Wheaton Regional Park and Brookside Gardens - Moderate 4.2 miles

I know people who lived in the suburbs of Silver Spring for years without stumbling across this hilly gem that features a carousel, an adventure playground and Brookside Gardens. The heat wave should break by Saturday morning, so it should be an excellent time to still see plenty of things in bloom throughout the trip.

We will start at the Pine Lake parking lot on the west side of the park and make a counter-clockwise loop around the inner trails of the park, passing three ponds and most of the garden collections on a roughly 4.2-mile circuit. The terrain varies from mulch to gravel to paved at various points. This is a relatively short trip but there are three moderate hills spaced out along the route. Those might slow us down a bit, though I expect we will be wrapped up by 12:30 unless we are particularly awestruck by the gardens.

We will mostly follow this route from Alltrails which takes us through most of the gardens.

I know there are a number of casual restaurants in Wheaton that people rave about. If anyone has a favorite, I can likely be convinced to grab lunch afterwards.