I love trails. They are my path to personal salvation.
After work, I often decompress from events of the day with a bike ride on a waterfront trail or a walk through the old growth forest in Schmitz Park. The trail activity lets me enjoy the outdoors and allows me to arrive home mentally refreshed.
Trails take me to special outdoor places. I have followed trails to the edge of Mount Rainier’s glaciers, skied and snowshoed into quiet canyons in eastern Washington, hiked into the Pasayten Wilderness to straddle the US-Canadian border, and pedaled and pushed my bike to ghost towns, abandoned mines and hot springs in the Cascades.
I have had some memorable and cherished experiences on trails. My sweetie and I shared our first kiss on a trail in Mount Rainier. I have enjoyed sunsets and twilight while biking on the Alki Trail. And I will always remember listening to the roar of the wind in the canyon below me as I camped peacefully on the rim trail of Zion Canyon in Utah.
National Trails Day is a celebration of America’s magnificent and vast trail system. This event occurs annually on the first Saturday in June, which happens to be June 1 this year.
I hope you will join me and thousands of other Americans as we pay tribute to our wonderful trails. Organized hikes, bike rides, work parties and celebrations are planned on trails in Washington and around the nation.
Participating in a work party is a great way to give back to trails. If you like to mountain bike, you can help Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance build a new trail at Tiger Mountain on National Trails Day. The Klickitat Trail Conservancy will host a work party to pick up trash, install signage, prune and weed along their trail.
Tacoma residents can celebrate National Trails Day by spending some time sprucing up the trails at Point Defiance. Come early with your bike and you can pedal Five Mile Drive car-free in the morning!
Celebrate with a trail ride at one of our state parks! Washington State Parks is offering free access (no Discover Pass needed) to its facilities on National Trails Day. This includes the John Wayne Trail and Columbia Plateau Trail.
You can find a list of registered National Trails Day events here. Check our Resources page for a list of local bike clubs and trail groups. You can contact them to see if they have any trail events planned. Or gather a few of your friends and celebrate your favorite trail with a hike or bike ride.
See you on the trail!
