Walk 6: Rock Creek and The Trail That Never Was

Whenever I think of Rock Creek, I'm reminded of Rudyard Kipling's description of the "great, green, greasy Limpopo River" that is "lined with fever trees on either side." Certainly parts of the forest in Rock Creek Park can resemble a bit of a jungle, and by August, the heat will be right up there to rival anything the tropics can throw at you.

The Great Green Greasy Rock Creek.

With all the recent rain, Sarah and I had no intention of walking one of Rock Creek's dirt paths with Loki but we wound up on one this morning for the same reason a lot of people wind up where they don't want to be: they got handed a bum map.

As I peered out this morning at the newly cleared sky, I figured this would be an excellent time to find a new trail with firm footing. After looking up the website for Montgomery County parks, I zeroed in on a trail that paralleled Kensington Parkway from Beech Drive up to Frederick Avenue. The trail showed a lot of promise. One way, it might just stretch out to 1.5 miles and if you started at Beech, you would up in Clum-Kennedy Garden.

The Dogwoods of Clum-Kennedy Garden.

Sarah and I decided to do the walk from the top down so to speak and everything looked bright as we strolled through the garden. Of course, Loki, who was straining at the leash with his tail between his legs, wasn't having such a good time. He wanted to fetch a tennis. As we reached the end of the garden, we looked for the trail that had stood out so plainly on the county website and then looked at the wide shoulder of the parkway. No trail. We hunted for it for two block with Loki pulling every step of the way and gave up. There ain't no trail here folks.

But we were close to a familiar Rock Creek walk and headed that way. Going toward DC on Beech Drive, we crossed under 495 and then over Rock Creek before pulling off on gravel lot just before Levelle Drive. The entrance to the trail is across the steel foot bridge which is currently about 12 above the creek level which was running high because all our recent rain. Hard to imagine, but sometimes Rock Creek crests a few feet above the highest rail of the bridge.

We let Loki loose and he tore off to position himself for a ball toss. He ran and fetched as we made our way up the asphalt tail to the concrete path which is really on old abandoned road. Here we went right and at the next fork, we headed down a dirt path that follows the banks of Rock Creek.

If you're the sort of person who is nervous about walking alone in secluded places, this may not be a great trail for you. But if you want to see a bit of nature without having to drive all the way the Potomac, this will fill the bill.

The Creek Bank Path

Since it was still early in the morning and the sun hadn't had a chance to burn off the mist, we caught some wonderful views of a gentle fog rolling through the woods. Actually, everything about the walk was about water. To one side the creek flowed, underfoot the mud squelched, and raindrops clung to the leaves of the plants.

Morning fog in our East Coast hardwood forests.

Brush the plants on the side of the trail and you may as well have taken a shower.













As we proceeded, the trail seemed to get wetter and wetter until it more or less disappeared into vast pools of water. It was about this point that I recalled that my daughter has spent the last three or four weeks learning about how to conserve water.

Now, I'm all for teaching kids about the need for conservation in general and how it's a good idea to recycle, but I'm pretty stumped when folks spend a lot of time on water in Montgomery County. Yes, it will be dry in the county come August. Every year it is, but in September, the chances are we will get hit with the remnants of two and probably more hurricanes. That's when Rock Creek will be over the tops of the bridges and if the creek is really rolling, it will uproot a few of them.

Of course, Loki wasn't concerned about any of this. He just wanted to find places he could dive into the creek and swim after a tennis ball. Time after time, he raced down the embankment but if he saw a strong current, he turned around and ran to a new spot. He likes swimming but, if he could talk, he'd probably say, "I don't do rapids."

After about 1.5 miles, we recrossed Rock Creek and picked up the asphalt hiker-biker trail that runs through the park. We stopped and chatted with another pair of dog walkers with a puppy and then followed the trail through what most of Washington DC was originally built on: a swamp.

Swamp land was here before all the roads and houses.

A funny place to worry about water other than how to handle it.

Practical information: Heading away from the DC line, pass the junction of Levelle Drive and Beech Drive. Take your first right hand turn off onto a gravel parking area. An asphalt trail leads to  a bridge over Rock Creek. Follow that trail to T junction with a concrete path which is really an abandoned road. Head right here and then veer off the concrete onto a dirt that parallels the creek. The park system doesn't maintain the trail but there is a foot bridge over a tributary into Rock Creek on the way. The dirt path ends at a second bridge over Rock Creek. Cross that and keep right back towards the parking lot. One way about 1.25 miles.