Appleton Memorial Loop 2025 06

This last week I read an artical indicating that Appleton plans to rename Memorial Park. So I thought it would be a good time to visit again. Don’t worry though they are renaming the park to Veteran’s Memorial Park.

Key Features

• Length: 0.9 miles
• Terrain: Paved
• Amenities: Benches, picnic tables, water fountains
• Points of interest: Baseball fields, pavilion, playground, community garden, Scheig Center, open grass space, fishing pond, nature walk

Review

We arrived at Memorial park and parked near the Scheig Center and Gardens. A building that used to be called the Monarch Gardens. These gardens currently have dozens of varieties of flowers blooming. It is a great place for an out door gathering. In fact a friend of mine got married here years ago.

So we started out the walk wandering the gardens near the building. Taking photos of the living bouquets as we walked. We circled the building once and then headed to the story book trails.

These trails on the south west side of the park are little more than paths mowed through the native grasses and around the local trees. As we walk through the trails, we pass displays for the children’s story book Mud!

Rabbits run from the trails as we walk and birds dart through the trees. Large drops of dew cover the larger leafed plants like Milkweed. The trail arched south, east, and then north to the fishing pond.

We continued on the south and east side of the fishing pond. Following the edge of the fishing pond we found a painted Turtle sunning himself in the path. To the south of us in a larger retention pond we see a Greater White Egret. Canadian Geese with varied ages of chicks flee to the pond as we continue north.

On a dead log in the fishing pond a large Red Eared Slider Turtle suns itself. But the most notable animal we see is a Green Heron perched on a branch just off the shore. He watched us as I took pictures and we walked past. Eventually deciding to fly off to safety.

We continue to follow the shore of the fishing pond until we reach the concrete path leading from the ice arena parking lot to the pavilion. We followed the concrete path to the pavilion for a quick bathroom break.

We finished our walk on the path back to the Scheig Center parking lot. Other visitors were at the park setting up photo shoots. We finally return to our car glad for the short walk we enjoyed.

Memorial Park might not be the miles long hike that we have taken on other hikes, but we enjoy it just as much. There are many paths to hike at Memorial Park. Through the softball fields, around the man made mound behind the fields and even through the stand of Poplar Trees growing on the Northeast side of the park.

Not much will change with the name but the park has slowly changed throughout the years. I can remember a water feature that used to surround the Scheig Center. Though I believe they retired that feature due to the difficulty in keeping it nice. There is also a drainage ditch that splits the park in half leading to the large retention pond to the south.

About the only complaint that I can give is that goose poop covers the concrete path near the pond. The geese seem to be a menace at any of the parks in Wisconsin with a water feature.

Let me know if you have any stories of Memorial Park in the comments below. Thank you again for reading my blog.