— I started the new year by revisiting some of my favorite places around the Austin area. On the second day of the year, I met a couple of friends and did a 3.5-mile (5.6 km) hike around St. Edwards Park in northwest Austin. The park has several trails for all types of users. One can remain close to Bull Creek and enjoy easy trails and find more people and dogs. What my friends and I decided to do was a bit more demanding. We took the outer loop combining the red and green trails. That included crossing Bull Creek and climbing 347 feet (105.7 meters) to admire higher-elevation views of the hills around the park and Bull Creek itself from above. The trail was also much quieter and with very few people using it. While on the hills, we saw this waterfall down below. So, when we returned to creek area, we hiked to where we had seen the waterfalls. It was not very easy to get a clear view of the falls, but I managed to squeeze between some trees and get closer to the creek. That was the sweet spot to get the falls and the beautiful light coming through the trees. This park is very popular in Austin, especially in the summertime. There are several swimming holes along the creek. Even on week days, the small parking lot gets full very fast. By the time we left around the noon hour, the lot was full, and cars were lining whatever space was free along Spicewood Springs Road.
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