Christmas events in the Upstate

LIGHTS

Roper Mountain Holiday Lights became a family tradition over the years, but 2017 marked the 26^th, and final, year of the event. We were happy to see the giant star atop the mountain continue to shine (over 30 years now!), and it has become a symbol of the holiday season here in Greenville. However, Hurricane Helene did a number on the Buck Michel star, and this year Roper Mountain Science Center had to take the star off the pedestal for repairs. 

The good news is that RMSCA is kicking off the "Relight the Star" campaign to raise the estimated funds needed to fully restore the star’s structure, wiring, and lighting system! For $20 you can “buy a bulb” and have your name listed on the website as a supporter of the Relight the Star campaign commemorating the 40th anniversary of Roper Mountain Science Center. Help us bring the light back to the mountain and donate here: https://secure.qgiv.com/for/fq5itn/event/relightthestar/

PARADES

The local Poinsettia Christmas Parade will take place this Saturday (December 2^nd) in downtown Greenville, and is always a great way to kick off the holiday season, especially when combined with hot chocolate from Spill the Beans, a walk through Falls Park, and a stop at M. Judson Books to browse for gifts (or to compose your holiday wish list!).

If you’re looking for a small-town Christmas parade, head to Cashiers, NC and you might even see a snowflake or two in the higher elevations! Make sure to stop at the Village Green for some time on a really cool playground, and if you’re feeling a bit more adventurous, check out the hiking and waterfalls in nearby Highlands on Mountain Waters Scenic Byway, Whiteside Mountain, or Sunset Rock.

GREENVILLE STAYCATION

Ice on Main! Skate for $5 every Tuesday after 3 pm courtesy of United Community, excluding Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve, and skate for $4 on December 4, 2025 courtesy of WYFF News Channel 4.

The Festival of Trees is from December 1^st through January 1^st, with 80 holiday trees decorated by local businesses, schools and community groups showcased in the Hyatt Regency Greenville, the Courtyard Greenville Downtown and the Hampton Inn & Suites RiverPlace. It’s an easy, free afternoon/evening to combine a tour of the Hyatt with a ride on the Greenville Trolley, and for supermom-status, pack a thermos of hot chocolate and holiday cookies to snack on while admiring the lights from the warmth of the trolley!

Make sure to stop by the Children’s Museum of the Upstate with the kids. With reindeer crafts, Frosty the Snowman Storytime, special events like Breakfast with Santa, and the holiday-themed room on the 1^st floor, take a breather from your holiday preparations!

…And while you’re at Heritage Green, swing by the library for a free kids holiday program, or stop in the Upcountry History Museum for Beyond Halloween Land | Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas.

HIKES

With cooler temperatures and longer to-do lists around the house, we tend to stick closer to home in December. Local State Parks are among our favorite destinations, Paris Mountain being an obvious one as it’s only 20 minutes away. Rose Hill Plantation State Historic Site hosts a Victorian-style Christmas December 2-3^rd, and Table Rock presents Santa at the Lodge on December 6th.

Or head to Lake Conestee Nature Preserve, for one of their winter events. We love hiking the trails in all different seasons, but winter is one of our favorites because there are no mosquitos, it isn’t hot, and it’s a relative wilderness just outside of the city.

In addition to their Winter Lights, the NC Arboretum is currently hosting Trolls: A Field Study! After finding all twelve trolls, head to the Baker Exhibit Hall for the children’s exhibit Snow: Tiny Crystals, Global Impact for some snow-related fun. 

WEEKEND GETAWAYS

There are still a few last tickets available to ride the Great Smoky Mountain Railway Polar Express, and Bryson City goes all out for the holidays! Visit the train museum, then board the historic train for a 1¼ hour ride to visit Santa at the North Pole.

For a destination a little closer to home, head to Asheville for the Grove Park Inn gingerbread competition. Christmas at Grove Park Inn is full of twinkling lights, Christmas music, and surprises around every corner in the 100 year old hotel.

  

If you’re still looking for ideas on holiday activities with the kids, check out Kidding Around Greenville’s events list – it’s got everything Greenville + kids!

For those of you who would like to keep in touch this December, I’ll be posting on Instagram throughout the month with our adventures here in the Upstate. Happy December!

Thousands of blooms at Dirt & Grit Flower Farm

We were greeted by Hannah, two baby goats, and a field of thousands of blooming tulips!

A new you-pick flower farm has their grand opening today, just 30 minutes from downtown Greenville in Woodruff, South Carolina. I was invited out yesterday for a sneak-peak & to snap a few photos for Kidding Around Greenville, and so Zintis and I made the drive down I-385 on a beautiful blue-sky day and in no time were on the farm gawking at the gorgeous flower fields.

As we toured the flower field with Hannah (co-owner of Dirt & Grit Farm), she reminisced on how some years ago she had searched for a you-pick flower farm near their home and found the options to be too far a drive - so instead she established a cutting garden. The garden grew into a flower field, which has now evolved into a you-pick offering for the Upstate; Dirt & Grit Flower Farm has 50,000+ tulips and 4,000+ daffodils blooming this season, with over 25 varieties available!

From March 8-9 (two days only!) VIP tickets are available, guaranteeing a full field of blooms and ten stems to take home from the you-pick field; you can buy tickets on their website Dirt and Grit Flower Farm. Then, starting Sunday March 10^th, general admission to the tulip and daffodil fields is just $8/person - children 9 and under are free! Enjoy the flowers, and if you wish to pick a bouquet, scissors, buckets and water are available on-site. Flowers are just $1/stem with general admission, and guests are welcome to take photos and bring a picnic to enjoy afterwards. Special care has been taken in the details - even the cups for cut flowers are sturdy, recyclable, and a perfect fit for the cupholder!

The family-farm is also a working farm. The adjacent pasture had horses and cattle, while another field contained the goats. We spotted a few chickens wandering around, and the softest, fluffiest dog came by to say hello. As we talked there was a constant buzz of activity – tractors delivering mulch, a team working on some last-minute painting – and always the background noise of the goats and cattle.

With the two baby goats still trailing us, I asked Hannah about their hopes for the farm. She said that if all goes well, they might convert a field across the street to flowers – maybe sunflowers, or other summer flower. However, the emphasis is “one project at a time!” and this season Dirt & Grit Farm is growing the opportunity for local families to come out and enjoy the beauty of spring flowers.

We are blessed to have such vibrant agro-tourism in the Upstate, and I hope you’ll take full advantage of it this spring. Drive down to Dirt & Grit Flower Farm, spend an hour in their tulip field, and pick a bouquet! Then the following week, dream of tulip fields and spring days as you admire the vase of flowers adorning your home…

Dirt & Grit Flower Farm
3456 Harris Bridge Road, Woodruff SC 29388
Find them on Facebook and Instagram!

Volunteer Opportunities in the Great Outdoors - Upstate SC & Vicinity

The outdoors has given us so much in the past year: a space to safely recreate, shared experiences as a family, and the beauty of our natural world in somewhat uncertain times. With the mantra of “give back to places you love” guiding our family’s approach to volunteer work, we have discovered there are plenty of opportunities to invest your time into the outdoor spaces and places you care about. Here are some of the volunteer stewardship opportunities in the Upstate, and how to get involved in the protection of our shared lands! 

Planting trees with TreesUpstate and Save Our Saluda

Outdoor opportunities close to Greenville

The Greater Greenville Parks Foundation created the Park Hero program to get some love for our public spaces. When you sign up to be a Park Hero, you will join other like-minded people who share a love of public lands and giving back; register online to receive notification as volunteer opportunities arise. 

Spartanburg County Parks has a similar program; the first step in helping to make the parks, community centers, and programs of Spartanburg the best they can be, is to complete the form on the Parks Department website.

Build bluebird boxes, participate in clean-ups, remove invasive species or contribute with observations for Lake Conestee Nature Preserve! Whether you and your family are interested in adopting a trail or just want to be kept in the loop about future volunteer events, visit the website and fill out the volunteer application!

TreesUpstate volunteers have helped plant over 10,000 trees in parks, schools, and neighborhoods throughout Greenville and Spartanburg Counties. Tree planting season starts back up in October and runs through March, so be sure to check back towards the end of summer for their schedule. Our family recently helped TreesUpstate plant native trees and shrubs in northern Greenville county; it was really cool knowing we were helping to protect the watershed for future generations! 

H.O.G. Day at a local school

Another website to keep your eye on is United Way’s Hands On Greenville. Hands On Greenville Day is the largest day of service for the state of South Carolina, and usually takes place in May. Volunteers spread throughout Greenville and surrounding areas to repair cabins at campgrounds for the disabled, paint playground equipment and murals at our public schools, landscape the grounds of local shelters, and beautify nearby state and city parks. Companies and organizations can create teams to participate, and are rewarded with knowing they’ve helped make a difference in our community. Fingers crossed they resume H.O.G. Day in 2022!

While applications for volunteer positions at the Greenville Zoo are currently not being accepted, teens interested in volunteer opportunities such as being a zookeeper assistant and horticultural volunteer should check the website every so often for new postings.

Sampling water on a tributary of the Reedy River

Riverkeepers

Friends of the Reedy River hosts two large, public cleanups per year - one in the spring & one in the fall - the next one taking place on September 18, 2021. FoRR can also provide assistance for private cleanups for small businesses, organizations, and community groups; find out more and sign up here.

Save Our Saluda's mission is to protect and restore the Upper Saluda Watershed through education and increased awareness of the watershed, water resource issues, and the need to help protect our rivers. Save Our Saluda often partners with other local conservation organizations; we planted native trees and shrubs along a tributary to the Saluda River a couple of months ago, with Save Our Saluda in cooperation with TreesUpstate, which was a very rewarding and also educational experience. Volunteers also assist with live staking, kudzu control and trash removal. For events and other information visit their website Save Our Saluda or contact them at info@saveoursaluda.org.

The Chattooga Conservancy protects the watershed of the Chattooga River, and you can get involved in one of their ongoing projects or join them for trash pick-ups. You can subscribe for volunteer alerts here or check their website for current info. 

Have children interested in environmental issues, or know kids who love citizen science? South Carolina Adopt-a-Stream might be the program to look into! A network of watershed stewardship, engagement, and education through involvement, volunteers play an important role in monitoring and tracking water quality while sharing information about local water resources with their communities. We help monitor two creeks near our home, and while the data collection aspect of this opportunity requires adult participation, my older kids help with everything from collecting water samples to making scientific measurements. Find out more here: The SC Adopt-a-Stream Program | Clemson University

Adopt a Waterfall with Waterfall Keepers of North Carolina! While we wish South Carolina had an organization similar to this one in NC, there are plenty of waterfalls within an easy drive of the Upstate that need to be adopted! You can learn more on their website, or from our recent article Junior Waterfall Keepers Program.

Pulling invasive species 

Botanical gardens

Hatcher Garden calls their volunteers the Hearts of Hatcher, because “that’s what they give each time they visit”! Whether it’s working in the garden, helping the office, or walking the paths as a tour guide, volunteers keep Hatcher Garden growing with their time, talent, and expertise – learn more here. 

The South Carolina Botanical Garden has suspended their volunteer program due to COVID-19, however they ask that people who are interested check back again, as that is likely to change. Volunteer in the Garden | Clemson University 

Park cleanup with Friends of the Reedy River

Community pickups

Palmetto Pride fights litter in South Carolina addressing prevention through education, supporting enforcement, connecting community groups to resources, and mobilizing volunteers. Get involved with one of their pickup events or programs!

Keep Greenville County Beautiful has a wide range of volunteer opportunities including environmental art, planting native species, litter cleanups, and community garden assistance. Find out more on their website. 

Oconee County has a similar organization, the Keep Oconee County Beautiful Commission, as does Pickens County and Spartanburg County. With the proper equipment and supervision, litter pickups can be attended by kids of all ages – find your local organization, or just pack a bag on your next hiking trip! Litter is a growing problem in the Upstate – let’s do our part in fighting it! 

Related article: Leave No Trace 

Constructing trail with Conserving Carolina

Conservancies

Conserving Carolina has helped to protect nearly 46,000 acres, from the waterfalls of DuPont State Forest, to the rock faces of Hickory Nut Gorge, and in SC serves the Landrum area including parts of Greenville and Spartanburg Counties. If you are a parent who wants your child to experience the wonders of nature, one way to do that is to get involved with Conserving Carolina. My kids love Conserving Carolina volunteer days; not only do they get to use cool tools when building trail and removing invasive species, but they get to hike really cool trails with the knowledgeable and friendly Conserving Carolina crew who teach them the names of plants and animals, find salamanders for them, and show them all the best spots! Check out all the volunteering options on their website.

There are many different ways to volunteer with the Foothills Trail community, but a main focus is trail maintenance. As the Foothills Trail stretches from Table Rock State Park to Oconee State Park, there are 77 miles that can use your help! For more information about volunteering, please contact maintenance@foothillstrail.org or visit https://foothillstrail.org/volunteer/.

The Palmetto Trail has passages in Oconee, Greenville and Spartanburg counties (and goes all the way to Charleston), so this is another opportunity to get involved on trail workdays. Find out more and sign up here: Volunteer – Palmetto Conservation Foundation.

Upstate Forever is a nonprofit conservation organization that protects critical lands, waters, and the unique character of Upstate South Carolina. Currently they are offering two categories of volunteering work: event volunteers and stewardship visits. If you are interested in becoming a volunteer, please visit their website.

Volunteering with conservation organizations here in the Upstate has really proved to be a way for our family to get outdoors, grow together, and at the same time give back to some of the organizations protecting the wild places that we’ve fallen in love with. As a mother, I feel it is important to motivate and educate a nation of outdoor advocates, to take care of the places we share and cherish. And as a citizen of the Upstate, I feel it is imperative that we reverse the negative trends that are impacting the natural areas. Now tell me – what’s your favorite place to volunteer outdoors?

This article was first published on Kidding Around Greenville as Volunteer Opportunities in the Great Outdoors Near Greenville, SC.

New Trail at Paris Mountain State Park!

Same short drive to reach the mountains, brand new trail!

This morning we dashed out to Paris Mountain State Park for the grand opening of Sassafras Trail. The 2.3-mile lollipop loop departs from the back of the Sulphur Springs parking lot, and winds through the 160 acres that was purchased by Paris Mountain State Park Friends in 2015.

The new trail is thanks to the tireless work by the non-profit Friends organization, who raised money and secured funds from the South Carolina Conservation Bank for the purchase of the tract. Paris Mountain State Park Friends then deeded it to Paris Mountain State Park in 2019, and after a year of trail construction, new kiosk and signage, the trail is finally open to the public! It was fitting that the president of the Friends organization was on hand to cut the ribbon.

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A post shared by Liene | Femme au Foyer (@femmefoyer)

The trail is rated moderate, mostly due to the 340 feet of elevation gain. Interesting trail features include multiple creek crossings and a quartz outcrop, and the trail is almost entirely shaded. When the Friends of Paris Mountain acquired the property, it had been extensively clear-cut. Ideally, it would have had a more pristine forest, but the present conditions offer benefits as well. The trail proves to be an excellent addition to the trail system at Paris Mountain, as it allows users to see firsthand the difference between a mature hardwood forest in comparison to an area that was recently logged. A second benefit is that as stewards of the land, the SC Park Service will allow it to return to a healthy state once again. Finally, the considerable addition of acreage to the park (10% increase in size!) is a boon to wildlife and our natural spaces in the Greenville area.

Sassafras Trail is multi-use, and was created with the increased usage of recent years in mind. Starting out in the Sulphur Springs parking area (behind shelters 5 & 6), the trail starts from the kiosk at the west end of the lot. Less than a tenth of a mile in it reaches the loop portion, with mountain bikers directed in one direction and hikers the other. The direction will alternate monthly, and ensures a safe, multi-use experience – especially for families with children! We hiked it in a counter-clockwise direction today, beginning with a rocky, rooted, easy-to-follow, blue-blazed climb through a mature forest. Once we had looped around, we entered the former clear-cut; there are several spots in this section that will probably feature views in the winter. Around 1.5 miles in we started the descent, re-entered the mature hardwoods, traversed the 3^rd creek crossing, and reached the trailhead where we started. For the Paris Mountain State Park trail map, click here.

From chatting with a couple of trail runners afterwards I understood that this is certainly a welcome addition to the Greenville trail system. While not a long trail (the Paris Mountain trails mostly average around 2 miles, but can be combined to form much longer routes), Sassafras has the challenging topography, as well as the central location that allows it to be added on to the Sulphur Springs loop or Mountain Creek trail for a longer hike/run. A couple of mountain bikers I encountered on the trail highlighted maybe the most significant factor; it will help alleviate congestion on some of the more crowded trails. And for families with school-age children, the short drive to the trailhead accommodates a quick hike in the late afternoon after school lets out.

Only a 15-minute drive from Greenville, Paris Mountain is one of the most popular state parks in SC, providing that escape to the outdoors without the long drive. But as the population and growth have surged in the Upstate in recent years, increased usage has had a considerable impact on the park in terms of effects on vegetation, visitor conflict, trail widening, and erosion. Named a “Leave No Trace Hot Spot” by the Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics, the trail ribbon-cutting is part of a five-day series of workshops, outreach programs and community events, including opportunities for community involvement; check out the website for the full schedule.

For more on Paris Mountain State Park:

• Paris Mountain State Park
• Paris Mountain's Fire Tower
• Brissy Ridge of Paris Mountain
• A Hike to Mountain Lake
• Music in the Woods (Tomorrow's concert is part of the LNT Hot Spot schedule)
• Creek Ranger Hike at Paris Mountain State Park

First Friday at GCCA // Latvian Mittens

This Friday head for the Village of West Greenville for First Friday, the monthly event at the Greenville Center of Creative Arts!

GCCA has found its home at Brandon Mill, built in 1900 and home to the baseball field that produced baseball hero "Shoeless Joe" Jackson. The beautifully restored mill houses an apartment loft community, as well as the visual arts center that boasts a variety of art classes and workshops, exhibitions of local and regional artwork, summer art camps, artist studios, and multiple special events.

First Fridays are the monthly open house event that allows the public to visit the studio artists on the 2nd floor, view the newest exhibition, create a work of art with your children, and be part of the Greenville arts community. October’s exhibition is "Textiles: A History of Expression and Last Words by Susan Lenz," and the opening reception will be Friday, October 5 from 6 - 9 pm.

Facebook event page here

“Textiles: A History of Expression illuminates textiles through contemporary concepts while reflecting traditional approaches to the medium. The exhibition highlights central themes of memory, fluidity of emotion, multi-sensory experience and reverence. Using natural dyeing, meticulous handwork, embroidery, and quilting techniques, the artists invite viewers into thoughtful engagement with their experience. The artists, Alice Schlein (Greenville, SC), Sasha de Koninck (Santa Monica, CA), Beth Andrews (Greer, SC), Kristy Bishop (Charleston, SC), and Meredith Piper (Greenville, SC) re-energize the rich history of textile by continually informing their contemporary practices.”

In addition to the main exhibit, First Friday will also showcase the traveling exhibit “Latvian Mittens,” a collection of hand-knit mittens from the Latvian folk art collection in New Jersey, which is traveling the U.S. as part of the celebration of the Republic of Latvia’s 100^th anniversary.

The exhibit will be available for viewing Friday at the GCCA event, and Saturday at the Spartanburg International Festival at the Latvia tent. This is a wonderful opportunity to discover the culturally resplendent tradition of Latvian knitting! Featuring the mittens as well as other authentic textiles, information on the Latvian designs and symbolism contained within, and traditional techniques, the exhibit is a celebration of the rich legacy of Latvian folk knitters.

Worldwide, Latvian mittens have become a symbol of the apex of the knitting world. Unique in their folk symbolism and technique, books about Latvian mittens have been published in many languages, and many knitters’ organizations and websites have featured original patterns, contributing to the recent Latvian mitten craze.

GCCA is open to the public and admission is free; come by and see the exhibition!

Musings on Hurricane Florence

How is everyone doing out there? Hopefully everyone is dry and the power’s on…

Just a little update from our corner of the Upstate… A little bit of wind (gusts up to 30mph), a little bit of rain (less than 2 inches). Power went out twice – once Friday, once Sunday – but Florence’s route directly over Greenville meant we were never in her northeast quadrant, and were spared the heavy rains the NE corner of the state received. You can see who got what here.

Blue skies and hot temps Friday at Chau Ram County Park

The most interesting weather actually came through on Friday, which we spent up in Oconee county in some soupy summer weather. As you can see in this video from our local Stone Academy weatherSTEM station, sunrise and sunset were crazy colorful. Add to that clouds moving in two different directions at once all day, and you have some prime sky-watching material.

The rainy weather meant curling up with a good book, and I’ve got two that merit mention here. The first, Karl, Get Out of the Garden!: Carolus Linnaeus and the Naming of Everything by Anita Sanchez is actually a children’s book, but it was read and enjoyed by 3 out of 5 household members. The beautifully-illustrated book is about scientific names and the Linnaean system (the basis for the classification system used by biologists around the world today), but backyard science is brought to life for the budding naturalist, scientist and botanist.

The second book was a completely unexpected. Despite (or maybe I should write in spite of) Florence, cookbook club persevered, and Sunday evening we gathered for a feast of hurricane proportions. This month’s book was The Cottage Kitchen: Cozy Cooking in the English Countryside by Marte Marie Forsberg. I’m not sure if it is because of the heavy Scandinavian undertones, the accessible ingredients, or the gourmet dishes requiring (surprisingly) little effort, I made a record number of recipes from this cookbook in the weeks preceding our Sunday dinner and loved every single one of them. I enjoy a cookbook divided by season, and with the high temperature/humidity days it’s no surprise I was cooking out of the ‘summer’ chapter… Tomato tarte tatin with burrata, Tomato, olive, and mozzarella baked peppers, Spinach and goat cheese frittata… Thank goodness fall is around the corner as I’ll be able to try the Potato soup with smoked salmon, then come winter I’ll repeat the Warm salmon, mint and potato salad, and Creamy fish soup with clams. However, don’t discount the ‘afternoon tea’ section – Lise’s carrot cake and Tante Marie’s coffee and fig bread among others – which is absolutely delicious. If I could suggest a Femme au Foyer cookbook of the year, this would be it. (Disclaimer, the first edition was actually published in 2017, but let’s not bandy words…)

The Cottage Kitchen's tomato tarte tatin with burrata

But back to Florence, what I find interesting is that despite the massive rainfall received in portions of the state, South Carolina is barely out of drought status. According to the National Integrated Drought Information System, the portion of the state that received the most rainfall in the past week was actually suffering from abnormally dry conditions just last week. Greenville County had been in a moderate drought up until June 2017, and although we’re now at ‘normal’ levels, it’s clear from the lake levels that it will take a little more to bring us back up to speed. Remember, some of the worst flooding in SC has been from rivers cresting – the same rivers that receive all the runoff water from the impervious surfaces and channeled rivers & creeks here in the Upstate.

On the 1.5 mile trail around Lake Furman - the lake level is LOW

Thinking of all those who had more than their share of this massive storm, and keeping a careful eye on the Atlantic during the next two months of hurricane season,

x your Femme au foyer

Music in the Woods

The beginning of September heralds the return of the Music in the Woods series in Greenville’s closest state park, Paris Mountain. Every Saturday afternoon from 2 - 4 pm through October, local bands perform in the outdoor amphitheater courtesy of Paris Mountain State Park Friends and the South Carolina Park Service. The concert is free with park admission, and in my opinion is the most undervalued free concert series in the Upstate!

The series kicked off with Nikki Talley on September 1st and the Trapfire Brothers this past Saturday. Next up, My Girl, My Whiskey and Me this weekend on the 15th, Gwyn Flower September 22nd, and Local Green Family Band to round out September on the 29th. October has Dave Desmelik on the 6th, Swamp Rabbit Railroad on the 13th, The Passing Scene on the 20th, and a local favorite, Darby Wilcox on the 27th. You can follow the series on facebook here.

To reach the amphitheater, park in the main parking lot across from the Park Center. From there it is a short walk on Mountain Creek Trail – follow the signs to the amphitheater. Concert-goers are welcome to bring their dinner, cooler and pets (on a leash), and the kids usually run around while the music is playing, exploring the surrounding woods.

These concerts are eco-friendly, using solar power to generate electricity for the bands. Part of the amphitheater is always in the shade of the surrounding trees, but if it rains, the closest shelter is the bicycle repair station up near the Park Center so you might want to pack an umbrella if there is a chance of afternoon showers.

Before or after the concert: hit one of the Paris Mountain Trails, admire the Civilian Conservation Corps era Park Center, or swim/paddle out on Lake Placid. And don’t forget to get your stamp if you’re participating in the SC State Parks Ultimate Outsider program!

Cancer Survivors Park

A huge thanks to Sunshine Cycle for getting me back up and cycling yesterday; after another flat I’ve now got two new tires (better suited to keeping up with the boys) and an upgrade – a kickstand! Sunshine has always been our go-to in Greenville for cycling needs, and their service is A+; I’m no Hincapie, but they get me back on the trail for a reasonable price without making me feel like I need to buy a copy of Bike Repair for Dummies!

Celebration Pavilion

What better way to celebrate being back on two wheels than by hopping on the Swamp Rabbit Trail for a post-school ride before all the autumn after-school activities kick in? We opted to hop on at the brand-new Cancer Survivors Park. Located between Falls Park and Cleveland Park in downtown Greenville, the park had its grand opening on June 1st of this year, and has joined the long list of beautiful parks along the Reedy River watershed.

There are three ways to access the 6.8 acre park: Cleveland Street, Church Street, and the Swamp Rabbit Trail. Despite being so centrally located, it’s a little hard to get to the park by car – there is no access from Church Street or University Ridge. However, the parking lot at 43 Cleveland Street provides free parking, and both Church and Cleveland Street are accessed by ramp, meaning even the 3 year old could easily get to the SRT on his bicycle.

The Chamber Portal

Passing through the gate of blue butterflies, the Celebration of Life Pavilion sculpture dominates the Cleveland Street side of the park. Cancer Survivors Park Alliance is planning to install canvas underneath the metal frame, and hope to illuminate the canvas year round with different colors representing different types of cancer. The metal sculpture sits atop the Survivorship Education Center, utilized for programs and activities to “help people learn more about screening, detection and treatment, as well as how to live beyond cancer.”

A multi-level boulder waterfall next to the Survivorship Center

The park is a result of a partnership between public and private parties, the majority of funding raised through private donations. Not only does it link Falls Park and Cleveland Park, but it is a key piece of the Swamp Rabbit trail, as the 2-foot-wide suspension Spirit Bridge replaced the old ‘cheese grate’ bridge that formerly crossed the Reedy right before it enters Cleveland Park.

Crossing the Reedy River, before and after

While portions of the plan have been completed including a labyrinth, a small amphitheater and the start of the children’s garden, it is obvious that the project has its work cut out for it; kudzu still dominates the steep sides cutting up to Church Street and NEXT Innovation Center, and the black sewage pipes cross the Reedy alongside the beautiful new bridge. However the park is a valuable addition to the Greenville cityscape, not only as the link between the two main parks that are at the center of Greenville's identity, but also for the spiritual aspect; the park has been carefully designed to mirror the various experiences of cancer – high and low points, areas for gathering and for solitude, tranquility, and the journey.

Healing Garden

Cancer Survivors Park is dedicated not only to those who have survived the disease, but also those who are battling it, and the survivors left behind by those lost to cancer. For more information, please visit the Cancer Survivors Park Alliance website.

Fear Not, by Charles Pate, Jr. in the Children's Garden

Source: Cancer Survivors Park website