Spruce Creek Preserve Park in Port Orange – Ridgewood Avenue

Spruce Creek Park in Port Orange, located at 6171 Ridgewood Ave., is part fo the Doris Leeper Spruce Creek Preserve. It’s one of five entrances to the park. At this entrance there is a great little family activity you can do!
Pack a picnic lunch and head to this park in the morning. When you enter the park drive back to where you see the ranger station/building and turn right. Drive back to the pavilion. You will see the pavilion with a children’s playground next to it. Once you park walk back past the playground, on the left hand side of it. That’s where the trail begins. There is about a 15-20 minute walk back to an observation tower. You walk over a boardwalk and then through a short walk through the woods on a trail. Then you are at the tower.
From the tower you can get a great view of the marsh. There are birds and it’s just a great view. Look down at the ground near the tower and you will see lots of little crabs scurrying around and digging holes in the ground. Making this whole short hike is about half an hour total, not including your stop to enjoy the view while at the top of the tower.
There are other longer hikes you can take at this entrance of the park, but this one is a short, sweet one that gets kids taking a nice walk and seeing a lot. Once you get back to the pavilion you can have lunch and let the kids play.
The trail is short enough to take young kids on it and they will enjoy it. While the boardwalk is suitable for a stroller, the other part of the trail is not once you leave the boardwalk.
Here are some pictures from the short walk at Spruce Creek park in Port Orange:



(Above: lots of little crabs)