After a long week at work, I decided I would spend some time today inside area parks. I focused most of my time in Fishers and Carmel and tried to visit some parks that I've either never actually visited or never actually really experienced.
One such park is River Road Park. It's a park I've driven by many times, but I've never actually stopped and enjoyed it.
River Road Park is a 62 acre park. Right off the bat, River Road Park presents a bit more uniquely as most area parks because in learning the history of the park we end up going way, way back.
In fact, we go back to 8,000 to 6,000 B.C. when the park area is noted as having been inhabited by what we call the Moffitt Village. It was home to the Early Archaic and Early and Late Woodland people and then later occupied by other prehistoric and historic Native Americans. Woodland people were characterized by ceramics, food production and mound building. Hunting became less main stream and the use of plants for food became more popular.
The park has really been developed as a way of acknowledging this history. Moving toward modern times, the park was purchased from Kosene & Kosene in 1992. The River Trail was constructed in 1998 as a joint project between Carmel Clay Parks and Hamilton County Parks.
The park's ancient history is captured in an award-winning interpretive exhibit created in 2002 along with a complementary historic play area. The exhibit really covers pre-historic Native American culture from about 700 years ago.
Today, the park includes paved trails, prairies, a White River overlook, wetlands, soccer and softball fields, and lots of green spaces.
River Road also has one of Central Indiana's most unique playgrounds. The playground is equipped with slides and a handicap accessible sandbox with artifacts and rock climbing structures. River Road also features an interpretive building designed to educate visitors about Native American life hundreds of years ago and the historical significance of the local area.
They are in the process of adding a canoe launch (signage is already up). There's a bike trail, nature trails, and the park does have public restrooms.
While the park is certainly not one of Hamilton County's fanciest parks, River Road Park is unique in that it combines education and play quite beautifully. It also allows for children with disabilities to join in for some of the fun (not every feature of the playground is disability friendly). Being close to the river, the trails here do have some gentle inclines/declines, but they are for the most part quite manageable.
There's also plenty of parking here, though a nice job has been done in balancing convenience with maintaining a certain rustic quality within the park's grounds. If you haven't been here, it's certainly worth your time. While smaller children may not stay busy for long, children who can really embrace the educational aspects of the park will have much to appreciate. read more