Mid-December Saunter on Monte Sano Oak Park Trail

I co-led a North Alabama Land Trust Nature Hike on December 13, 2025, at Monte Sano Nature Preserve. I had never trekked the Oak Park Trail, which climbs ~300 feet up the north side of Monte Sano Mountain, returning via a counterclockwise circuit to the trailhead. Like so many of my first-time treks, I didn’t know what to expect. Join me as I share my reflections, observations, a few images, and one brief video.

The trail is within the city of Huntsville, just 25 minutes from my home. My career took Judy and me through thirteen interstate moves in this sequence: Cumberland, MD to Syracuse, NY; Franklin, VA; Savannah, GA; Prattville, AL; Syracuse, NY; State College, PA; Auburn, AL; Cary, NC; Fairbanks, AK; Urbana, OH; West Chesterfield, NH; Fairmont, WV; Madison, AL. We learned that we prefer wrinkled land, where a 25-minute drive can take me from 800 feet on the Tennessee Valley to the Cumberland Plateau’s Monte Sano, 1,600! I enjoy exploring the wrinkled terrain of northern Alabama and its rich forests. Wrinkled is different from mountainous. From our 1,000-foot elevation University of Alaska at Fairbanks, we could see Denali (aka Mount McKinley; 20,310 feet) on a clear day. The White Mountains rose 3,176 feet within 20 miles to our north. At the tender age of nearly 75 years, with two knee replacements, chest scars from triple bypass surgery, fully recovered from a minor stroke, and a few continuing aches and pains, wrinkled is sufficient to sate my woodland exploration appetite!

I recently saw a relevant meme:

 

The Land Trust’s signage welcomes, orients, and directs visitors.

 

I borrow from an online descriptor of the trail, here is the route we followed: Climb up the north side of Monte Sano! One of the favorite trails of our trail running groups is Oak Park, which you’ll follow until you get to the northern fork of the Buzzard’s Roost Trail, which features a small waterfall at the wetter times of the year. Take the loop of Buzzard’s Roost back down across the Dallas Branch Spring to the lower section of Oak Park, and climb back down to the parking lot for a short but vigorous hike.

Even this old forester, who knows most of our main canopy species by sight, appreciates tree identification plaques. It’s always nice to confirm my skills. Two old favorites, yellow poplar and northern red oak, shouted their greeting long before I read their name tags.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sugar maple and American basswood likewise are easy to identify based on nearly 60 years of familiarity!

 

The trail presented no difficulty to our group. Mostly gentle grades, smooth surface, and well-marked.

 

A yellow buckeye stands beside a red oak (left). An identified black oak is at right.

 

Nearby are a pignut hickory (left) and paulownia (right).

 

The rock formation below resembled a dry waterfall, yet there was no evidence that surface water flows even during heavy rains. Does it under special conditions, less frequently than annually, carry water? Decadal floods? One hundred-year events?

 

A minor wooden bridge crosses a ravine, currently dry.

 

A trailside marker describes another footbridge, this one constructed using “no power tools, only saws, hammers, wedges, etc. over a period of 3.5 days in April 2017.”

 

 

Here is the referenced video of a hand-built black locust bridge:

 

Black locust wood is disease resistant, renowned for use as fence posts.

We chose the Buzzards Roost Trail to continue our counter clockwise citcuit, eventually returning us to Oak Park Trail at an intersection where we had earlier passed to the left.

 

Buzzards Roost provided a nice place to rest and enjoy the clear beauty, a place that gave me a feeling that we were far higher than 1,300 or so feet.

 

We looked downhill from the Roost. A crooked green ash tree, at the base of the ledge, drew closer with the telephoto lens.

 

Further magnified, a pool of water reflecting branches above it hints that even in a dry autumn, moisture is present. I can accept that were I to return in a period of mid-winter rains, the Roost would feature a small waterfall at the wetter times of the year!

 

We descended the limestone slabs working our way to Dallas Branch Spring below the Roost. We passed a large gnarly white oak fronted by a tortured looking eastern redcedar.

 

There’s little soil and only seasonally abundant water to sustain forest cover.

 

Dallas Spring greeted us with surface water among the rocks.

 

Meager flow hinted of the wet season to come.

 

Hidden beyond the trees, Buzzard’s Roost stands above the photo point (left). Water trickles downstream (right).

 

The winter sky, soft cirrus and pale blue, drifts past beyond the canopy. This time of year we don’t need to distract ourselves with those pesky rising cumulus and 30 percent chances of afternoon showers…capable of drenching us with frog-strangling rains, gale force microbursts, and tree-slamming lightning bolts!

 

Okay, to be honest, I enjoy summer’s pop-up thundershowers. They add variety and spice to our long hot summers. They give us most of the rainfall that sustains the lush forests where I hike, explore, study, celebrate, and find spiritual renewal across the seasons. Winter rains, contrary to summer’s hit and miss downpours, are predictable days in advance.

 

Thoughts and Reflections

 

I offer these observations:

• At my age, wrinkled land is sufficient to sate my woodland exploration appetite! (Steve Jones)
• Like so many of my first-time treks, I had no expectation beyond knowing that I would find more than I sought! (Steve Jones)
• All men are created equal; only the best can still go hiking in their seventies! (Anonymous meme)

Inhale and absorb Nature’s elixir. May Nature Inspire, Inform, and Reward you!

If only more of us viewed our precious environment through the filters I employ. If only my mission and vision could be multiplied untold orders of magnitude:

Mission: Employ writing and speaking to educate, inspire, and enable readers and listeners to understand, appreciate, and enjoy Nature… and accept and practice Earth Stewardship.

Vision:

• People of all ages will pay greater attention to and engage more regularly with Nature… and will accept and practice informed and responsible Earth Stewardship.
• They will see their relationship to our natural world with new eyes… and will understand more clearly their Earth home.

Tagline/Motto: Steve (Great Blue Heron) encourages and seeks a better tomorrow through Nature-Inspired Living!

 

Steve’s Four Books

 

I wrote my books Nature Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit), and Dutton Land & Cattle: A Land Legacy Story (2023) to encourage all citizens to recognize and appreciate that every lesson for living, learning, serving, and leading is either written indelibly in or is powerfully inspired by Nature. All four of my books present compilations of personal experiences expressing my deep passion for Nature. All four books offer observations and reflections on my relationship with the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

• I love hiking and exploring Nature
• I see images I want to (and do) capture with my trusty iPhone camera
• I enjoy explaining those images — an educator at heart
• I don’t play golf!
• I do love writing — it’s the hobby I never needed when my career consumed me
• Judy suggested my writing is in large measure my legacy to our two kids, our five grandkids, and all the unborn generations beyond
• And finally, perhaps my books and Blogs could reach beyond family and touch a few other lives… sow some seeds for the future