Timberland Heights has been my recent trail playground. It has a large trail ecosystem that gives you a variety of surfaces, terrains, forested trails, river treks and even waterfalls. The trails is also a scenic wonderland with a view of the mountain ranges and the forested trails.
#TaleOfTheTrail
I’ve been to Timberland Height trails several times for recon and once for a race. It’s a perfect place to train for trail running with a mildly rolling terrain and a lot of run-able stretches along the way. As of now, it’s more popular as a bike trail but it has also been a home for several trail runs and events. It just gets better in the future as Timberland would be developing a lot of unexplored areas for runners. I’ve also tried the trails in both wet & wild and hot & humid conditions yet it remains to be such a scenic trail playground.
Wet & Wild Timberland Trails
The first time we explored the trails it was wet and wild. We entered via the Blue Trail . We had a mix of single track trails with overlooking view of the mountain ranges that also came with a lot of surprises like this one.
That’s a really steep climb of 400-500 meters. We had to crawl on some parts and also had to rest as it literally took our breath away. After the long climb, you get rewarded by a scenic view of the mountains.
Now this one makes up for that really steep climb. It was also wet and wild at that time so I did have several slips and slides but it’s all part of the fun. After the steep ascent and the magnificent view, we took the trails heading to Ka Vergel, which is a common pit stop here for Mountain Bikers.
It was a fun descent that added to my slip and slide total of 4. There were muddy areas, which was all good. We took a short break at Ka Vergel and proceeded our way out of the trail.
Short and Sweet Timberland Trails
The second visit was a quick 6K loop we have to squeeze in before heading to our meeting that day. We took the spine road this time and headed to the main trail passing by the chapel, which was about 1.5 kilometers mix of single track and forested trails. The main trails leads to the rolling mountain trails that gives you an even better view of the mountain ranges.
It was drier this time around though there are still some puddle of muds at some areas. The trails lead to a short river crossing before it ascends again. Since we are short of time, we took the road heading to Ka Vergel mid way into the climb before heading out of the trail for a short but sweet 6K loop. Even on a short course, the trails can really amaze you.
Timberland Falls
The third trip we had was to go check out the Timberland Falls. Basically we had to follow the trails on our second visit except that we had to climb further up to the overlooking part of my Timberland, which is fast becoming my favorite part of the trail.
This is the same overlooking part we visited on our first trail but the climb was much more tolerable from the river area compared to the first one. It was a bit foggy this time but the view is still breathtaking. From the overlooking part, we went further to the trail before we descended towards the trail leading to the river. When you reach the river, you can actually do a river trek but it would be more difficult since you have to pass by slippery rocks along the way and it was raining. We took the upper trails, which was a much better idea since it was also a scenic one.
As we went up the trails, we hit the ridge area with the lush green surroundings as your backdrop. It was all way down from here. It was a bit of a challenge going down on the lower part of the trail though there were steps that would help you on the descent. The trail leads to the river and from there was a mix of rocky surface as well as river treks to hit Timberland Falls. It was raining then but it was tolerable though you have to watch where you step as there are some deep parts of the river.
Timberland Falls was beautiful. There were some deep parts, which is good for a swim. The water was cold and refreshing. We stayed a while to enjoy the falls before we took the road leading up the trail.
It was a series of uphill climbs at this point. Some were steep but the climbs were tolerable as we divided the climbs to several segments. The climb brought us back to the spine road. We then tried out the Green Zone which is a beginner-friendly trail with switch backs along forested trails before we called it a day.
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