When most people think of nature they think of wide landscapes, mountain top views, maybe the beach. The thing is, nature isn’t necessarily a 2 hour drive away and hiking on trails at a state park or national forest. Nature is also around the corner at the local park or trail.
About a decade ago, over part of an Easter weekend, I was in Lufkin, Texas to spend some time with my husband Chris as he was doing a field job nearby. It was nice, taking advantage of a hotel room and having time to explore the area. I really wanted to go and do a few hikes in Angelina National Forest nearby but was too chicken to go out there by myself at that time and now it is something I wouldn’t bat an eye at doing. I probably could have driven a few forest roads and seen a lot of interesting things but instead I opted to see what was in the heart of Lufkin itself. I decided to go explore two different parks in the city. One of them was the linear Azalea Trail.
This is an urban/suburban trail, made for walking or light exercising. I parked on the north side of the Lufkin Mall and walked over to where the sign is above. I had planned to do the entire trail up to the northern terminus but turned around maybe three-quarters of a mile in.
There were a couple of other folks out for the day, mostly walking. I was pleasantly surprised to see a lot of interesting things along the trail including this small sassafras.
The path follows Hurricane Creek, which is filled with litter due to its proximity to the urban environment, but I think that helped in providing some interesting habitat for what wildlife I did see.
This squirrel was the only mammal I saw along the path, though it was not interested in posing for me, dashing around the vegetation if I moved just a little.
One section of Hurricane Creek that wasn’t filled with litter.
It was spring so Eastern Tent caterpillars were everywhere! Their fuzzy bodies were interesting to watch as they crawled along leaf litter and up pine trees.
One plant blooming profusely at that time was lyre leaf sage, Salvia lyrata. It’s beautiful in the spring and one of the first spring plants to bloom in late February and early March.
There were several cardinals bouncing around the tree canopies and this male posed for a few minutes for me.
Flowering dogwoods were providing a beautiful show in the woods around the area. This one was close enough and low enough for me to get a nice shot of.
I turned around once I reached a massive Chinese wisteria vine. Did you know the flowers are edible? Despite wisteria being a very invasive species it is still a beautiful flowering vine and the pollinators do enjoy it!
And that was my walk, a little bit of nature in the city coming from Lufkin, Texas. I guarantee that you have a corner of your neighborhood or city that is teeming with wildlife and nature that you might dismiss. When you get a chance, download the iNaturalist app and bring along your phone or camera, and start moving slowly through your local park to see what you might uncover!
Too bad about the litter, but still really cool to find a nature trail tucked into a suburban area.