Category Archives: Hiking

Hiking

Mother’s Day!

05/13/2014 Danielle Huddleston Leave a comment

Our second hike for Mother’s Day weekend was on Sunday right after church!

The Oxley Nature Center is such an amazing place to visit!

The trails are wide(so not as many ticks on you) and easy.

I could watch them walk side by side all day.

I wanted to go through the Blackbird Marsh to the Observation tower to see if any snakes were out.

You can see a map on their site, here.

Crossing Warren Bridge.

You turn left after the bridge to go through the marsh on the boardwalk.

At the end of the boardwalk right before the observation tower is an overflow pipe.

We have seen dozens of snakes camped out there before after a hard rain, catching fish that come out.

There were none this time so we took the trail to the right of the boardwalk around the marsh(Blackbird Marsh Trail) to see if we could find any snakes hanging out.

Jackpot!

We saw two!

We went back across the bridge and headed to the Blue Heron Trail.

There were a lot of turtles and geese!

I am definitely going to head this way again next time.

Honeysuckle.

This little guy was hiding under a leaf.

We saw this guy dash across the trail and thankfully my husband was super quick and got a picture of him!

We think it is a woodchuck?

What is your favorite local trail to see animals?

What did you do on Mother’s Day?

Hiking

Sheppards Point at Heyburn Lake ~Kellyville, OK

05/12/2014 Danielle Huddleston Leave a comment

For the past three years we have gone on a Mother’s Day hike.

We hiked Saturday and Sunday this year!

On Saturday we headed to Heyburn Lake’s Sheppard Point.

I wanted to check out the Rattlesnake Trail there.

You take the trailhead to the Boot hill trail.

We took the scenic route instead but you can feel free to take the more direct approach.

Some call it getting lost but I like to think of it as exploring…

Despite the hot weather we all wore long pants due to poison ivy, chiggers, and ticks.

It is a good idea to wear long pants on any trail that you know is narrow.

You cross a park road to continue on the trail.

Then you will see signs for the Rattlesnake Loop.

As far as I know it is not a loop.

Does anyone know why they call it that?

You will need to cross another road to get to the trail.

There is a lot of tall grass on this trail.

I usually try to avoid brushing up against things while hiking but that was impossible on this hike.

My youngest summed up this hike really well.

“It‘s like an obstacle course of ticks, thorns, and those furry plants.”

I do not think I have every had that many ticks on me before.

We stopped to take them off a lot.

It was a beautiful hike though.

The boys loved this soft plant.

Nick put a little bit of water on one of it’s leaves so the boys could see what happened.

We turned around before the end of the trail(the trail is around 4.5 miles one way).

We ended up doing over 7miles.

We will definitely try out this trail again but will wait until the cold weather to do it.

Way too many ticks otherwise!

Hiking, Wildlife Preserve/Reserve

Wilson Trail, Keystone Ancient Forest ~Prue, OK

04/22/2014 Danielle Huddleston 1 Comment

After we heard that the Keystone Ancient Forest had a new trail open we decided to go check it out.

We had gone last year when everything was dormant and were not sure it was for us because the trails were just too easy.

The Wilson Trail was listed as very rugged though so we were pretty hopeful.

To get to the start of the Wilson Trail you first need to go on the Chandler Trail and then the Frank Trail.

The Wilson Trail is on the left where the fire access road and the Frank Trail intersect.

It is a .90 mile loop.

I thought the warning sign was good.

We really like rugged trails.

It started dropping and having a lot of rocks.

In other words, fun!

This was an absolutely beautiful trail.

I did not want to leave.

Plop a cabin right on the that hillside for me and I would be happy as a clam(why is a clam happy?).

What goes down…

We will definitely go on this one again!

We went ahead and went to the end of the Frank Trail, it ends at an overlook with information about Washington Irving’s exploration of the area.

This little Ring-Necked Snake was sunning on the trail.

Yes, I laid on the ground with the snake to get a shot…

Since we did all three trails we ended up with over 4 miles total.

They are only open on Saturday’s so be sure to check out their site before you head out.

If you want something easy be sure to check out the Childers Trail, it is paved and only .60 miles.