Cherry Hill Gate – Family fun in Burlington
What parent doesn’t want a cool photo of their kid feeding a chipmunk or a bird? (hint: every parent wants this 🙂 ) and so Cherry Hill Gate delivers!
Chipmunks, birds, beautiful tall trees, a nice stroller friendly trail, and a scenic boardwalk await you at Cherry Hill Gate.
A fun Burlington activity for toddlers, kids and the whole family
The trails here are very scenic and just the right length for small kids in tow. It’s stroller friendly, but the first hill, right inside the entrance, is a bit steep (easier down than up J). We’ve taken our stroller here the past few years and never had a problem.
To get the most fun out of this trip, you absolutely must bring a big bag of bird seed. To get the birds and chipmunks to eat from your hand, just grab some bird seed, and hold out your arm. Wait a few moments and …voila!
A hidden gem in Burlington
Cherry Hill what? Is the most frequent question I get when I mention this place. It’s somewhat of a hidden gem tucked in between the Burlington/Hamilton border. It’s part of Royal Botanical Gardens (RBG) and is located at the intersection of Plains Rd W and Botanical Dr.
Just west of the main entrance to RBG, there is a small parking lot. Look for the blue Hendrie Park sign. The entrance to Cherry Hill Gate is at the west end of the parking lot.
Free admission too!
But wait, there’s more! Not only does this place have a great nature trail and cute critters – it’s free to get in! The only cost to this outing is a very reasonable parking fee of $1 per hour (max 5 bucks).
Beautiful family friendly nature walk
Once inside the main entrance, follow the path down to the bottom, this is the best place to feed the chipmunks.
Keep walking along the path and you will get to a great bridge – another popular photo spot. Look down and you might see ducks, geese and turtles.
On the other side of the bridge, is the boardwalk. I find the boardwalk to be the best place to feed the birds. It’s a nice board walk but it only has a railing on one side. I always hold my kids a bit tighter in this section!
For us, we usually make it about 10 minutes past the end of the boardwalk and then we turn back. This is the point where at least one of our kids has to pee or sleep or eat, so I can’t comment on the remaining part of the trails.
We usually continue on for a few more minutes after the boardwalk. We check out the flowers, swans and other cool nature-y things.
More online information needed
I wish there was more online information about the trails here. Before embarking with the kids, I would like to know trail lengths, difficulty, features along the way, is it a circular trail etc.
If you have any more info on the rest of the trails in this area please comment below or connect with me via email or Facebook, as I would love to include more info here.
Family fun in Burlington
Fun, unique and practically free, Cherry Hill Gate scores big points with me and Harry and the kiddos talk about it long after we’ve left.
Some good to know information:
