Meeman-Shelby Forest State Park, Tennessee

Date	Distance	Time	Elevation Gain	Average Moving Time	Year to Date Miles
4/7/2023	2.8 miles	1 hour 51 minutes	185'	1.6	160.1

Parking: 

• Woodland Trail trailhead

Map:

• Meeman-Shelby_Forest_web.png (2550×3300) (tnstateparks.com)

Directions:

• We hiked the loop counter-clockwise from the trailhead. There are signs that tell you when to turn for the 1-mile and 3-mile options.

Now that we finished our planned 3 state high points, it was time to make our way back home. We stopped at Meeman Shelby State Park for a hike on the Woodlands Trail loop. There were 1-mile, 3-mile, and 4-mile options. We chose the 3-mile option. This was a well-marked hike. It was generally easy, but I'm getting out of shape due to my cutting back on hiking, so I was huffing and puffing going up a couple of the small hills. This hike was very colorful. It was filled with blue phlox and red buckeyes. We followed a stream for a big portion of the hike. We took many breaks to let Krummholz play in the water.

Another long day. We stopped in southwest Nashville (luckily not downtown) and went to Woodlands Indian Vegetarian Restaurant: Woodlands Indian Vegetarian Restaurant | Best Vegetarian Restaurant in Nashville (woodlandstennessee.com). They had south Indian cuisine, which is harder to come by. There were so many dishes I wanted to try! I ended up having sambar (saved for breakfast) and a dosa. If we come back to this area, we will definitely need to stop there again. Parking was fine. 

The following day, we had plans to hike at Cumberland Mountain State Park, but it was pouring rain all day, so we just drove home. 

Blue Phlox

Blue Phlox

Andersonglossum virginianum   

Red buckeye

See this nice stick I brought you?

Please throw it.

Red buckeye

Red buckeye

Rough horsetail

Virginia bluebells

Mayapples