Evening Run - Western Ridge Trail

I live near Rock Creek Park, which is wonderful for running.  I have slowly started getting in to trail running, mainly on my lunch breaks, and decided to try a new route last week.

The Western Ridge Trail runs through the park from the MD/DC line to Porter street.  I decided to start my run in the city, cut through the neighborhood I grew up in, and pick up the trail at Grant Road.  I was thankful I had my phone on me during this run not only to take photos, but because the trail branched out in a few places and I needed to pull up a map so I wouldn't take a wrong turn and get lost.  In fact, I originally ran right past the trail as it's not very wide.  

This trail is the polar opposite of the Rock Creek Trail - it's a narrow, winding dirt trail that has quite a few inclines.  I only saw one other person on the trail the entire time I was on it (around 2.5-3 miles) and because most of the trail is in the middle of the woods the only sounds were birds and squirrels.  It was a wonderful opportunity to take off my headphones and enjoy my surroundings (sidenote: I also took off the headphones for safety reasons - any woman running through the park alone needs to be careful, especially if there's no one else around).

Some photos:

One of the forks in the trail:

It got narrower:

I happened upon a random pen - I guess for horses?

The trail is in a heavily wooded area - it got pretty dark in places:

As I got closer to the end of the trail, near Peirce Mill, the trail paralleled the creek.  There were a lot more runners on this section of the trail and I put my headphones on and cranked up the music as most of what I heard was traffic on Beach Drive.

Peirce Mill Barn:

Crossing the creek:

Another photo of the creek... because waterfalls make me happy:

I ended my run cutting through the National Zoo on the Olmstead Walk.  Oddly enough, this was the first time I'd ever run through the zoo.  I wish I had some pictures to share, but I was afraid that if I stopped to take a photo I wouldn't start running again - I'd forgotten how steep that hill is!  It was an interesting little obstacle course ducking around small children and strollers, but it was worth it to see some of the animals - toward the top of the hill I saw a peacock strutting his stuff.  Next time I'll be sure to see the big cats - how cool would it be to run by lions and tigers?!