Since I’ve already walked, piecewise, some of the longer paved trails in the area—the W&OD, Mount Vernon, the two trails that connect them, and the Capital Crescent—I needed a new project to keep me motivated for outdoor exercise, so yesterday I started the traversal of Fairfax County’s Cross County Trail. The trail, recently completed, covers 40 miles, from Potomac River in Great Falls Park in the north to the Occoquan River in Occoquan Regional Park in the south. It connects with lots of other trails in the county, and shares a track with some in several stretches, and so I’ve already walked some of it without really taking note of the fact.
I started my recordkeeping with a section near to home, a segment of somewhat less than two miles from where the CCT splits from the W&OD and threads through Tamarack Park to an underpass at the Dulles Toll and Access Road. The trail dips in and out of the valley of Difficult Run and shares the Toll Road crossing with the run. Unfortunately if not unexpectedly, the most salient feature of this passage is the plentiful graffiti covering the support columns of the Toll Road. Fairfax County is not wilderness. There is some wildish habitat to be found along the trail, but you’ll also see your share of white-tailed deer munching backyard gardens. And I discovered that carrying a trash bag along with me would be a good idea. There is little elevation change in this section of the trail, but it can be tricky to find your way at times, especially where young pickles have effaced the marker posts.