Richardson Nature Center is tucked away off Bush Lake Rd in Bloomington in Hyland Park Reserve
(just north of the mega kid-mecca playground known as “Chutes and Ladders” - pictured at right)

I had learned about the Richardson Nature Center when I attended the “Raptor Release” a few weeks ago, and now it is our favorite place to go. The building is beautiful and there are lots of things to do on a cold or rainy day. Ben loves playing “match-match/same-same” on the 3-D murals that cover the walls. Kids pull out laminated cards out of bucket picturing a woodland creature and search around to find it.

There’s also a puppet theater and aquariums full of snakes, turtles and salamanders. Go upstairs and you can see a red-tail hawk, or a barred owl. Keep walking and you’ll come to a bird feeder viewing area with floor to ceiling windows. You can sit in a row of wooden rocking chairs and listen to the waterfall outside while you watch wild turkeys strut their stuff.

But when it’s nice out (like this past weekend of weather perfection) you can go see them in their natural habitat. There are miles of trails for exploring. We came across a dock and the lake surface was punctuated with turtle-heads, frogs, polliwogs and waterbugs skating around. The kids were enthralled.

It’s just so great to find a forest haven that makes you feel like you are no longer in the city (even though you are just south of the hustle bustle of HWY 494).

There are so many lakes and trails in the area - Cribsheeters where do you escape to get back to nature?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 27th, 2009 at 9:29 am and is filed under Things to Do. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.