Loy’s Station Park and Covered Bridge

This is a great creek for kids. We take my cousins here every summer – wonderful for a day trip. There’s parking right by the bridge. We bring a picnic lunch, folding chairs, and some tools like cups, a bucket, and colanders. Early in the summer there are many HUGE crayfish. Later in the summer there are tons of small ones. There are also plenty of cool bugs to catch, and you never know what creatures you’ll find. The grown-​ups sit in the folding chairs while we watch the kids search for critters. Right under the bridge there’s also a deeper area where little kids can swim. I’ve heard the fishing is good too, and I’ve seen some pretty sizable fish, but I’ve never fished there.
If your kids get squirrelly, there’s also a pretty nice playground so close you can see it from the creek.
There is a picnic table with one of those coal grills they have in parks, although it’s not very well maintained and I wouldn’t want to cook on it. Sometimes I wonder about the quality of the water because there are a couple swampy-​looking places during the summer, but they’re easy to avoid.

So I took my daughter and her friend swimming here, and they had a terrific time… they met other kids and had a great time playing. The water isn’t very deep, so you can’t really swim, but they splashed around and waded. Be sure to bring water shoes or old tennis shoes. Lots of people came with coolers and lawn chairs and actually sat in the water. Some people also bring nets and buckets to catch crayfish.
Another bonus if you don’t want too much sun is that this is almost entirely in the shade (not so important to me – I like a little sun – but my daughter’s friend is a very fair redhead who burns within minutes, so her mom was glad she didn’t have to worry).
Ugh – we did see a water snake… so be forewarned – but hopefully not deterred – because it really is fun.