Monday — never an easy time for the outdoors enthusiast. After a weekend of adventure, returning to the humdrum work-a-day world can make one melancholy. To help ease the transition, every Monday we feature a 90 Second Escape — essentially, a 90-second video or slide show of a place you’d probably rather be: a trail, a park, a greenway, a lake … anywhere as long as it’s not under a fluorescent bulb.
Tag Archives: Mountains-to-Sea Trail
This weekend: Park your kid, hike the MST, Tri Lake James
This weekend may finally solve the dilemma of how to get your kid off the couch and into wild. It’s also a great time to celebrate Mountains-to-Sea Trail Month, and a good time as well to indulge the many recreational opportunities of Lake James State Park.
90 Second Escape: A month of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail
Monday — never an easy time for the outdoors enthusiast. After a weekend of adventure, returning to the humdrum work-a-day world can make one melancholy. To help ease the transition, every Monday we feature a 90 Second Escape — essentially, a 90-second video or slide show of a place you’d probably rather be: a trail, a park, a greenway, a lake … anywhere as long as it’s not under a fluorescent bulb.
This weekend: A unique trail, a trail run, a run downhill
The hike at Fort Fisher State Park Saturday is only a mile and a half, but it’s a well-appointed mile-and-a-half; there’s a rare introduction to the misunderstood pursuit of trail running along the Eno River Saturday afternoon; and on both Saturday and Sunday, those crazy videos of skateboarders bombing down twisty mountain roads comes to life at Mount Jefferson.
Spring along the Eno
Saturday, our GetHiking! group enjoyed spring full throttle on a 5-mile hike of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail in Durham, from Penny’s Bend up the Eno River to West Point on the Eno city park.
Content from Spring along the Eno
The hike was full of the typical hiker bonhomie: catching up with hikers who had hibernated over the winter, learning the stories of new hikers, comparing snacks. It also offered an eyeful of the spring wildflower display that the Eno River valley is known for. After a winter-delayed harvest, the trail was ablaze in spring color: mayapple, fiddlehead fern, toothwort, green-and-gold, speedwell, rue-anemone, Dutchaman’s breeches, spring beauties, periwinkle, American speedwell and more.
Click on the links to learn more about each wildflower. A great local guide we’ve found is A Virtual Wildflower Garden Across Time, which categorizes wildflowers by color and typical date of appearance.