Spring break is upon us! This is the first year for our school district to use a balanced calendar, which means that we have two full weeks of spring break. Our original plan was to do an actual vacation this week, but that kind of fell through, so instead we decided to head out for a long weekend of state park fun. Then THAT plan was also almost thwarted by mandatory overtime for Mike. Sigh. In the end, we left Saturday afternoon. We got to our hotel around 8 p.m., and I ended up taking the boys swimming at the blessedly empty hotel pool for a loooooong time. Then Sunday morning the real adventure began.
Our target for this trip was Harmonie State Park in New Harmony. New Harmony itself was the home of two different utopian/religious societies, but that's a story for another day because the park itself doesn't feature any traces of them. We started out exploring the banks of the mighty Wabash River. And here is where I digress to disgorge a factoid from my lint-trap brain: The Wabash plays a prominent role not only in the state's official song "On the Banks of the Wabash, Far Away," but also in its unofficial anthem, "(Back Home Again in) Indiana," which I remember all the words to because we had to sing it for elementary school music programs. Also, it's kind of an earworm, so I won't link to any version of it lest you get stuck with it in your head like I have. Suffice it to say that the Wabash is kind of a big deal here.
Eventually, we made our way to a trail that led deep into the woods, and while we had fun, honestly, it was kind of generic as state parks go. Which is to say: We had a nice walk in the woods. We did see lots of butterflies, including swallowtails, and lots of interesting flowers, and some fish. Oh, and wild chives that Mike and the boys tried munching on. We had intended to take a little side trail off the main trail, but the bridge was closed, a fact that sent Liam into a funk from which he nearly didn't recover. But eventually, everyone got back with the program, and we finished up our hike, then took a quick drive around to look at the rest of the park.
Like I said, it seemed pretty average on the park scale, at least from what we've seen so far. It did have some impressive-looking mountain bike trails, so if we had brought our bikes, our rating might have been much higher. It was definitely a great place to spend a morning, but I'm not sure it's on our must-return list.
See also: SPP1, SPP2, SPP3, SPP4.
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