Hines Chapel Preserve Trail - McLeansville, NC
“Be fearless in the pursuit of what sets your soul on fire.” – Jennifer Lee
“I don’t know where I’m going, but I’m on my way.” - Carl Sagan
"Of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt." - John Muir
The Story -
On a crisp and cool Saturday afternoon, Ginger, Sophie, and I explored Hines Chapel Preserve, a relatively large future passive park in northeastern Guilford County. Please note the term, future passive park, as Hines Chapel Preserve is not yet open to the public. Ginger and I were fortunate enough to preview it, however, and I’m confident it will be yet another excellent addition to the growing list of open spaces and trails in Guilford County available for public use and exploration.
Hines Chapel Preserve -
At just over four hundred and fifty acres including two miles of water frontage on the Reedy Fork Creek, the Hines Chapel Preserve will be the largest passive park in the county. Ginger and I hiked roughly three miles in the western section of the preserve with expectations to return to hike the eastern section once the trail is completed, hopefully in the near future. To that end, Guilford County in combination with the Friends of the Mountain-to-Sea Trail have scheduled several trail workdays in the coming months including one this Saturday, April 2. Click here for more information.
Hines Chapel Preserve Incubator Farm -
One very unique feature of Hines Chapel Preserve is an innovative plan to dedicate almost eight acres of the preserve to be an incubator farm. An incubator farm is typically a place where people are given temporary, exclusive, and affordable access to small parcels of land, equipment, infrastructure, and often training, for the purpose of honing skills and launching farm businesses.
While the offerings of specific incubator farms differ across the country, the overall purpose remains to minimize barriers to entry for beginning farmers and provide professional development to increase the likelihood of their success.
Several meetings have been held with the interested stakeholders including Guilford County, Rockingham County, Elon University, NC A&T, the Piedmont Conservation Council, and the Center for Environmental Farming Systems, yet these meetings have yet to produce a clear path forward for an incubator farm at Hines Chapel Preserve. Stay tuned.
Spill The Tea -
The Hines Chapel Preserve is still a work in progress, yet that didn’t prevent me and Ginger from having a wonderful experience on the trail. Starting on a lengthy dirt road long abandoned, the trail weaves deep into the forest, passing old hardwood trees, open fields, marshes, ponds, creeks, large boulders, remnants of a former homestead, and eventually crossing Reedy Fork Creek several times. The sound of the rolling water and the wind echoing through the trees made it hard for me to believe that we were only twenty minutes from downtown Greensboro and still within Guilford County.
Wrap It Up -
The Hines Chapel Preserve Trail will soon be a welcome and exciting addition to the parks and hiking trails of Guilford County and North Carolina. And once the eastern section of the trail opens, it will definitely be one to include on your list.
