We spent the Fourth of July weekend at Burr Oak State Park Lodge. While there we hiked what I'm calling the "upper loop." It is a 4.2 mile hike that begins at the parking lot where Mountville Road terminates at Burr Oak Lake. The terrain for this hike is hilly with a total elevation gain of 1,315.5 ft. During a portion of the hike there were glimpses of the lake through the trees.
Getting oriented
We traced our hike using the My Tracks Android app. Below is a map showing our route.
And Read more ➜ Burr Oak State Park: Hiking the Upper Loop
We spent the Fourth of July weekend at Burr Oak State Park Lodge. While there we hiked what I'm calling the "upper loop." It is a 4.2 mile hike that begins at the parking lot where Mountville Road terminates at Burr Oak Lake. The terrain for this hike is hilly with a total elevation gain of 1,315.5 ft. During a portion of the hike there were glimpses of the lake through the trees.
Getting oriented
We traced our hike using the My Tracks Android app. Below is a map showing our route.
And Read more ➜ 
This past weekend we decided to hike the 7.2-mile Day Hike Trail in Shawnee State Forest. The Shawnee State Forest is sometimes referred to as the "The Little Smokies of Ohio" because of its hilly terrain. Although much of the trail followed ridgelines along the top of hills, there was a lot of uphill/downhill hiking to get to those ridgelines.
The trailhead for the Day Hike Trail is just off SR-125 on the opposite side of the road from the Nature Center in Shawnee State Park.
There 
We returned to Lake Katharine Nature Preserve in mid-May to walk the 2.5 mile Pine Ridge Trail. Among the attractions of Pine Ridge Trail are Lake Katharine itself, Rock Run creek, a cascading waterfall, large rock outcroppings and cliffs, a hemlock grove, and magnolia trees.
The trail-head starts in the parking lot and leads east to the intersection of the Pine Ridge and Calico Bush trails. From there it intersects a service road that descends down to the earthen dam at one end of 
We visited Boch Hollow Nature Preserve again last week. The weather was just about perfect. Here's a few pictures from our hike.
This opossum was slowly wondering up a dry stream bed when he decided to stop and pose for a picture.
Additional information
TrekOhio: Hocking County Parks & Preserves — This is the county where Boch Hollow is located; check out this page for links to the official site and for information 
Once again, a mated pair of osprey is nesting on one of the platforms at the northern end of Hoover reservoir. We observed one osprey on the perch above the nesting platform. The second osprey was in the nest doing something with the eggs or perhaps newly hatched youngsters. Periodically we would see its head or tail stick up above the nest as it moved around. But because the sides of the nests are so tall, most of the time we couldn't see it.
Photographing the osprey was a challenge 
Bob and I visited Clifton Gorge State Nature Preserve in early April. Since the foliage isn't out yet, visitors can get a clearer view of the Little Miami River than would be available in summer, plus the river is swollen from all of the spring showers.
The bare branches that are extending over the falls in the above photo will block part of the view after the leaves have emerged.
After observing the falls from above, we moved upstream and looked back at it.
Then we started 
We visited the Hocking Hills State Park in July to view a couple of the park's waterfalls: Broken Rock Falls and the Lower Falls. We scheduled our hike on a sunny day following a rainy spell, so we hoped that lots of water would be flowing over the falls.
To get to these falls we passed by Old Man's Cave, one of the park's most famous attractions. The trail to all of these attractions passes through a scenic gorge.
Below are some of the sights that we took in on the way to Old 
When we visited Holden Arboretum this past spring, we primarily visited the formal gardens. So in August we decided to go back and check out one of the nature trails. It turns out there are 19 miles (30.6 km) of hiking trails at Holden Arboretum.
We were accompanied by our daughter, Dee. We parked by the Visitor's Center, looked at some of the gardens behind the center, and then walked to the trail-head for the Old Valley Trail. We passed several wetlands and a nature observation platform 
Sunday we visited Char-Mar Ridge Preserve in Delaware County to enjoy the cool autumn weather and the last of the fall color. So without further ado, here are our pictures of Char-Mar Ridge.
Additional information
TrekOhio: Char -Mar Ridge Preserve — Our original article on Char-Mar Ridge. It includes information on the park's location.
TrekOhio: Delaware County Parks & Nature Preserves
It was cool and sunny on Saturday morning so we decided to take a look at fall foliage at Rock Stalls. Rock Stalls is a privately owned nature sanctuary run by Camp Akita. It is open to the public, and we last visited the site in February. It is a box canyon crisscrossed by small streams. There are also several, seasonal waterfalls along the rim.
We arrived early Saturday morning at the parking area which was completely empty. The descent to the floor of the canyon was colorful