Eliason Nature Reserve - Nature preserve in Portage - 1614 W Osterhout Ave, USA

Best public restroom in all of Portage. I will go out of my way to use this baby. Peaceful, quiet, always fully stocked, spotlessly clean, and not heavily used... What more could you ask for? Oh, the building is also quite attractive as well. You won't be disappointed going here. Nice little paved trail through the trees beyond the restroom. I recommend this place to everyone. Now Google is included.

Fun, neat nature preserve with both a dirt trail, boardwalk, and asphalt walking path perfect for bikes. The park comes out to another park, so perfect if you’re biking or wanting to walk long distances. One of my favorite parks in Kalamazoo, and I love the fact that the paths aren’t overgrown. The park also has clean restrooms.

Second stop of the day was that Eliason nature preserve in Portage. From Eliason we navigated through and merged with Bishop Bog Preserve before circling back around to Eliason. The cool thing here is that the preserves are connected by a long boardwalk. In Eliason The trails are a combination of paved with side trails that are packed dirt. In Bishops bog the trails are either packed dirt or boardwalks. Word of warning you can get a bit wet on the bog boardwalk. These parks are kid friendly, dog on leash friendly and the paved sections are handicap accessible. There are bathroom facilities in both preserves. There are good sized parking lots at both preserves also. The terrain isn’t overly difficult and if you connect both these preserves and the trails at Schrier park you can get in 10#miles. We did 4 miles here and really just skimmed the surface. If you’re a geocacher there are several here however we’re not very good at it so we only found one LOL. Definitely a cool place/places to explore. 

Housing developments encroaching on the west side. The city is more concerned with collecting property tax dollars than maintaining a balance with the amount of green space.

This is my new favorite trail! It is fully paved so it's great for anything with wheels.

There are a plethora of elegant trails to traverse. It is bike-friendly and the trails are well-maintained and clean. The only real downside is that the trail over the bog is closed off which is a real shame as it had been arguably the main feature of the park. I recommend using the All-trails app as there are many adjacent trails to the main trail and it may be easy to get lost if you are unfamiliar with the layout.

A fully paved trail that doesn’t lose any natural beauty for its blacktop. Covers lots of steps and connects to even more. Awesome to have such a great spot so close by.

My wife and I walked the trail from Osterhout Ave up to Portage Industrial Dr and then back to our car. The paved trail is perfect for walking, jogging, or riding a bike. The public restrooms at the parking lot off of Osterhout Rd appeared to be fairly new and were very clean. The trail meandered through the woods where there were occasional benches for taking a rest. The trees provided a good mix of sunny and shaded areas. We saw squirrels and a couple different types of butterflies. We really enjoyed the trail and wish we had time to see more of it. I would reccomend visiting this trail.