Sunday, April 5, 2009

Rollin T. Grant Gulf Wilderness Park


Another beautiful spring day in Western New York. Another reason to get to the woods.


We were really short on time, so we stayed right here in Lockport and hiked a bit of the Rollin T. Grant Gulf Wilderness Park on W. Jackson St. A little slice of heaven in the City. The trail from the road is laid with what appears to be old ground up asphalt. But it changes over to a more natural state the deeper you go on the trail.

The violets were blooming all along the trail.



In short order, we came upon the creek. Here's Pete 'going out on a limb' to get a better view.


Same spot on the trail, just looking upstream instead. Can you see the electric poles right in the middle of the picture? Weird. But they weren't incredibly distracting to the rest of the view.


Even the wild roses know its spring :)



As we followed the trail downstream, we came across a photographer using the old large format type camera. Very neat.

The trail officially ends at this waterfall, though we could have easily crossed the rocks to the other side.

Here's the view to my left. Hard to pick out, but there is a massive old tree on the hill that had fallen. There were a lot of those laying around. Always makes me a little sad.

We backtracked and continued west on the trail, going upstream. Lots of rolling hills with rocks everywhere with little mini waterfalls cascading down to the large stream.


Not sure if this rock staircase was man-made or not, but it's really cool.

A nice short hike to satisfy the soul for now.....

3 comments:

  1. I love these little gems all around. So quiet yet so beautiful at any time. They add a nice touch start or finish to any trip. Thank you.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks! Hope to hike there after lunch tomorrow.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Finally went the other day, was always concerned about the pollution. We hiked the white trail and cross the bridge because that's where it seemed to lead. Thought we ended up on the red trail and didn't want the kids to get poison ivy so we turned around. Turned out later it was the blue trail. Then when heading back we went to find the waterfall and checked that out before leaving. Wasn't much of a waterfall at the time. Was actually looking for the ancient falls I guess which I assume is in the other direction as I believe that was the origin of the pollution and perhaps why it's not listed on the map. Also curious about sutliff park. Anyone have anymore insight?

    ReplyDelete