Fort Benjamin Harrison State Park

This is a great park. I was asked to watch my two young nieces all Saturday while my brother and his wife went to Kings Island for the day. Sarah is 8 and Paige is 5 and they arrived at my house about 9:30am on Saturday morning. I wanted to plan a fun but cheap outing for them during the day. I never like to be cooped up with the children at my house and I didn’t want to disturb my roommate with their loud voices all day. So I gathered up a packed lunch, blanket and beverages and off we went.

I love to go to the state parks so I bought a pass in April for $40 and it grants me admission until December for all of the state parks in Indiana. When going to the parks I usually go to the ones out of town. I have been to Mounds in Anderson a few times but it is fairly small. But I have never been to Ben Harrison and I thought I would try it since it was so close to home and I wouldn’t have to drive far. After weaving through the multitudes of runners (apparently there was some type of marathon that day) I drove us through the park and found and fun looking large hill. I parked the car and I decided we needed to eat lunch at the top of the hill. Off the kids ran to race to the top. They were so excited…how often do you get to run up a giant hill. Then they ran down to me and then they ran up. I was tired watching them. When I finally made it to the top I spread out the blanket and served our humble lunch of Turkey sandwiches and a salad. It was so relaxing to sit there and watch all of the people try to make their way to the top. As I was reading the map trying to orient myself with the trails the girls raced up and down the hill. I can’t understand the desire but they seamed to enjoy it. As I packed up the things to leave they came back to the top and rolled themselves to the bottom. What a joy to see them unafraid of getting hurt.

I picked us out a 1 mile trail and drove us to the entrance. The girls were so good walking along and staying on the trail. The liked looking at the water, trees and leaves. Some of the leaves were gigantic on the ground; I don’t have such leaves by my house. It was crazy. We found a place on the trail that there was this long tree that was dead and fallen on it’s side. Naturally the girls wanted to walk along it Dirty Dancing style. Of course it was only three feet off of the ground. A while later we found some hanging branches that looked like long vines. The girls took turns trying to be Tarzan flying through the forest. I tried but I could hold myself up by my arms. As we approached the end of the trail we were happy to be done and I though we had all exerted enough energy. However, I was wrong.

I hadn’t realized that the trail that I chose was not circular. Duh! We did not end up at the beginning. We then had to take another 1 mile trail back to the car. This trail was a large paved surface that would be great for bike rides. This trail was faster as we kept on task and were getting tired and just wanted to finish. However, I am supremely impressed that the 5 year old made it the entire way. I didn’t baby her and she was able to walk the entire time. I really liked this park and I wish I had discovered it before now. It is the perfect place to take the family for an outing.