Cuyahoga Valley National Park

The Cuyahoga River, mid November, near the visitor's center.

Teaching from a national park was quite a thrill. First thing, I took my life science students on a hike and talked about everything we saw on the trail. Of course, I: misread the trail map, discovered it was twice as long as predicted, realized that the trail didn't loop back, and went equipped with nowhere near enough water for myself and my canine companion.

Luckily, Cuyahoga Valley National Park is pretty forgiving to first-timers; not in great trail signage, but certainly in that you can get a cell signal almost anywhere, there is plenty of shade in a deciduous forest, and - aside from a black squirrel - we saw no animal wildlife. My students never got to see Blue Hen Falls, sadly. It cost me my lunch break, but I made it eventually.

Made it to Blue Hen Falls!

My physical science students got a much less interesting lesson on flight dynamics (paper airplane throwing contest) in honor of the Wright Brothers being from Ohio and a mini-lecture on water chemistry, density, and how a river could catch on fire.

Last block, my Earth Science students came with me on a short hike to Brandywine Falls. My co-teacher for that class served as a navigator as we went from the visitor's center to the trailhead; having grown-up in the area, she was intimately familiar with the sites and history of the park. Brandywine Falls was an incredible showpiece. Boardwalk trails gave glimpses of the glacial geology, sedimentary strata, and three levels for viewing the actual waterfall. By far the most educational part of the day and the prettiest.

The most interesting thing I can say about Cuyahoga Valley is that it is a conservationist dream, with evidence that a river on fire can become the centerpiece of a suburban, national park. Having only ever been to national parks that were remote, the experience of having highways and criss-crossing roads was bizarre. There were also whole neighborhoods tucked around bends or smack in the middle of the park. 

Altogether, it was a little underwhelming for a national park. For fans, hear me out: Harper's Ferry National Historic Park and Great Falls Park on the George Washington Memorial Parkway are more enveloping and bursting with nature in equal or significantly more densely populated areas. In fifty more years, when some of the larger wildlife returns (or is reintroduced) to Cuyahoga Valley it could definitely match up with some of these "lesser" National Park Service sites. For now, I'm grateful to have been able to see what local, state, and national officials can do when they work together to protect a piece of our planet.

For more unpopular opinions and views of places in this great nation, keep coming back.