Seneca Creek State Park

Lake Shore Trail at Clopper Lake

In the Gaithersburg, MD area, we are lucky to have this massive park called Seneca Creek State Park. It consists of 6,000 acres of park land, all connected together by 16.5 miles of trail called the greenway. You may have visited sections of this park and not even realized it. The greenway starts at route 355 near Game Preserve Road and goes south west all the way to the Potomac River at Riley's Lock. The green way extends North East of 355 to Brink Road as well, but that's not included in the State Park section.

The park includes Clopper Lake, which is right on Clopper Road, go figure! This lake has a park entrance that charges on the weekends, but it's free on weekdays. There are loads of picnic pavilions available, as well as paddle boats, playgrounds, and disc golf. My favorite activity here is the Lake Shore Trail which does a 3.8 mile loop around the lake. I enjoy using this loop for my daily workout. I often see joggers and mountain bikers on this trail. I usually do a brisk hike as I'm not much of a jogger and this is a bumpy dirt path.

Map of Greenway Trail

The Park also includes Schaeffer Farm which you can access from Schaeffer Road near Darnestown, MD. The greenway trail crosses Black Rock Road next to Black Rock Mill and comes close to Schaeffer Farm. The Farm has a bunch of trails criss-crossing throughout. It's popular for mountain biking, but open to hikers and equestrians as well.

These are just a few examples of all that Seneca Creek State Park has to offer. In this new blog I've started, I hope to share my hiking experiences within this park, throughout Maryland, and beyond.

Please feel free to leave a comment if you have a favorite park you'd like me to explore and write about. Happy Hiking!