Tynehead Park is one of my most favourite parks because it’s by far one of my most sentimental ones. I feel like I grew up in Tynehead Park… often visiting at least once a week with my mom to go for a walk, and then taking my Girl Guides there to learn about the environment. I can’t tell you how many Girl Guide Badges I worked on in that park!!!
I’ve been back there lots of times with my kids, but mostly as a way to get some fresh air while they were in the stroller or sleeping in a carrier. This week we went for the first time where the kids would both be out exploring the trails, and it was a great experience.
When we arrived the parking lot was as full as I’ve ever seen it… Secret is out… this is a great park! We checked out the map and headed into the familiar trails. So many things had changed, and yet so many things had stayed the same.
The kids loved the wide paths and running around like airplanes. They came across a feeding spot where many people had been feeding birds and were excited to see how close they could get to the birds, with each of them checking each other out!
Next came the iconic bridge… Oh the memories! I won’t bore you with more sentimental talks of long walks holding my mom’s hand as we talked about the creatures in the river or the shapes of the trees…
The trails are a lot nicer now than they were 20 years ago. They are wide, and easily accessible… we passed both a stroller and a wheelchair on our journey.
My favourite parts of the Tynehead Park trails:
- The old tree stumps that show the remains of the massive trees that were taken down years ago. It would have been magnificent to see the trees still standing there today.
- Walking over the boardwalks. When I was little the boardwalks were titled and slippery… not so the case today. I told the kids about the time where I was running and fell off the boardwalk into a bunch of skunk cabbage. The kids liked the visual of me falling and asked to learn more about skunk cabbage. (“That’s silly”)
- There are some small hills in the trail, although when I was younger I remember them being HUGE.
- There’s a lot more variety in the trails then there used to be and the park itself has doubled! We only did our “regular route” but we easily could have spent a couple hours wondering, exploring and finding new treasures.
- Speaking of treasurers there were quite a few people out and about geocaching… There certainly are lots of great places to hide caches in the park!
- We somehow broke into random songs throughout our walk… the ants go marching was today’s favourite.
