An outdoor adventure for the whole family! An easy rambling walk that will take us along the Cedar Point Trail to Steep Hill Beach with naturalists from The Trustees of Reservations. We’ll take note of how winter has changed the landscape, and how plants and animals adapt to survive this “dormant” season. Our wander will end in the Pine Grove, where we’ll warm up with hot chocolate around a campfire.
If you have ever seen tracks in the snow, sand, or soil and were curious about what made them, then this is the program for you! Refuge staff will lead you through the basics of identifying common animals through the clues that they leave behind. A brief introduction to animal tracks and other sign in the visitor center classroom will be followed by a trip to the refuge where we will look for tracks and attempt to determine their owner’s identity.
Welcome the New Year with a brisk hike through the Crane Wildlife Refuge! We’ll begin with a small fire on the beach – bring a slip of paper with regrets from the past year, and we’ll send them up in smoke. Then we’ll cleanse our psyches with a trek through the starkly beautiful landscape of the dunes; trails winding along the sandy hills, blood pumping, the smell of the sea in the air – what a perfect way to to enter into 2018! At hike’s end we’ll warm up with hot cider.
The Inns of Rockport invite you to join them for an evening stroll on Saturday, December 9 from 4-7 pm. For the second year, the Inns of Rockport are opening their doors for the Twilight Holiday Inn & Cookie Tour! Stroll through Rockport’s finest Inns decorated for the season, and along the way, collect an assortment of home baked cookies along with a collection of coupons donated by Rockport businesses. Local artisans will be displaying and selling their creations for your holiday gift giving.
On this Friday before Thanksgiving, in the dark of the new moon, we’ll walk with tea lights (no open flames!) to illuminate our passage through the trails and along the rolling hills at the Crane Estate. While we walk, we’ll talk about the first Thanksgiving, and how giving thanks can make us appreciate all the good and wonder in our lives. You’ll be amazed at how fortunate you are when you stop taking things for granted! Come with an attitude of gratitude! Pre-registration is suggested.
Come explore the Crane Estate trails in this season between the chaos of summer and the quiet of winter. We’ll take note of the ways nature gets ready to rest – the preparations that plants and animals make to survive the snowfall that will arrive in a matter of weeks. Bring your sharp senses and your skills of observation! This is an outdoor adventure for the whole family! We’ll end our ramble with a campfire and hot chocolate.
Chill with the coolest guys in town! Enjoy a cool visit to Cape Pond Ice Company, icing Gloucester's fleet since 1848. We were featured in Sebastian Junger's account of The Perfect Storm. Tours highlight the history of the ice industry, with vintage film of natural ice harvests. See first hand 300-pound block ice being made (up to 350 tons per day), fishing vessels taking on ice and ice sculptures being carved in our historic icehouse on Gloucester's working waterfront. Part of Trails & Sails.
Chill with the coolest guys in town! Enjoy a cool visit to Cape Pond Ice Company, icing Gloucester's fleet since 1848. We were featured in Sebastian Junger's account of The Perfect Storm. Tours highlight the history of the ice industry, with vintage film of natural ice harvests. See first hand 300-pound block ice being made (up to 350 tons per day), fishing vessels taking on ice and ice sculptures being carved in our historic icehouse on Gloucester's working waterfront.
Essex River Cruises hosts a narrated sightseeing tour that winds down the beautiful Essex River aboard Essex River Queen, a pontoon boat. Explore the marshes and discover a habitat brimming with abundant wildlife and the changing landscape that supports it. Bring along your binoculars, cameras and sketchbooks! You're bound to be inspired!
Join park staff from the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge to see and experience the refuge’s salt marsh than from the cockpit of your own kayak! Join a couple of refuge rangers for a 2.5 hour meander through the marsh and learn about some of its fascinating natural and cultural history.
