A Walk in the Snowy Woods

Molly sniffing out the trail

Mother Nature smiled on the Get Outside Richmond Project on Saturday morning.  An inaugural outing that threatened to not get outside, due to snow, freezing temperatures, and the challenge of getting one’s children out the door (“I thought we were going bowling!”), exceeded all forlorn hopes and diminished expectations.  Sunny skies and a rising mercury welcomed twenty-one intrepid GORP explorers to Poor Farm Park, bold adventurers who gamely followed their fearless leaders – dressed and packed as if setting off for a month at the North Pole – into the woods.


Crossing Stagg Creek to Abel's "Island"

And if not for Molly we would probably still be out there.  My own memory of the morning blurs.  Children, it must be admitted, do not make for a contemplative outdoor experience.  I was grateful nonetheless that we did not lose one in the chilly waters of Stagg Creek.  Besides the children, I did see, at some point, a bird (a woodpecker I think, though naturally I was unable to identify it properly) and perhaps a squirrel, but any wildlife native to the area was flushed out by screaming voices well ahead of our group’s approach.  Even the trees seemed anxious to pick up root and run for cover. 

Back at the playground, the two-week hour walk behind us, the sled caught my attention, and I found myself wondering if in the history of sled pulling one has ever been pulled a greater distance over less snow.  It was, however, a handy way to transport all that unnecessary arctic gear. 

Of course children don’t make for a very contemplative indoor experience either, and on returning home it wasn’t long before we found ourselves wishing we’d left ours in Ashland.  A subsequent swing of some stomach bug through our children’s quarters has us only more desperate to get outside again – actually, to run away.  So, while our kids remain in too weakened a condition to put up much resistance, we’ve decided to schedule our next GORP outing for next Sunday, February 10, at Pocahontas State Park.



The first GORP casualty

Pocahontas State Park is about 20 miles south of the city – a part of the region that, like all parts of the region south of the James River until about Myrtle Beach, is totally unfamiliar to anyone like me who was raised in the West End of Richmond.  Although the space is much larger than Poor Farm Park, our itinerary will be set up in a way similar to last weekend’s outing, so as to (hopefully) minimize the possibility of getting Terribly Lost.  We’ll meet at the park at 10am or so, do a 2-3 mile family-friendly loop hike around Beaver Lake, then have a picnic lunch near where the hike begins and ends.  (The park covers almost 8,000 acres and features an extensive network of trails, many of which are excellent for mountain biking, for those interested.)  Directions and other specifics will be distributed a few days in advance of the outing.



G.O.R.P.