By Caroline Eaton

Chapin forest is a wonderful and beautiful place. Some trails lead to gorges, rock cliffs, and valleys. This place will lead you to a different world. When I went there I went on a loop and in the process, we saw many wonders. Today I am going to explain to you the wonder of this park. Skis and horses can go on these trails so watch out for dung!

Here is the map and part of the trail that we hiked. The blue part is the Buckeye trail. The purple part is the trail we hiked. And green is the part where we hiked some of the Buckeye Trail. We started at the black X and made a figure 8, ending on the Buckeye Trail.

We walked on the trail and got to our first hill at the middle of the figure 8. On one side there were piles of hay so if a skier loses control they can go into the hay. But even with the hay, I would not want to ski down the hill. At the top of the hill, we continued on the trail to a rough, rooty area. We stopped and looked at the trees. The original 100-year-old trees were cut down in the 1800s. Though some trees today in Chapin might have well lived 100 years!

We eventually went through a rocky section in the trail. This rock is Sharon conglomerate. Be careful. Do not run on these when it is wet! During that section, if you look to your right you will see deep rock gorges and structures. This rock that the gorge is made of is bedrock. At one point if you are careful you can see a little cave on the side of the gorge. These rock formations were made from a glacier carving itself down the mountainside.

You follow this trail till you find a small overlook. It is not the real one but still, it is pretty. Down the trail, you will find the real overlook. There you can see Lake Erie and Cleveland. It is really beautiful. You could spend hours just looking at it. This is a picture of me and my family. My mom and my dog Ollie were off the picture because they took it. I am the second to the right and you can see Josie behind me. I am with my 3 brothers and my dad.

After that, we went on with the trail. We walked along the ridge for a while before going back on the trail. We passed many cool natural structural like mossy stones. Then we got to a bridge and crossed it. When we got to the parking lot we went to the playground. There was a hut with a fire so that is where we warmed up. I hope you go there one day!!!