Review: Honey Hollow, Bucks County Audubon Society

Outdoor Appeal: 10Setting: old barn converted to a stunning self-serve nature center, smooth hiking trails, a brook, bird blinds, a pond and a waterwheel

Explorable Op's: A ton. The nature center alone is an hour or so worth of exploring.

Difficulty: Easy. Although we have not explored all of the trails and property at Honey Hollow, it seems that most of the treks are short, flat and relatively uncluttered by roots and rocks.

Facilities: Civilized. Actually, they are top notch. The nature center is the best around and the bathrooms are immaculate.

Review: This is a must for a Bucks County outdoor enthusiast with kids. We've gone several times and it's always been fun. Walking into the nature center is like walking into a cathedral. The high ceiling brings you to silence. Timbers show off the skeleton of the barn and wooden steps lead up to the learning center loft. The bottom floor has some tables and folding chairs to work at along with some taxidermied animals, history placards and "please touch" tables. The "please touch" tables we've seen are skulls/bones and nests, feathers, eggs rocks and trees. The second floor learning loft has an open view to the bottom floor, is carpeted and is down right cozy. It's flanked by two walls that have wooden painted nature puzzles. It's a bit hard to describe but you pull out a piece of the wall, which is shaped like a leaf or an animal, and then you look on the back of it to find the name. In warmer weather there are aquariums with animals. We saw two tanks, one with turtles and one with a lizard. There are nature themed jigsaw puzzles, stuffed animals (to play with), some more taxidermied animals and a reading room with comfortable sofas and chairs. It's a great place to go even on a rainy day. The trails around the property are meant for bird watching so they are pretty well maintained to assure watching birds instead of watching your step. We took the pond trail on one of our visits and I found that it was a good length for small kids. Plus it has a lot of interesting things to see along the way to keep the momentum of the hike rolling. Our first stop was the waterwheel, which doesn't actually work. But it's still neat to look at. But beware, there is a nesting animal in the rafters that was unhappy with us peering into it's home. I'm still not sure what it was but it sounded none too friendly. From the waterwheel we headed around the pond over the bridge that crosses the outlet steam. This was a fun place for both Max and Frank to run around. They were a bit frustrated that they couldn't get down to the steam, but there are other trails for creek exploration on the property. The next stop were the docks. There are two docks on the far side of the pond. We could see sunfish from both and had a good time looking at our reflections in the water. Moving on from the docks the hike gets slightly more challenging with a few hills. You can complete the loop around the pond by crossing the inlet stream and heading back to the nature center or you can continue on a path that follows the stream to where it crosses the gravel road that runs through the property. We checked out the inlet stream but instead of crossing it, we back tracked and took the path that follows the stream. We made it back to the gravel road and hiked back up the big slope to the nature center. The whole walk from start to finish took about 45 minutes. The back of the nature center has a large slate covered patio. We set up there for lunch. It was a perfect place for the boys to run around and eat at the same time. Once we finished lunch we headed back into the nature center to take a last look at some of the curiosities we found. We signed the guest registry and we were on our way.

Recommendations: If you've got binoculars and the time, this is a great place to see birds, although it not really possible if you're looking after small kids. The pond trail is a sure bet because the waterwheel, the bridges and the docks provide built in rests and give some incentive to keep on moving to the next destination. Plus there is a good chance you'll see some animals in or around the pond. If you are itching to get out of the house on a rainy day, the nature center is a perfect way to get outdoors without getting wet. Honey Hollow is a big thumbs up. Hope you enjoy. Happy trails.