Trenton Park; More than meets the eye!

Pond filled with dead trees at Trenton Park

Yesterday was a sunny but blustery, chilly day making my desire to go outside for walk waver between “hurray its clear enough to hike” to “heck no I’m not going out in that cold wind!” After some insistent pestering from my better half I dragged myself out of the house to the closest place to walk some trails; Trenton Park, the lone attraction in our small town.

Trenton Park is a 565 acre stretch of land inside the town limits. They have an outdoor pool, playground, outdoor auditorium and two ponds of varying size. There was at one time an active campground but it was been unfortunately closed the last couple years. My favourite feature of the park is the trails. For easy walking there is a groom gravel walking trail all the way around the ponds which totals about 3.5 km. There are also almost 7 km of mountain bike or footpaths through the surrounding woods and they offer a nice brisk hike without going too far from home.

Beaver Damn at Trenton Park

It was these trails that we wandered for about 40 minutes yesterday. For such an unassuming place Trenton Park offers the kind of scenery you might find deep in the woods. Along the trails we found a large beaver damn admit a small forest of broken trees. The scenery was both beautiful and a little sad as many of the trees were dead and splintered to pieces. Walking along the rougher trails also provided great shelter from the cold wind that almost kept me in the house.

Pretty stone path at park

For someone who only a half hour before whined about going out in the cold I really enjoyed the walk. It started my craving for hiking this year and as you can see from my previous post I have some big plans for that this year. Hopefully this weekend will be nice so we can hit up another local trail system at StonehameChalets on Fitzpatrick Mountain. 

Trails to Try

Cape Breton Highlands - Source: risingtideexpeditions.ca

With the warm weather (hopefully) quickly approaching I am beginning to get that craving for fresh air, warm sun on my skin and the pleasant ache from a day of hiking. Nova Scotia is full of diverse trails for all levels of hikers and after tackling Cape George last year I feel like expanding my horizons this year. There are several major trail systems I want to hit up and I have detailed them all below. Whenever I do get to one I will post here about the experience.

One of the trail systems that a fellow hiker recommended was the Kejimkujik National Park Seaside Adjunct Trails. There are two major trail systems here one is a 5.2km hike and the other is 8.7km hike. They offer spectacular views of the seaside and surrounding woodland. I would like to do the 8.7km hike though I read on another blog that it was closed for upgrading. Hopefully it will be reopened for this season. Along with the two major systems there are several smaller trails to explore throughout the park as well as a variety of other activities to try such as canoeing or kayaking.



Board Walk at Keji - Source: Parks Canada

The second trail system I want to hit up this year is Five Island Provincial Park. They offer two trail systems to explore. The Economy Mountain Trail is 5km long and follows and old logging road up Economy Mountain through diverse foliage of birch, maple, beech and white spruce. The second trail is the Estuary Trail that runs along the East River. This trail offers interpretive panels and viewing areas along its length. Five Island Provincial Park has some spectacular geological formations to explore while visiting and they have a campground should you wish to spend the night.

There are two major trail systems I want to visit this summer. The first are the trails in Cape Breton Highlands National Park. This park offers a wealth of trails to explore at a variety of lengths and difficulties. There are over 20 different trails to try from less than a km to over 25km. Each trail has its own amazing sights to see and each visit will bring a different experience.

The second major trail system I want to visit is at Cape Chignecto Provincial Park. There 8 different trails to attempt here some perfect for beginners others more suited to experienced hikers. One hike actually takes four days to complete. I really want to attempt the four day hike and camp along the way to enjoy the full experience. I have never attempted such an ambitious physical feat but that is one of my goals this summer.



Trail to Christy's Field - Source: capechignecto.net



I have only mentioned four spots here and there are others but if I can only get to a few these four are the ones I want to hit up. Along with my hiking excursions I would like to visit other interesting sites around Nova Scotia. For someone who grew up here I have seen surprising little of the province. I plan to remedy that this summer. I hope you will all join me on my adventures in Nova Scotia this summer! As always comments and suggestions are always welcome and encouraged!

 All my information was gathered from the following sources:

http://www.pc.gc.ca/pn-np/ns/kejimkujik/activ/activ5.aspx

http://www.colchester.ca/five-islands-provincial-park-trails

http://www.pc.gc.ca/eng/pn-np/ns/cbreton/activ/activ1.aspx

http://www.capechignecto.net/trails/index.htm