25 a year (depending if you want your newsletter electronically or sent to you in print via snail mail).
Go check out their website, keep an eye out for events on their meetup.com page, or friend them on facebook (where folks post a lot of bird photographs that they take).
We headed left off the main trail (not on the map posted on our trail report) to head around the near side of the lakes). You can see the big drop here where the marl was mined.
I love swamps.
We spotted a beaver swimming around!
Pants tucked into those socks is a dorky look, but so done with chiggers!
Swamp at the end of Emerald Lake.
Having a blast in the stream. There were more than a dozen kids with their folks or grandfolks on this hike, it was quite the crowd!
One more on the way back.
Way to get out there! Thanks for sharing!