Solon Recreation and Nature Area
Solon Recreation and Nature Area is a well-maintained city park and recreation complex in Solon, Iowa, featuring a variety of sports fields, modern restrooms, and a large parking area including accessible parking. It offers a pleasant loop hiking trail and serves as a trailhead for extensive biking and hiking routes, including paths to Lake McBride, Ely, and beyond. The park is wheelchair accessible and suitable for children’s activities such as birthday parties. It is a popular spot for outdoor recreation including disc golf, basketball, and walking or jogging trails.
Reviews
Lovely city park and recreation complex on the west side of Solon, Iowa. It features a huge parking area, playing fields for a variety of sports, two modern restrooms, the Timber Dome Lodge (available to rent for events), and a pleasant loop hiking trail. It serves as the Southern trailhead for a nearly continuous bicycle trail that travels north 80+ miles through Ely, Cedar Rapids, Hiawatha, Center Point, and eventually to Waterloo & Cedar Falls. No fees or permits for the portion of the trail between here and Cedar Rapids, which is 100% paved. The 30 mile round trip from here to the Czech Village/NewBo neighborhood on the south side of Cedar Rapids is especially popular. This park also serves as the eastern terminus of a gravel trail that runs along the north shore of Lake McBride and ends at the Lake McBride State Park beach.
It’s a good destination to ride to from Cedar Rapids.
Parking was a breeze. Handicapped parking is accessible and convenient. The trail is in great shape. We noticed a new fire hydrant before the bridge near the trail with ground cleared around it, probably to put a waterline in. The weather is warm and windy 4/9/23 Easter Sunday.
Very nice trail, can lead to the road to Ely, about 10 miles away. The trail itself is only 1 or 2 miles. Edit: there’s a fork in the trail, one leading to Ely and the other trailing across the Lake McBride northern shore, leading eventually to the McBride campgrounds and beach. The Ely path is 2 miles without the actual car roads, and the McBride trail is 5 miles, with some road in between the end of the trail and the campgrounds.
Amazing park and green space especially for a small town. There are football, baseball and soccer fields for days. There is a nice little disc golf course. They have a great basketball court here with a colored plastic time floor and large glass backboards. There is a small playground for little kids. A bike train runs right thru it and is a trailhead for biking, walking, jogging to lake McBride, Ely and beyond. Tons of parking, they are also working on a large splash pad!