Battery Kemble Park

(Photo credits: Craig Swain)

I’m going to start from the beginning, with the very first park that I explored by myself as a kid. Battery Kemble Park is a relatively small park, even by D.C. standards. But when you’re twelve years old, it looks as big as Yellowstone.

In those days, I fancied myself as a brave explorer like Hernando DeSoto or Meriwether Lewis, fearlessly venturing into uncharted wilderness. That day (April 14, 1960), I explored the main trail from MacArthur Boulevard up to the open meadow, a half mile each way at the most. But by the time I returned to my bicycle, I was hooked on hiking. Other parks and other trails followed in quick succession.

Battery Kemble Park is a small but delightful preserve extending from Nebraska Avenue to the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal at Fletcher's Boathouse. The northern portion is historically significant. Battery Kemble was one of a series of forts built in a circle around Washington to defend the city from Confederate attack during the Civil War. Like most of the others, Battery Kemble saw no action during the war. In the early decades of the twentieth century, its owner maintained part of the area as a private zoo. The National Park Service acquired it later. Planners drew up designs for a road named "Fort Drive", which would have connected most of the above-mentioned forts and buried the park under concrete.

Fortunately, this did not happen, and today two trails lead through the wooded valley to MacArthur Boulevard, and one of them continues to the C&O Canal down through a steep, scenic ravine. The Wesley Heights Trail connects Battery Kemble to Glover-Archbold Park.

I’ve heard various stories about the private zoo. But the only remnant of it is a cement dam across the creek a short distance south of the meadow.

The park begins at the intersection of Foxhall Road and Nebraska Avenue, N.W., a short distance from American University. (Metrobus M4, weekdays only). The trail starts in the far right hand corner of the open area, and extends about 1.20 miles to the C&O Canal at Fletcher’s Boathouse.

The trail soon enters the big meadow below the fort site. The open slopes to the right are used for exercising dogs, sledding and even skiing if there’s enough snow.

After crossing the parking lot, the trail bears left, enters the woods, and soon joins a small creek. I’ve heard the stream called Battery Kemble Run, but it may not have a formal name at all. You soon pass the cement dam mentioned above, then a wooden footbridge. This marks the beginning of the yellow-blazed Wesley Heights Trail. It leads eastward to connect with Glover-Archbold Park.

After another pleasant half mile through the woods and along the stream, the path reaches MacArthur Boulevard. (Metrobus D6). It picks up on the other side to the left of an old schoolhouse that in later years was a branch of the DC Public Library. Today, it is used for a children’s educational program called Discovery Creek.

Continue on the trail downstream, with the ravine to the left becoming deeper. At this point, the routing gets a little tricky. Take one of several side trails down to the creek. Cross it, then follow a rough trail along the opposite bank. The creek passes through some attractive cascades at this point. Use caution as the trail goes down over some rocks.

Ahead, you can see the C&O Canal, the Potomac River and Fletcher’s Boathouse. But you have to get by Canal Road first. You could cross the road, but traffic is heavy at all times and it moves very fast. I suggest going through the culvert that carries Battery Kemble Run beneath the road. There is a crude cement walkway through it. Then you have to climb over a wooden railing to emerge onto one of the access roads to the boathouse complex. Turn left for a few yards, then go right and cross the C&O Canal on a footbridge.

On the canal towpath, it is 1.78 miles to the left, to the south end of the Glover-Archbold Trail, and about another mile to the main Rock Creek Park Trail. To the right, it is 11.16 miles to Great Falls, 19.66 miles to Seneca, and about 55 miles to the Appalachian Trail at Weverton. The Capital Crescent Trail is a few yards below the towpath and runs parallel to it in this area. Go right and it will take you to Bethesda and Silver Spring. The way that all of these trails interlock and connect is amazing.

There is also an upper trail in Battery Kemble Park that leads from the meadow area to MacArthur Boulevard. Follow the gravel access road uphill until it bears right, then follow the trail that strikes out across a glade. It winds back and forth parallel to Chain Bridge Road and joins the lower trail just before MacArthur Boulevard. The two trails make a short, easy loop hike.