Gunpowder Falls State Park — Attraction in Perry Hall

I rented the Elm pavilion from 1-7 pm this weekend. We arrived at 12:30 p.m. and began spraying around pavilion for mosquitos. Dozens of wasps began appearing. After about 20 minutes of trying to do damage control ourselves and inspecting pavilion, we found 11 nests in the ceiling of the pavilion. We called park staff for help. The gentleman who arrived was very helpful, friendly, and apologetic. He sprayed the nests, hammered them, and used a leaf blower to remove debri. He went through this process twice. We found at least 20 nests. He then inspected adjacent playground, at our request, to ensure kids could play safely. 2 additional nests were found at the playground. While inspecting playground, my team continued inspecting pavilion as we continued to see a large number of wasps. We found 4-5 additional nests. Some of them were underneath the tables and bench chairs. We spent the first 2.5 hours of our visit to the park dealing with wasps and then wiping everything down after standing on the tables and having park staff spray bug spray over everything. And then had to rush to set up and cook, as most of our party had already arrived. The gentleman assisting us with the wasps stated (twice) that the park director was on site and he would have him come over. The director never came. We asked the staff member to come back and check on us within an hour and he did. The wasp activity died down but there were still a lot more than usual. Once I visited the bathroom, I noted several wasp nests in the ceiling of the ladies room as well.

I understand that we were in a natural environment. However, the park rents pavilions as a source of income for the enjoyment of guests. One would think that the pavilions would be inspected on a regular basis, or at the very least prior to a reservation's arrival. I give the park 2 stars because the staff that we encountered were super friendly and the pavilion and restroom, aside from being infested with wasps, were clean. But the wasps added much stress to hosting. Due to our delay in being able to get started, I spent most of the day working and had a little over 1 hour of enjoyment prior to preparing to break everything down...

It was a long, nearly 16 mile hike this time that took me 7 hours. There weren't any huge changes in elevation along the entire hike so it was fairly simple. In order to make things interesting I scrambled up 2 different rock faces, climbed up a slippery section of stream, climbed to the top of a fallen tree, and clambered around the pot rocks section, all of which was really fun. I was along the water pretty much the whole time and there where plenty of Geese, Great Blue Herons, and other water fowl. Blazes were marked consistently, I figured I'd give Alltrails a go and surprisingly it was super convenient. I think I'm gonna use it from now on. The trail was closed at I-95 and I'm thankful because I would have gone further and the return trip would have been more grueling. I like to travel light with the items that I bring. It's usually a bag of trail mix, map, phone, ID, car key, and hiking stick that's it no water, I drink before I walk so I'm not carrying a heavy water bottle. Overall, the scenery was nice and it was a cool and cloudy spring day, honestly, couldn't ask for...

Thoroughly confused on what I am missing on this "trail" and how it has a 4.7 rating. There is one entrance that splits into two trails that meet again MAYBE a quarter mile down, if that. When following it goes to a dead end with gas line notices and no where else to go. Walking around and down around the murky water there was a decent amount of trash, beer bottles & beer cans. Nothing significant here....