9
EZTHE WASHINGTON POST.
FRIDAy, MARCH 27, 2020hikes go, the larger Melvin C.
Hazen Park and the adjacent
Klingle Valley Trail. The fences
and gates at the entrance along
Klingle Road NW give Tregaron
the air of a private oasis, but you’ll
quickly be enchanted by the 13-
acre escape.
Flagstone steps and wooden
benches surround a pond with a
burbling fountain. Freshly
mulched paths lined with newly
planted daffodils wind through
the woods, under a stone bridge
and up terraced slopes. Couples
sit reading on a grassy lawn. Par-
ents and children toss lacrosse
balls in a meadow, while dogs
strain at their leashes to play, too.
Gleeful kids run and roll down an
amphitheater-size hill, while
adults chat at a safe distance.
This parkland was originally
part of a larger estate, once
known as “The Causeway.” In the
1910s, landscape architect Ellen
Biddle Shipman embellished the
gardens with a natural setting
including ponds, woodlands and
natural plants. (The estate’s man-
sion is home to the Washington
International School.) The house
and grounds are included on the
National Register of Historic
Places, but by the mid-2000s, they
were an overgrown mess. Enter
the nonprofit Friends of Tregaron
(now the Tregaron Conservancy),
which secured the land for public
access after decades of legal bat-
tles, and began restoring it to
Shipman’s d esign. To day, t he land
is sustained by donations and
maintained by volunteers, who
keep the beautiful park open to
all, free of charge.
Intersection of Woodley and
Klingle roads NW. Open daily
from dawn to dusk. tregaron.org.
Free. — F.H.Jug Bay Wetlands Sanctuary
For three-and-a-half decades,
the freshwater tidal wetlands,
marshes and forests of the Jug
Bay Wetlands Sanctuary have
been a haven for migrant birds
and native reptiles and amphibi-
ans. These days, the 1,700-acre
park is offering some much-
n eeded sanctuary for humans,
too. In normal times, this vibrant
ecosystem is a living, breathing
lesson for school groups and envi-
ronmental researchers, who
come to study the diversity of
animal life and monitor the
health of Jug Bay and the Patux-
ent River. But today, with the
visitors center closed, it’s a quiet
place to let yourself be enveloped
in nature.
First-time visitors should start
with the relatively flat Railroad
Bed Trail, which follows the trac-
es of the Chesapeake Beach Rail-
way, which once ferried pleasure-
seekers from the District to the
resort town of Chesapeake Beach
before going bankrupt in the
midst of the Great Depression.
The path, on a peninsula leading
to the Patuxent, leads through a
tunnel of tall trees, with marshes
full of wild rice and cattails on
either side. Listen for birdcallsand rushing winds over head, and
mysterious “bloops” c oming from
the shallow waters, and take note
of benches, where you can look
out over the water. The Scrub-
Shrub Boardwalk leads off into
the wetlands itself, a walkway
suspended over the water offer-
ing an up-close look at an unfa-
miliar environment.
Blinds are scattered through-
out the park, but the wooden
shelters are used for observation,
not hunting: More than 200 spe-
cies of birds are seen annually at
Jug Bay, according to various
counts, and the National Audu-
bon Society has named it an Im-
portant Bird Area.
Numerous trails run through
the sanctuary — 17 miles in all —
broken into chunks ranging from
just over a mile to jaunts that take
several hours, depending on how
much time you have to enjoy the
space. No m atter how long that is,
you’ll wish you could spend just a
little longer gazing out over the
plants gently waving in the water
or watching for signs of beavers
and birds.
1361 Wrighton Rd., Lothian,
Md. Open Wednesday and Friday
through Sunday from 9 a.m. to 5
p.m. jugbay.org. Free. — F.H.Piscataway Park
Twenty miles south of the Dis-
trict, there’s a rural retreat where
red Devon cattle graze in idyllic
pastures, and lambs and piglets
hungrily greet passersby.
Piscataway Park, a sprawling
sanctuary in Accokeek, Md., is
remarkably tranquil. Even on
warm days, crowds remain
sparse, and it’s sufficiently re-
moved to attract wildlife, such as
bald eagles and ospreys. The bird-
watching is top notch; Piscataway
is located along the Atlantic Fly-
way, a well-trafficked migration
route, and common birds at the
park include herons, hawks, fal-
cons and wood-warblers.
Multiple hiking trails carve
through Piscataway’s scenic
woodlands, wetlands and mead-
ows. The Blackberry Trail, for ex-
ample, is lined with pokeweed
and pawpaw trees, and the Riv-
erview Trail is, naturally, the place
to go for striking river views.
Pisacataway’s trails and path-
ways remain open, but the park’s
visitor’s center is closed, and vol-
unteer events and other sched-
uled activities are on pause. (Out-
door restrooms and extra hand-
washing stations are available.)
National Colonial Farm, a living
“museum” that demonstrates
18th century agriculture, is open,
but its farmhouse is closed to
discourage people from congre-
gating in enclosed areas. You can
still say hello to the tenants: rare
breeds of livestock, including Hog
Island sheep and Ossabaw Island
hogs.
Piscataway i s a popular destina-
tion for water activities, with a
fishing p ier, boat ramps a nd kayak
launches along the shoreline. No
watercraft is necessary to revel in
the pier’s stunning, private viewsof the Potomac — including a new
perspective on Mount Vernon,
which is directly across the river.
3400 Bryan Point Rd., Acco-
keek, Md. Open daily from dawn
to dusk. n ps.gov/pisc. F ree. — A.H.Sky Meadows State Park
In a state known for its numer-
ous historic sites and stunning
natural beauty, Sky Meadows
State Park has always managed
to strike a balance between the
two. Set in the s hadow o f the Blue
Ridge Mountains, Sky Meadows
includes a two-and-a-half-mile
segment of the Appalachian
Trail, challenging hikes up steep
inclines and easy walks through
rolling meadows. But the land
can be traced back to James Ball,
a settler who purchased the land
from Lord Fairfax in 1731, and it
includes several farms and
l iving-history areas, w here week-
end visitors can watch black-
smiths f orge iron i nto tools, learn
about cooking in the 19th centu-
ry or quiz Civil War reenactors.
As at other parks, however, the
visitors center has closed and
interactive lessons have paused,
leaving the park, which stretches
almost 1,900 acres, the domain of
hikers, cyclists and horseback rid-
ers. (Ten of the park’s 19 trails are
approved for equestrians as well
as hikers, reminding you that
you’re solidly in the heart of Vir-
ginia’s horse country.)
Casual visitors should head for
the “historic area” section of the
park, where the parking lots are
close to farmland and meadows,
where children can stretch their
legs and adults can sit under a
tree. The trails in this section of
the park, known as Blue Ridge
Backcountry, are shown on the
park map in short segments of a
mile or so and well-blazed, so they
can be strung together to make
longer hikes. Easy or moderate
dirt and gravel trails lead to the
ruins of Snowden Manor, which
burned a century ago, and awe-
inspiring overlooks with views of
the hills and fields of the region,
though be warned: Even trails
marked “easy” can have surpris-
ing grades to climb, and after a
little over an hour of exploring on
a recent visit, an iPhone health
app had logged the equivalent of
climbing 43 flights of stairs.
(Those up for more exercise can
look at virginiatrailguide.com
and hikingupwards.com , which
offer detailed guides for longer
excursions.)
The sheer size of Sky Meadows
makes it perfect for people who
need space. Even when the park-
ing lot is full on a weekday after-
noon, visitors on the trails are
alone more often than they’re
within sight of other hikers. For
some, that’s the perfect kind of
social distancing.
11012 Edmonds Lane, Dela-
plane, Va. Open daily from 8 a.m.
to dusk. $7 per car; $10 weekends
April through October.
d cr.virginia.gov/state-parks/
sky-meadows. — F.H.
[email protected]PHOTOS BY MATT MCCLAIN/THE WASHINGTON POSTmac River. The view from an observation deck at Jug Bay Wetlands
h stretches almost 1,900 acres in Delaplane, Va.