Wissahickon

Wissahickon Valley Park (est. 1868) is a lush, 1,800-acre gorge, crossing forest and meadow before plunging down to the Wissahickon Creek. The creek itself drops more than 100 feet as it passes through the gorge and merges with the Schuylkill River. In 1920, the wide road paralleling the creek was closed to vehicular traffic and became “Forbidden Drive,” stretching from the Cedar House Cafe at Northwest Ave, past the sole wooden covered bridge within a US city and the Valley Green Inn restaurant, ending at the historic papermill “Rittenhouse Town” at Lincoln Drive.

The park boasts 57 miles of trails, maintained by the non-profit Friends of the Wissahickon. A series of WPA-contructed stone retaining walls, bridges and huts dot the landscape; crumbling dams memorialize industrial mills that once drew power from the creek. Two statues pay tribute to the Leni Lenape tribe and the early Quaker settlers of the area and a tall monolith memorializes the late-18th-century hermit Johannes Kelpius and his band of reclusive German mystics who lived in these woods awaiting the End of Time.

The lush valley is home to a vast array of wildlife – often hikers see raccoons, squirrels, chipmunks and herds of whitetail deer; arboreal and water birds including bald eagles, red-tail hawks, and blue herons; reptiles, amphibians, and numerous spiders and insects. Occasionally a black bear lumbers through, to much local excitement.

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