May Day! May Day!
You could take that two ways. But let’s go with the fact that it is May Day, the first of May, which means that both March and April of 2020 are in the rearview mirror. Yay.
So what does it mean, it being May in the age of coronavirus?
With your world essentially shrunk to your neighborhood, there’s never been a better time to get out and explore your immediate surroundings. Our coverage in the spring of 2020 has focused on this topic, on how to help you sate your love of adventure — within 10 miles or so from home.
It’s the journey, not the destination, Ralph Waldo Emerson is often quoted as saying. That’s especially true when you Explore Your Neighborhood.
Typically on outdoor outings the journey to reach the trailhead isn’t so special: an interstate highway, a self-serve gas station, fast food. You’ve seen one burrito supreme, you’ve seen ‘em all.
From its origins in the late 1960s, the Eno River Association, known then as the Association for the Preservation of the Eno River Valley, has been saving land along the Eno River in Orange and Durham counties. In that time, they’ve preserved more than 4,000 acres along the Eno and its tributaries. Much of that land has gone into creating Eno River State Park, some into Little River Regional Park. The Confluence Natural Area, which opened a couple years ago, is the only land the ERA has purchased that it operates as its own.
(Every Monday for the duration, we’ll explore an aspect of Exploring Your Neighborhood. Today, a gem we stumbled upon in our own backyard.)
I’d heard tell of some trails I wasn’t aware of in western Orange County a couple years back while researching a story about the Mountains-to-Sea Trail’s path from Saxapahaw to Hillsborough. Because of landowner objections along the planned route, the route was pretty much just that, planned. “That is,” came the vague caveat, “except for a couple miles of trail somewhere along Seven Mile Creek.”
