Twin Ponds Park — Saturday, May. 11, 2024

On a sunny, 80-degree Saturday in May, we chose Twin Ponds Park as our hiking destination. Parking was a snap at the park's parking lot at the corner of 55th and 1st Ave. It was only a short hop off I-5 to get there, and parking was no problem. The lot capacity was approximately 20-30 cars, and it was only half full.

This essentially flat park was interesting on many levels. The twin ponds are large and seem more like small lakes. They were a tad on the scummy side, with lots of algae. But on a sunny day, they still had their own sort of beauty. The ponds are framed by a well-maintained soccer field and kids play equipment area on the east side, and then vegetation galore on the other 3 sides. The street (155th) forms the north border of the park, and homes abut quite closely on the west side. The south end is a mass of tangled vegetation. 

There are two creeks. Thornton Creek is flowing from the north as you enter the forest from the parking lot. It was gurgling and moving nicely. On the southwest corner  of the park is Meridian Creek, of a similar size as Thornton Creek and more slowly flowing from the east. 

The park had lots of signs about "restoration in progress", which was great to see, as the park does need some TLC. We appreciated the efforts of volunteers, which were apparent throughout the park. Definitely you should check out greenshoreline.org to see what help is needed. For the most part, the trail is well maintained. We especially appreciated the warning signs about Italian arum, a toxic and invasive weed. The signs included photos of the plant in its various stages, and located in beds of the plant. I had never heard of this plant, which you should never touch. We only saw it in a small section at the north end of the park. 

We hiked through the "Trail of Cedars", which made me laugh, as the majority of the very large confiers are spruces. I only spotted a couple of very, very young cedars, the remaining trees are a variety of spruce. At the south end of the second pond, we did encounter major gnarly roots which made it challenging to safely hike. Worse was the water gap of about 6 feet in width, with only a couple of logs strategically placed to assist one in negotiating the gap. We opted to reverse our steps rather than risk injury. 

For wildlife, we spotted a pair of American Black Ducks, which was a first for us. They resemble female mallards, but the male is a bit darker than the female and has a bright yellow bill. We also saw a very large pileated woodpecker, an awesome sight. There were plenty of juncos and other small song birds. And the occasional squirrel, of course. 

We ran into a few others on the trail, but truly not many: a few pairs of folks, some dog walkers and one father-son. We definitely enjoyed our adventure, as this our first time visiting this park. It has noteworthy aspects and is worth exploring!