Five Rivers Metroparks, OH - Taylorsville East Park

ABOUT THE PARK: 
Five Rivers Metroparks Taylorsville - Metroparks.org

DIRECTIONS:
GPS Coordinates 39.881401, -84.155940

TRAIL MAP:
Five Rivers Metroparks Taylorsville Trail Map - Metroparks.org

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HIKE DISTANCE:  5.25 miles

THE HIKE:

The trail starts at the kiosk.

We kept right at the intersection on the orange trail.  We'd be taking the yellow trail later.

There were people at the rock outcrop so we didn't stop but there would be another opportunity later on

Keeping right on orange.

No matter how often I checked, partial cloudy was never in the forecast.  No more rain but it was supposed to be solid clouds.  Glad they were wrong.

An overlook ...

... that is no more.

Great Miami River spilling over its banks through the power cut.

The trail follows along the Great Miami River.

Uh oh.  The trail flooded out.  Fortunately this is right at a connector trail so we turned left and took that.

The connector trail met up with the orange trail that we had come in on so we backtracked and took it around the other way ...

... to where that end was flooded out but it was a good view of the river.

Retracing to the rock outcrop.

At the intersection we continued right on the yellow trail.

The overlook platform on the yellow trail ...

... with a little bit of a view of the Great Miami River.

It made a nice dry break spot.

Continuing on yellow.

Yellow was also flooded out but by looking at the track compared to the map, it should turn left just beyond this point away from the flood waters.  Indeed, after bushwhacking a short distance through stinging nettles (OUCH) we met up with ...

... the trail coming out of the flood water so we were able to complete the loop.

At the picnic pavilion keeping right leads back to the parking lot.

About 6 hours later, our destination.

Five Rivers Metroparks, OH - Englewood

ABOUT THE PARK:
Five Rivers Metroparks Engelwood - metroparks.org
Englewood Metropark User's Guide

DIRECTIONS:
GPS Coordinates 39.88309, -84.28631

There are many places to park but I chose the lot with restrooms.

TRAIL MAP:
Englewood Metropark

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HIKE DISTANCE:  4.6 miles

THE HIKE:

Leaving St. Louis, MO early in the morning, I arrived in the downtown area to find the ramp to the highway I needed to take closed so I was forced to go through downtown to get to another bridge across the Mississippi.  Had that not happened, I would have missed this iconic St. Louis shot at sunrise.

To break up our drive on Day 1 of out trip home, we stopped to hike the green trail at Englewood Metropark outside of Dayton, Ohio.

The green trail passes wetlands.

Then heads to Stillwater River.

Stillwater River

The trail follows the river for a while.

Up to this point, it was quite muddy and the mud just kept accumulating.  It felt like I was wearing ankle weights.

Some rocks at an outlet - a good place to clean off some mud and by the looks of it, others before me had done likewise.

After the outlet, the trail was much drier and there was no more mud accumulation.

Trail intersections are numbered and correspond to numbers on the map.

White joins in.

Northern Flicker

Black walnuts were dropping everything.  I don't know how we managed not getting clobbered in the head by one.

Coming up on Martindale Falls.

Temps had been in the 20's overnight and it was only in the 30's during the day so waterfalls had icicles.

Up the steps to ...

... the top of Martindale Falls.

Continuing on.

With the leaves down it's easy to see how high up the trail is.

Yellow joins in.

A boardwalk through Pumpkin Ash & Swamp Forest.

Lots of trees had these signs on them.

Patty Falls

A viewing deck at the bottom of Patty Falls.

A short distance along on green ...

... we crossed Patty Road.

The top of Oak Falls.

There is a side trail down the far side of Oak Falls but not much to see.

Another trail user.

At this intersection the green trail turns right ...

... with blue and red joining in but ...

... I decided to go left on red to extend the hike a little.

Red ends at the road where we turned right ...

... and followed along the reservoir.

Some footpaths lead down to the reservoir.

Just before the intersection we took a service road to cut off some of the road walk.

This led right back to where I parked.

Back on the road and back to the same motel in Columbus, OH to spend the night.  Brodie is an excellent motel guest.  He curls up on his bed and goes right to sleep.  No barking, no shenanigans, no nothing.