Three Free Places in Athens, GA for Kids

When most people think of Athens, GA, they think of the University of Georgia. They think of college students and drinking downtown. What most tourists and residents don’t realize is that there are many kid friendly venues that are free and offer educational opportunities. In this article, I will discuss three of these venues: The State Botanical Gardens, Memorial Park, and Ben Burton Park.

The State Botanical Gardens are run by the University of Georgia. It is located at 2450 South Milledge Avenue, Athens, Georgia 30605. This facility is free to the public and is maintained by UGA for teaching and outreach purposes. The facility has three main attractions: the Visitor Center, the Maintained Gardens, and the hiking trails.

The Visitor Center consists of the conservatory, a gift shop, and a cafeteria. The conservatory features beneficial plants from the tropics, mainly food stuffs. There is also a small gallery of different arts and crafts. The gift shop has garden related memorabilia and some plants for sale that change with the season. The cafeteria, Caf�© Trumps, is open for lunch daily except Mondays and also offers catering services.

Surrounding the Visitor Center on three sides are the maintained gardens. There are eleven altogether, but most are seasonal. The few year round gardens are the Herb Garden, the International Garden, and the Heritage Garden. These are all immediately outside the Conservatory and survive winter and fall the best.

Between the maintained gardens and properties edge, is a wilderness area with several hiking trails. These hiking trails go through, or trail beside a variety of land types, including wetlands, floodplains, slopes, and upland plateaus. Also portions of the white and orange trail are set along the Middle Oconee River.

The second place I would recommend is Memorial Park. This is inside the city limits and is run by the Athens-Clarke County Leisure Services department. It is tucked between two major thoroughfares and is located at 293 Gran Ellen Drive, Athens, Georgia.

The park itself contains a public pool, playgrounds, and a large lake. There is a maintained area around the lake that includes picnic areas, covered shelters, outdoor grills. The park also contains the Bear Hollow Zoo and the Birchmore Trail.

Bear Hollow Zoo is free and houses native Georgia wildlife. Many of the exhibits are be rehabilitated before being freed back into the wild, so the exhibits do rotate frequently. The only permanent exhibits are the bald eagle, the bears, and the otters. The staff also offer guided feeding tours so that children can watch the animals being fed.

The last item of interest at Memorial Park is the Birchmore Trail. This is a mile long trail that follows a creek through a beautiful section of urban forest. There are also a few very rustic picnic areas, and some great rock formations for some amateur rock climbing.

The third place on my list of free and kid friendly places in Athens is Ben Burton Park, which is located on Mitchell Bridge Road. This park is directly on the Middle Oconee River. It has several picnic areas with outdoor grills, and a lovely creek full of rock to climb on that empties into the River. There is also a 1.2 mile mineral surfaced trail that leads through the wilderness area around the river.

So now that you know a few of my favorite places here in Athens, GA, I hope to be seeing you there.