Quick Facts:

• AllTrails link: Terrell Marsh Trail, 1km, 5m elevation gain
• Difficulty: easy but not very stroller friendly
• Traffic: light
• Facilities: interpretive boards
• View: mixture of local flora from forest trees to marsh plants
• Overall score: 7/10

On our short overnight camping trip in Birch Bay State Park, we checked out this cute little hiking trail, Terrell Marsh Trail.

This is a 1 km loop trail which is very easy to complete and suitable for young kids. The whole trail is quite flat but some parts are narrow and rooty, making it difficult to push a stroller around.

At the trail head you can find pamphlets for self guided learning through the trail. There were also information stops along the whole trail, inviting you to delve deeper into the ecosystem around you. The info was actually quite interesting and our little walk soon became a scavenger hunt looking for different species of trees.

Due to the marsh environment, the plants and trees here are very diverse. There are red cedar, western hemlock, Douglas fir, and Bigleaf maple trees. Our little ones took up the challenge to spot as many red cedars and western hemlocks as they can find.

Other interesting plants here are the ferns and the False Lily of the Valley flowers. Once they learned the difference, identifying sword ferns and lady ferns became Big Bro’s favorite task. There were some skunk cabbage in the marsh too.

The trail took us about 30-40 minutes to complete as we were taking our time looking for trees and plants and reading our self guided pamphlets. If you bypass the signage, you can complete this short trail in about 15 minutes.

Parking was fairly easy as this is not a busy trail. There are about 6-8 spots in front of the trail head. Discovery pass is required to park here and you can purchase these from the park. If you are camping here, there’s no need to buy the pass as it’s already included in your camp reservation.

There are no washrooms throughout the trail; however, the trail is fairly close to the Birch Bay day use area where a big washroom is located by the playground.

Overall this is a very educational and enjoyable little loop trail for the kids. Perfect if you want to educate the kids on some common trees and plants in the Pacific Northwest. We would definitely suggest to take the kids here for a stroll if you are camping at Birch Bay State Park.