South Fork aka 1000 puddles trail hike

The 1000 puddles trail name of it's origin is such a misnomer. It's anything but a 1000 puddles trail. It is a wonderful mostly dry trail these days, thanks to some trail improvements. We've hiked it in the Summer and the Winter and never experienced the "many" puddles. Thankfully it's now known as the South Fork trail. A much less daunting name. There isn't an end to this trail for many miles, unless you call crossing a creek the turn around point for your day. Today was just that for us, we hiked to Cavanaugh Creek then turned to the right and had lunch on the sandy river shore. It's not a long drive from Bellingham, Wa. to reach the trailhead. If you drive south on hwy 9, you'll turn left on the Saxon road just past Acme. Drive to the end of the road, near the fish hatchery. There is room to park in the wide shoulder at the side of the road. Begin walking towards the gated road on your right. There is a trail access just to the right of the gate. If you'd like to read my other posts of our hikes on the South Fork trail, you can search for it in the search box on the right side bar of my blog (desktop version).
It's a nice flat trail, with just a couple of other smaller creek crossing before reaching Cavanaugh creek. Here are some of the pictures I took of our day.

I love this many trunked Maple tree at the beginning of the trail. I wonder how old this tree is?

A Spartan Woman has to climb over the gate right 😉. There is a trail around, but this was more fun.

A heart rock on the trail.

We put in our "Volunteer" trail crew time in today and earned our right to hike today.
Before

After!

Looking down the river as we walked back to the trail from our lunch spot.

My husband and I had a wonderful day on this beautiful trail with it's trees, ferns, flowers, creeks, a river and a few hundred stinging nettles - ha!

Garmin stats:

total miles hiked - 6.65 miles

Hovander & Sharpe parks

My husbands sister came for a visit this past week, we shared some of our beautiful area with her.

We walked the trails & gardens around Hovander park. I really enjoyed the Children's Story garden.

 \

We then walked over to the Fragrance garden before heading out to the boardwalk trail to Tennant lake.

The lake is nearly covered with Lily pads.

We climbed up the stairs in the Tower before we left. What a wonderful way to view the surrounding area.

The Fragrance garden from the top of the Tower.

The spectacular "summer" weather was a welcome addition to our time together. Our day at Sharpe park couldn't have been more beautiful. I love Sharpe park, it has the perfect mix of a forest trail with it's varieties of ferns, mosses, trees and a sea bluff trail with succulent flowers and plants along with wide sweeping views. Arid and humid environments all on the same trail.

We sat at Porpoise point for lunch and saw a couple of kayakers gliding along the shore. We also saw an Otter and several Porpoise swimming along just below us while we ate. We could also see the snow topped Olympic mountain range off in the distance.

I'm so grateful that we live in such a beautiful area. It's always nice to get a chance to share it.