According to Trip Advisor the number one thing to do in Huntsville, Alabama is the Madison County Nature Trail. The #2 attraction is the Botanical Gardens and the #3 attraction is the NASA Space Center. We opted for the Nature Trail because we wanted to get outside and move around after a long day of driving yesterday. It helped that entry was free. Adult admission to the Botanical Gardens was $12 each and it was going to cost $20 each (minimum) to get into the Space Center. For some reason it did not seem right to us that we should have to pay to get into a NASA museum. Perhaps it is a privately funded and maintained museum?
The weather forecast for today was perfect: mostly sunny with thin, high clouds, light winds, a high temperature of 77, and zero chance of rain. Without trees to shade our motorhome we decided to put all of the awnings out and open all of the roof vents to make sure the interior temperature remained comfortable for our cats.
We are camped just north of the city limit of Athens, Alabama so we drove through town to have a look. The rail line to the west of the RV park runs through the center of town. The town was incorporated in 1818, a year before Alabama became a state, and still has grand homes dating from the 1820’s.
Entrance to the Madison County Nature Trail on Green Mountain, Alabama.
From Athens we took US-72 east into Huntsville and picked up US-231 / Memorial Parkway SW going south. From the Parkway we took Weatherly Cove Road SE to Bailey Cove Road SE to S Shawdee Road SE to Nature Trail Road SE, the road into the park. Located southeast of Huntsville on a 72 acre site atop Green Mountain, the 1.5 mile Madison County Nature Trail circles a small lake, crossing a covered bridge and winding through a forest of hardwoods and conifers. Along the trail we saw a Winged Elm tree. But this was not just any Winged Elm; it was the Champion Winged Elm for all of Alabama, the oldest and largest tree of its species in the whole state. It was by no means the largest or tallest tree we have ever seen, but it was beautiful, perhaps more so because we knew we were looking at something special.
We have been intentional about not packing every day full of activity and decided to return to our coach after our hike. We reversed our route, stopping at a Kroger supermarket on US-72 for a few things. We took a second pass through Athens, crisscrossing the historic Beaty District and driving past Athens University before returning to Northgate RV Travel Park.
We had hummus, bagel chips, and grapes for lunch. I downloaded the photos I had taken along the nature trail and worked on processing them. I finished editing my blog post for yesterday, uploaded it, and then took a nap. I eventually got up and returned the awnings to their travel configuration while Linda prepared dinner. As she often does, she adapted a recipe to the ingredients she had on hand and made a one pot dish of barley with mushrooms, onions, garlic, tomatoes, hot peppers, and kale. It was very good. We had fresh strawberries later for dessert.
