A Family Day on the Farm at Round Hill Park

Parks provide an opportunity to get active outdoors and to enjoy nature. If you know anything about me, you know that I love sharing my healthy, active lifestyle and I love outdoor adventures! I’m very excited to highlight the first of nine Allegheny County parks, Round Hill Park.  

Located at 651 Round Hill Road, Elizabeth, PA 15037, the park is open daily from 8:00am-sunset all year long. You don’t have to wait for the weather to break to make plans to visit! Our favorite times to visit are in the summer when we don’t have competing school schedules and on the weekends in the fall when the leaves change and the trees are brilliant.

When we enter the park, we’re greeted by a variety of water fowl. Waddling across the path, the ducks and geese welcome us with happy honking and quacking and indicate to my children that we are “there yet!”  

We unload and visit the pond first.

  

Then we usually head over to the farm. Most of the paths are paved and easy to push the stroller along, however, the path to the sheep pasture is unpaved and uphill and a little trickier to navigate. There are multiple barns and pastures. We visit cows, horses, chickens, sheep. The pigs are our favorite!

We walk into barns and see cats climbing along bails of hay and birds flying around high in the rafters. There is a different pace on the farm, and we enjoy the time to breathe deeply of fresh air and the space to run around and explore. Some of our favorite moments are spent just playing on the grassy hills in the shade of the trees.

  

There are some raised bed herb gardens to observe. It’s a nice place to pull out your picnic lunch on the farm side of the park and a good place for a photo opp!

  

Once we’ve said hello to all of the animals and reenacted the “Sound of Music” on the hills, we still have more options!

We can head over to any number of picnic groves (there are 17 of them) and most of them have an adjoining playground. Some are more up to date than others, but we think the best part is being able to choose a different one every time. The picnic groves reflect the life of the farm with names like Alfalfa, Quiet Acres, and Wagon Wheel. Round Hill’s signature, large, modern, and new playground is easily accessible from the main entrance.  

During the summer months, a farm-themed spray water park is open for kids of all ages to enjoy.

The best part? Round Hill parking, including the farm exhibits, are FREE seven days a week!

The spray park is typically our last stop. There are restroom facilities on the farm side of the park to clean up and change clothes for the ride home. All of the kids usually fall asleep because there has been plenty to do and see at the park on any given visit…mom’s gift in return for a fun day of exploration and play!

Additional information about the park, directions, events, rentals and maps can be found at Allegheny County Parks’ website.  

Happy recreating, mommas!

Pittsburgh Moms Blog has partnered with Allegheny County Parks to bring you this series of articles on family outings in the parks, but all opinions expressed are my own.