The Sunny Hill to Nute’s Pond Trail is now open, the second trail built under the Bainbridge Island’s Parks & Trails Foundation’s Trails Connect Bainbridge Island campaign.
The 0.3-mile wooded trail connects the existing Sunny Hill Trail (south of Country Club Road) with quiet Nute’s Pond park on Toe Jam Hill.
The project was funded by private gifts to the Parks & Trails Foundation.
The trail and extensive boardwalks over wet and sensitive areas were completed by the Bainbridge Island Metro Park & Recreation District trails team.
“Trails are physical, on-the-ground connectors,” said Steve Matthews, Parks & Trails Foundation board president. “On them, we meet new people and see old friends, we say hello and smile in passing and stop and catch up as well. They offer such social cohesion.”
About 30 neighbors turned out for a June dedication and trail walk.
The wooded path gives hikers new access to scenic but somewhat out-of-the-way Nute’s Pond.
The Parks & Trails Foundation purchased trail easements across the three properties to create the trail route. An aging fence line along the trail marks the east boundary of historic Fort Ward, marking the fort’s expansion by the Navy during World War II.
The trail has already been embraced by walkers from Fort Ward, Country Club and Toe Jam neighborhoods, who’ve added it to their regular rounds.
“It’s great,” said Eileen Safford, who’s been walking Fort Ward and the growing south-end trails network for more than 40 years. “And Nute’s Pond is so beautiful.”
The Parks & Trails Foundation is working with the Park District to secure more easements to connect the Sunny Hill and Nute’s Pond trails directly with Fort Ward Park and adjacent neighborhoods.
The 33-acre Nute’s Pond park was created in 2006, the nineteenth property purchased with funds from the City of Bainbridge Island’s 2001 Open Space Bond. It features wooded loop trails and a scenic, 11-acre freshwater pond and wetland.
A small concrete dam and spillway there was built a century ago by Arthur Packard Nute, to collect fresh water that was piped down the hill to homes on what is now Bean’s Bight.
To get there: Nute’s Pond park has a single parking space on Toe Jam Hill Road. The trail can also be reached via trailheads at Country Club/Toe Jam Hill (park at Blakely Harbor Park and walk east on Country Club) or Bolero Drive (note: there is no parking in this neighborhood).
The Trails Connect Bainbridge Island campaign is bringing four signature trails to Bainbridge Island.
The Arbor Trail, connecting the W. Port Madison and Dolphin Drive/Agate Loop neighborhoods, was dedicated earlier this year. The Foundation is now fundraising for the Lost Valley Trail, nexus of an east-west trail route from Winslow to Gazzam Lake, and the Waypoint Woods Gateway Trail near the Washington State Ferries terminal.
For more information on the campaign, see www.biparksfoundation.org/build-trails.
