Westcave Preserve Uplands and Violet Crown Trail 4/15/17

Saturday, April 15, 2017

Hike: Westcave Preserve Uplands and Violet Crown Trail

Weather: sunny, pleasant, mid 70s

Hikers: Ian, Court, and Sara

Length: about 3 miles combined

We had planned to go out to Westcave Preserve, near Hamilton Pool and Reimer’s Ranch, to take the guided tour to see the grotto.  Guided tours are required because of the fragility of the area.  However, on beautiful days like this, apparently you have to show up more than 10 minutes early for the 10am tour, as we just missed the cut off (30 people).  It would have to wait for another day.

However, since we were already out there, we did a quick 1 mile loop in the “Uplands” area of Westcave, which is a nice, flat prairie loop.  It starts out with a short boardwalk, but quickly transitions to gravel, dirt, and grass.  We are at the end of wildflower season, quickly approaching hellish broiler season, so there are only a select few flowers left, but it was still very pretty.

The trail was only a mile and we all wanted to hike more so we came back into town and hit the Violet Crown Trail down to the Greenbelt and back.  We hiked down the switchbacks and crossed dry creek beds several times before we got down to Barton Creek, which was flowing well.

We lingered shortly before turning around and making the trek back up to the trail head at 290 and Brodie Lane.  There wasn’t much length for the hikes today, but it was good to get out on the trails nonetheless.