The land for Golden Ponds park and nature reserve was donated to the city of Longmont by Vernon V. Golden, who had previously used the site as a gravel mine. It opened as a park in 1990, a year after his death. From the map/satellite view, it does look like industrial quarries that have been filled in with water to make a handful of small ponds, and for this reason it wasn’t my first choice of places to visit. This park is just a few miles from our house, though, so yesterday we decided to check it out.

By car, you access the 94-acre park by heading over the railroad tracks and between a neighborhood and a couple of mini-storage facilities. There’s a small parking lot that was mostly full on a glorious spring day, with overflow parking along the street. We had some lunch in one of several picnic pavilions before heading out on a little hike around the ponds. One of the first things I noticed was the preponderance of water birds — on the first pond there was a large group of Canada geese, mallards, seagulls, and herons all hanging out together. A couple pairs of Canada geese were very interested in our lunch, so I imagine people have been feeding them – they were not at all shy about coming within inches of humans. It’s surprising how large (and loud!) they are, up close.

Vernon Golden was an avid fisherman, so there are numerous fishing spots established around the park, as well as a statue of him baiting hooks with a small boy. There are about 2.5 miles of trails around and between the ponds, with fantastic views of Mt. Meeker/Long’s Peak from just about everywhere. The Flatirons are also visible from the northwest end of the park.

We walked northwest on the trail along the railroad tracks (alas, no trains) as far as we could go, then looped south around the ponds, where the trail runs along the St. Vrain Creek. We’ve been in a drought situation for a while, and it’s too early for much snowmelt in the creek’s Continental Divide headwaters, so the creek was just inches deep and its cottonwoods seemed a bit sad. There’s a bridge over a “waterfall” but right now it’s just dry concrete and tangled tree roots.

Golden Ponds serves as trailhead for the St. Vrain Greenway, Longmont’s 18-mile bike and walking trail. We walked on the Greenway a bit south to Lykins Gulch and found a fabulous bronze toad sculpture, the Golden Ponds Guardian (part of our local Art In Public Places initiative), before heading back up and around the loop.

The trails at Golden Ponds Park are flat, making this an easy, accessible venture for just about anyone. We saw hikers, runners, bicyclists from about age 2 up, skateboarders, folks in wheelchairs, inline skaters, and evidence <ahem> of horse riders. Dogs are welcome on leash. I believe limited people-powered boating is allowed, but we didn’t see any.

Unfortunately there are powerlines crossing over the easternmost pond, with massive towers on each end. IMO these really detract from the natural beauty, but it’s still a very nice spot. We saw a graceful heron take flight and a seagull diving from the sky for fish, the latter of which is very strange to see a thousand miles from the nearest ocean. We also saw a huge bird in a nest at the very top of a tree that may have been an eagle, but it was too far away to know for sure.

Despite the powerlines, railroad tracks, and the fact that it’s a former industrial site, nature has taken over enough in the last 30+ years to make this park a fine sanctuary just outside city limits. Like McIntosh Lake, I imagine it is absolutely stunning at sunset. It is close enough that we could ride our bikes over there, and then ride all over the city on the Greenway. I wonder if we could find one of Longmont’s twelve microbreweries along the way?