Trailhead for the Algonquin Trail at Prince William Forest Park

Length: .4 mile, round trip
Time: 15 minutes
Difficulty: Easy

The trailhead for the Algonquin Trail is at Parking Lot I. Its path is shown on the Prince William Forest Park trail map, but it is not identified by name. There is, however, a large sign marking its start at the parking lot. The trail is a very short out-and-back trail that leads down to one of three consecutive cascades on South Fork Quantico Creek. To reach the other two cascades you must hike the South Valley Trail, which is on the other side of the creek and accessed from Parking Lot C.

Despite heading down to a creek, which are usually located at the bottom of a ravine, the Algonquin Trail is fairly level. It passes through an area with a lot of mud, but the National Park Service has erected a boardwalk across the wetter sections.

Boardwalk through a wet section of the Algonquin Trail at Prince William Forest Park

There’s really not much to see once at the creek, as the cascade is far from impressive. You can hear the other cascades farther downstream, and hikers have even beaten a path along the shore to them, but it was too overgrown for my tastes. I had already picked up a couple of ticks while hiking earlier in Prince William Forest Park.