I love exploring. Last weekend, I was driving my older son to his girlfriend’s house in another town and happened to notice a sign for the Richfield Nature Park along the way. On the way home, I asked my younger son if he felt like exploring, and next thing you know, we are discovering a cool new local attraction that I hadn’t even known existed!
At first glance, Richfield Nature Park, in Richfield, Wisconsin, seems as though it’s not much to look at. We walked a small trail around part of the park and thought there wasn’t much to see. It was nice to get out in Nature for an afternoon, but it only took us about ten minutes to walk the trail. Then we noticed that that road we drove in on continued beyond the nature park and went past an old red barn. At first, it wasn’t obvious if the barn was part of the park, or if it belonged to a neighboring property. We decided to follow the road and see what lay beyond.
So, we jumped back into the car and headed past that barn. Around a gentle curve, and just down the hill, we found a beautiful little stream and a whole ‘nother park! It turns out that Richfield Nature Park is attached to the Richfield Historical Park. The historical park includes a couple of original homestead cabins and the Messer/Mayer Grist Mill. None of the buildings was open while we were there, but it was still fun to look at them from the outside. (I checked out their website but couldn’t find any information on whether inside tours are available.)
This was an unexpected and fun way to spend a beautiful afternoon. I’d like to challenge all of you to go out and find a new attraction in your local area one of these weekends. You might be amazed by what you find once you open your eyes to those sites that you pass blindly on your daily commute!
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I’m just over the border in Northern Illinois. I always made it a point to take my daughter to the off beat parks. There is a working farm in Schaumburg of all places. We have another one nearby that no longer has the buildings open, but like you said, it is fun to just walk around. We always try to find ways to be outdoors.