Cook Forest and the Swinging Bridge
- by Lou Bernard
- August 3, 2022
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“So the Pennsylvania Wilds is divided into six landscapes,” I explained to my wife as we drove along Route 36. “So far this year, we’ve managed to take family trips to five of them.”
Michelle nodded, as if she hadn’t heard all of this before. “Which ones?”
“The I-80 Frontier, Elk Country, Dark Skies, Pine Creek Valley and the PA Grand Canyon,” I said. ”And as of today, Cook Forest and the Ancients.”
We’d been taking a lot of day trips recently, family trips through the Pennsylvania Wilds. At the beginning of the year, I’d written a piece about things I’d like to do throughout the year, and Cook Forest had been at the top of the list. I’d been in the landscape, and in Clarion County, but had never visited the state park itself.
Cook Forest State Park covers 8,500 acres, and is home to some very old trees. Some of the trees in Cook Forest are 350 years old. My son Paul is only 343 years less than that, and was excited about another family trip to a place he’d never been before.
We got to the park office and got out of the car. Cook Forest is beside the Clarion River, and is in three counties: Clarion, Jefferson, and Forest. The parking lot, in fact, is right at a corner of all three.
While Michelle and Paul went into the office, I walked right down the road and took photos, finding some amusement in walking through three counties within a minute.
I found Paul and Michelle in the office, where we picked up a couple of maps and then headed up the trail. I’d gotten Paul all excited by telling him about the swinging bridge.
From the park office, the swinging bridge is just a short walk up the Birch Trail. Paul ran ahead, because he is a kid, and couldn’t wait to walk over it. The swinging bridge is a suspension bridge over Tom’s Run, and this thing wobbles like a bouncy castle, especially when you’re walking across it with a seven-year-old who has just been sprung from the car. I was kind of delighted with it; Michelle was not as thrilled.
“Are you sure this is okay?” she asked.
“Michelle,” I said. “I am telling you, this thing is absolutely, one hundred percent safe-ish.”
“Can I go down to the water and see if it’s cold, Daddy?” Paul asked. “I just want to stick my finger in.”
“Be careful,” I said. “Do not fall into the creek under any circumstances.”
Two minutes later, after fishing my drenched son out of the creek, I let him play on the rocks under the supervision of my wife while I walked up into the forest cathedral area for some photos.
It’s the most impressive part of Cook Forest, the part that really makes you stop and think. Some of those trees are older than me and anyone I know, older than my home, older than the country I live in. They were here long before me, and they’ll still be there long after I am gone.
But here I am, standing among them now.
As I walked back to my family, I felt very small, one tiny piece in a vast, diverse world. And I felt that it was okay, that it’s the way things are supposed to be.
When I got back to my family, Paul was still having fun climbing on the rocks. “This is my favorite place, Daddy,” he told me. “Where are we going next time?”
I smiled. “We’ll see,” I said.
