Cunningham Lake in Omaha, Nebraska

Like the outdoors? Head to Cunningham Park for a bit of fishing, boating, hiking, relaxed walking, a picnic, or perhaps just relaxing by the lake and enjoying the outdoors and watching the world.

For us, the simplest way to get to Lake Cunningham is to head north on N72nd, past the hospital, and eventually there will be a sign pointing out the road to Lake Cunningham, which will take you by quite a few housing areas before you actually arrive at the lake.

On our last trip here (July 2009) we did enter the park through the main entrance, which leads to the boat launching area, and noticed a sailboat anchored nearby. A fisherman pulled in as we were there, and said he caught his limit of catfish early that morning.

After a fairly brief stay we headed back to our car, and drove up to the next entrance to the park, located on the other side of the dam. This is our personal favorite starting point for a visit to this lake, and we were eager to be back there.

The picnic shelter remained, a short section of new sidewalk had been poured, though not landscaped yet, and there was a new port a potty here. Not fancy, but much better than the old bathrooms.

The trail (at least in this area) was about the same as it used to be, just a few years older than the last time we were on it. Some sections of the trail are asphalt.

Walking this trail, we discussed whether or not it would be a good trail to ride our tandem bicycle on. We agreed that it was a bit too bumpy, and had more hills than we preferred. An unknown factor for us is just how long the trail might be, we only walked down it about a mile.

A fishing pier has been added, and this view of it is from across the lake on the trail. To reach this from where we started our walk it is necessary to walk a bit of a loop around the lake befroe getting there, though it may also be reached by car.

The trail continues, and soon you will reach a pedestrian bridge, which crosses a stream leading into Lake Cunningham. At this point the trail bends to the right and you will fairly soon be at the picnic area with the fishing pier.

We kept our eyes open for any more of the unknown species of wildlife that one time chased us out of this area. Luckily we did not see any.

Arriving at the area of the fishing pier, we wandered up to the parking lot area on top of the hill. I was hoping to find a bathroom, if you must know. Luckily there was a toilet there, not too fancy, but appreciated.

We had sort of planned on making this our turnaround place, but decided we wanted to wander “just a bit” further up the trail.

Discovering a gravel covered spit of land that extended a bit into the lake, we wandered out to see what we could see. We were lucky enough to see this mother duck with her six young ducklings, though we were unable to get a clear picture of the ducklings.

While there, a couple of kayaks (or are they canoes?) went by. This looked like a pleasant way to explore Lake Cunningham, and they seemed to be able to get in and out of quite shallow areas.

About at this point we decided to begin our walk back to the car. It wasn’t a long walk, our pedometer showed the total round trip was only two miles, including our little walk at the main entrance.

Still we saw quite a bit, had a good time, and enjoyed being back at Lake Cunningham again.

Neglected to mention it earlier, but we did smell a skunk along the trail. It wasn’t too strong, so either it was quite a distance away, or it had been a while since it sprayed. This brought back memories of living in Wisconsin.

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