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Cresheim Valley Drive Spring Cleanup – Love Your Park – Sat 5/17
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Earth Day Workday! Volunteer event Sun 4/19
Cresheim Trail volunteer workday Wed 4/1
Cresheim Trail volunteer workday Sat 3/21
February volunteer workday CANCELED (Sun 2/15)
Cresheim Trail volunteer workday Sat 1/17

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We encourage you to join our group by making a donation ($50 suggested) online at our Square page or by mail to:

Friends of the Cresheim Trail

PO Box 4341

Philadelphia, PA 19118

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Email: info@cresheimtrail.org

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This weekend, we’re gonna keep it spicy. Spicebush

This weekend, we’re gonna keep it spicy. Spicebush — northern spicebush specifically, Lindera benzoin — is native to eastern North America. It’s notable for its spicy fragrance, yellow spring blossoms (which are winding down after this heat wave), and red berries in the fall. It’s one of the most abundant understory shrubs in the Cresheim corridor and throughout the Wissahickon. And, it’s surprisingly plentiful in the Quarry Rock Garden, where we’ll be working at our volunteer outing THIS SUNDAY.

The forecast looks like it’ll be a little wet, but as long as the rain does not involve thunder, lightning, or high winds, we’re gonna go for it. What better way to celebrate Earth Day than getting out in a little rain. Our partners at @wissrestvols and @fowissahickon agree, so grab a hat and a slicker and let’s do it!

There are lots of invasive plants to remove (including several crowding otherwise healthy spicebush plants), deadfall to clear, trash to pick on the Friends Loop, good times to be had.

We’ll meet at 9am in Mermaid Park in Chestnut Hill, where @chestnuthillcommunity installed a butterfly as part of a collaboration with @morrisarboretum that will be up throughout 2026.

If the forecast takes a turn for the worse, we’ll post any cancellations here.

#cresheimtrail

Greetings, earthlings! 🌎 With a warm week ahead, t

Greetings, earthlings! 🌎 With a warm week ahead, the early forecast looks just about *perfect* for our next volunteer workday. Celebrate Earth Day weekend with Friends of the Cresheim Trail and our partners from @fowissahickon @wissrestvols & @chestnuthillcommunity this Sunday, April 19th at 9am.

We’ll meet at Mermaid Park in Chestnut Hill (7645 Germantown Ave) for another morning in the Quarry Rock Garden, plotting against invasive plants and planning for native ones to come later. We’ll be clearing brush and deadfall, pulling vines, picking trash, and all of the usual fun stuff of a volunteer workday. If we have enough people (and it looks like we might), we have some other tasks elsewhere like watering plants and placing gravel on the new connector trail at Wissahickon East.

A very special thank you to @athleticbrewing, whose Two for the Trails grant is supporting this outing, and of course to David Bower and the Q-Team, Wissahickon Restoration Volunteers, and Chestnut Hill Community Association.

It’s happening THIS SUNDAY, and as always, if you’re a Weavers Way member, you can count your volunteering towards your working hours.

#cresheimtrail

Once again, a monumental offering of gratitude goe

Once again, a monumental offering of gratitude goes to the 37 volunteers who came out yesterday, in the middle of the week, to care for our beloved Cresheim Trail! Extra special thanks to David Bower and the @fowissahickon Q-Team, @independenceyouthcycling, and @philaparkandrec. Teamwork ⟿ dreamwork. With spring buds starting to emerge around us, we met and worked in the area of the trail crossing at Cresheim Road, from the Outdoor Classroom down to the road crossing at Buttercup Cottage.

Among the work that got done: we removed and scattered a bunch of yard waste and organic debris that was littering the road, we cut back lots of honeysuckle and multiflora rose before it started encroaching into the trail, we continued our mission against english ivy, and of course we hauled out a few bags of trash. Most importantly (and arguably most fun), we did some much needed trail work on the south side of the crossing, stabilizing some loose areas, building some new grade reversals to help shed water off the trail, and we debermed the area where the poison ivy grows so strong.

All in all, a heck of an outing for the middle of the week. Thanks again to all who came out. We’ll get back to it on Sunday, April 19th for a big tag team Earth Day weekend outing. Save the date for now (we’ll start at 9am) and we’ll announce details shortly.

#cresheimtrail

Calling all friends for a volunteer outing THIS WE

Calling all friends for a volunteer outing THIS WEDNESDAY, April 1st at 9am. 🕷️ The forecast looks like we *might* get a little wet, but the heavy stuff should hold off till later in the day, so we’re gonna go for it, our first weekday workday of the year.

We’ll be happy to be joined by David Bower and the @fowissahickon Q-Team for a variety of tasks — trail stuff, trash stuff, sightline stuff… all the good stuff. We’ll meet at the Outdoor Classroom, where the Cresheim Trail crosses Cresheim Road. If you’re driving, please park on the *north* side of Cresheim Road, i.e. on the right as you’re coming downhill from Allens Lane.

Also, save the date of Sunday, April 19th, as we’re putting together an all-star collabo outing for Earth Day weekend back at the Quarry Rock Garden. Details on that to come, but in the meantime, see you Wednesday morn.

#cresheimtrail

Oh yes indeed, we’re getting right back to it. Fri

Oh yes indeed, we’re getting right back to it. Friends of the Cresheim Trail are happy to announce our first weekday workday of the year, NEXT WEDNESDAY, April 1st. No foolin’.

David Bower and the @fowissahickon Q-Team will join us to put some attention on the sidewalks where Emlen Street turns into Cresheim Valley Drive, i.e. where the trail crosses over to the Wissahickon at Buttercup Cottage. We’ll also have some other spring cleaning to do, trail tasks, and more. And if you haven’t been to the Outdoor Classroom since the kiosk’s been installed, you’re in luck: that’s where we’ll meet.

It’s all happening next Wednesday, April 1st, at 9am. The Outdoor Classroom is where the Cresheim Trail crosses Cresheim Road (map in slide 2). If you’re driving, plan on parking on the shoulder of the westbound/downhill side.

Our next volunteer workday will coincide with Earth Day weekend, on Sunday, April 19th. Details to come. #cresheimtrail

35 mega thank yous go out to the 35 volunteers who

35 mega thank yous go out to the 35 volunteers who joined us on Saturday for a most beautiful first full day of spring in the Quarry Rock Garden. We really put our back into it, hauling and stacking cut up timber, raking and hauling brush, pulling vines, exposing rock features, cleaning the stairs, filling 13 bags of trash, and even getting some of the vegetation off of the top of the rock face. All to be continued at next month’s volunteer workday (Sun 4/19).

But before we get to that one, we’re going to get out for our first weekday of the year, next Wednesday, April 1st, at 9am with David Bower and the @fowissahickon Q-Team. Details and location TBA, but save the date if you’re available and we’ll see you then.

#cresheimtrail

Special thanks to @chconservancy for sharing these

Special thanks to @chconservancy for sharing these wonderful historical photos. Rina Brun Fesnick was a Chestnut Hill native who donated her photos to the Conservancy, including these two photos from the 1930s of the Woodward Rock Garden, as it was known then. Rina died last year at the age of 100.

That's Cresheim Valley Drive in the background of pic 1, and pic 2 will be familiar to anyone who's traversed the Friends Loop. Come see the contemporary views of both with Friends of the Cresheim Trail this weekend.

Our March volunteer workday falls on the first full day of spring, this Saturday the 21st. We'll meet at 9am at Mermaid Park in Chestnut Hill (the subject of a project by our friends at @chestnuthillcommunity). Please note that @chestnuthillfm farmers market will be happening 9am–12pm, so plan on parking at the Chestnut Hill Friends Meeting, who've kindly opened their parking lot at 20 E Mermaid Ln to volunteers — you can take the Friends Loop straight down to the meetup spot.

#cresheimtrail

A huge shout of gratitude to @appalachianmountainc

A huge shout of gratitude to @appalachianmountainclub (who’s celebrating their 150th anniversary this year) for hosting a two-day advanced trail training over the weekend in Fairmount Park. Lots of familiar Cresheim Trail faces, along with friends from @belmont_trails, @fowissahickon, and @independenceyouthcycling were on hand to enhance skills and build new ones in rockwork, rigging, and trail analysis - with special projects on the Belmont Trails to put the skills in action.

We’ll be baking this skill set into upcoming volunteer workdays, including one this weekend. Join us at Mermaid Park in Chestnut Hill (7645 Germantown Ave) for a morning in the Quarry Rock Garden. It’s happening at 9am this Saturday, March 21st.

#cresheimtrail

(c) 2026 The Friends of the Cresheim Trail

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