I am sure everyone out there has their favorite local park. There is one special park you may not be aware of: Camp Rivendale. This large playground is specifically designed for special needs kids. With chair style swings and a structure made to accommodate a wheel chair, every child should have access to all the fun. Part of the Jenkins Estate complex, the park is located at 8385 SW Grabhorn Road (just up the hill from Farmington Road), in Beaverton. The park is open from 8am to at least 4pm daily.
During summer days a day camp for Special Needs kids is offered to residents in the Tualatin Valley Parks system. You can also rent the park for private parties. We looked into this for Noah's birthday and it would have been about $600, so we passed. Those are the two reasons you may find this park closed when you try to go up and play. It is really worth coming back to find them open. Able bodied Owen calls this his favorite park.
We went up on Tuesday to play and unfortunately found it rented for a party. So, we went up the hill a little further to Cooper Mountain Nature Park. Taken from the Tualatin Hills Parks Page:
Overlooking the Tualatin River Valley, Cooper Mountain Nature Park is located on the edge of Beaverton. The 230-acre park, at 18892 SW Kemmer Road, Beaverton, offers visitors 3½ miles of trails (with varying levels of difficulty) that traverse the park and pass through each of its distinct habitats - from conifer forest to prairie to oak woodlands. Visitors will be rewarded with grand views of the Chehalem Mountains, close-up looks at Oregon white oaks and a small prairie that has sat relatively undisturbed for hundreds of years.
The park also has, near the parking lot, one of those new modern playgrounds. You know the ones, that have play equipment you aren't exactly sure what to do with. There is also a sand box, where we met with an unpleasant child. This is officially our first experience with some kid being a jerk to Noah because Noah is different. We have lived in a very happy bubble where all of our families and friends and their kids know Noah and love him for his quirky self. This kid at the park was very vocal that Noah was really bothering him with the way he was playing. Now, Noah can be a notorious sand thrower, but this time he really wasn't! He was just chirping to himself and filling his cups with sand. With no parents in sight I couldn't involve this child's parents and just had to tell him he needed to play nice and I would take care of Noah. I took the kids on a walk and Owen was much more upset by this kid than Noah, I don't think Noah noticed. I felt like we did leave the sand box to escape this child, but I would have done that with any kid that annoyed me!
It takes more than one jerky kid to put us off our plan. Noah is a part of this world and deserves to use the sand box as much as any other kid. We will be back to Cooper Mountain Nature Park.
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