Monday, February 23, 2009

Fort Worth Nature Center & Preserve

Sunday - Feb. 22nd we planned another 10 miler and decided to go to the Forth Worth Nature Center and Preserve. It is located near Fort Worth. It was predicted to be a cold morning, so we decided to get started after lunch. We got the the trail head at about 1:30 pm.
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Alex & Oliver at the trail head
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We took the Canyon Ridge trail that has quite a few changes in elevation. The Trail is 3.25 miles and it took us about 1.5 hours to finish. The scenery was nice and changed quite often from a wooded forest to a grassy plain. It was interesting to see all of the prickly pear cactus along the trail. The picture below is of one of the several steep parts to the trail. At least they had stairs for us.
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Stairway to ???
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The Nature Center was built by the CCC. There we several remnants of their stone work in some of the roadside bridge edges, some latrines some benches and the ramada that the boys are standing on below.
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Remnants of CCC Structure

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After the Canyon Ridge trail we hiked for a bit on the Riverbottom trail. We made a bit faster progress because it was mostly flat, but still quite wooded.
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The Nature Center closes at 5 pm and there were signs all over indicating to watch your time because they close the gates and you can get locked in. So, we hiked back to the car along the curving road to make sure we made it to the car in time. When we got back to the car we had 30 minutes, so we hiked out to Greer Island. There is a neat little road leading across the water to the Island that is wooded and had nice wide trails. There were several people walking, bird watching and alligator seeking (I guess there have been several spotted in Lake Worth lately).
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Our time was up, and so were we, so we headed back home. Taking your boots off never felt so good.
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Oliver and Alex, ready for the ride home.
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This was a nice place, and I wouldn't mind doing again, but with a bit more time and my walking poles (which of course I had forgotten).

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