Colville Rotary Trail

For a small town we have a pretty neat walking path. I have walked around my neighborhood in the past, but other than worrying about bears and cougars, it's really kind of boring. Barking dogs and narrow dirt roads lined by tall pines with not much to see.

The Colville Rotary Trail has a number of different configurations and mileages. The neat thing about the trail is that goes around the back side of the golf course, through pastures, farm fields, the airport and then the high school before it cuts back between the 10th and 11 hole of the Colville Dominion Golf Club. (duck!) The average distance is 2.5 miles, but a side trail up a hillside adds another 1 mile if you'd like.

It was nice of the rotary club to build the trail and thanks to the Elks for allowing the trail to cut directly through the golf course. Thumbs up to the private landowners for dedicating some of the their land to the city. 

Here is where the trail goes downhill through the course. If you happen to start on the other side...then it is uphill. That is the high school in the upper left hand corner.

The trail is crushed rock and dirt, level on the sides and easier to walk on than cement.

I am greeted most mornings by these two beautiful horses in a pasture.

The area around the golf course is riddled with ground squirrel holes. My very first early walk on the trail made me think someone was shooting at, or near me. Turned out it was the golf course personnel who go out at sunrise and drop cherry bombs or M80's down the holes.

The Scotch Thistle is a very noxious weed in Eastern Washington. If it gets a hold on pasture land, the cattle will be forced out.

Wherever you see Typha (cattails) you will find water or marsh lands.

A dandelion flower soon turns into a seed head. 

The trail has plenty of shady spots along the way to provide a break from the summer heat.

The day before, I saw this chinook with a water bucket fly over me on its way to the airport. I accidently filmed it in slow motion and then saw that the helicopter had disturbed a bald eagle, which is flying in the lower right hand corner.

The chinook landed about three hundred yards from me and its bucket is sitting on the opposite side of the pole.

Some of the pasture land along side the trail.

This first pond is called Harry's Pond. I'll assume that when they put in the back nine, Harry was somehow instrumental in its formation. You'll always see ducks, thousands of birds, hawks and eagles on the walk.

This larger pond has no name, according to the lady at the golf shop. She said she was more worried about avoiding it while playing...than naming it.

All in all this is a very pleasant way of getting some exercise during spring, summer and fall. The trail becomes an excellent cross country ski or snowshoe trail in the winter.