Small park in Gloucester County with a nature trail and views of Wilson Lake.
December is always busy with holiday obligations that keep us out of the woods, and this past weekend we had things both days.
When there’s a brunch involved, we try to find a nearby park to a least get in a little hike afterwards (and to work off some of the big meal!)
This year the closest one to brunch was Scotland Run Park. I’d found a map online that showed a nature trail, arboretum and some other trails but there was no scale on the map to tell how long they were.
Since we were going to be just down the street we decided to go check it out anyway.
Overall, there doesn’t seem to be much hiking here but is perfectly fine for a short easy walk in the woods if you are in the area.
There are nice views of Wilson Lake, as well as picnic areas, a decent playground and a small nature center (which we didn’t check out).
Restrooms were marked on the map near the lot, and there was a porta-John in the boat launch area. We managed to piece about a 3.25 mile hike together.
Parking: N39 39.423 W75 03.096
For the lot near the playground. There is also parking on the other side of the road near the nature center.
Miles: 3.25
Nearby: Woods of Wenonah; Black Run Preserve.
Hike Directions:
Trails are unmarked:
The nature trail starts across the field from the parking area, near a sign for the arboretum.
This is a very brief trail – it didn’t even take 10 minutes. We came out to a huge old dead tree trunk which just lead to a field… So we headed over to the sand trail and turned left onto that.
This came to a T-intersection where we turned right (to the left is another entrance to the park.) The sand road shortly came to a large parking lot for a boat launch area.
Nice view of Wilson Lake from a little dock.
The map showed a trail off the parking lot, which turned out to be where a gate was, next to a porta-John.
This non-descrip trail split after a bit, but both lead back to the same trail. The trail ended near a fence so we turned around, retracing our steps back to the parking lot.
We headed to the other side of the park by walking past the large playground area and crossing the street to the path near the nature center (which looked like a house).
The path lead through the grounds a little to the start of the trail at a mailbox and bench. This was another non-descrip trail that shortly split, we took it to the left for a bit and then it just circled around to the right.
There was another trail that turned to the left off of it, but we continued circling back because we really were just looking for an hour after-meal hike (and, well, it was just an ok trail).
