Bennett Wadsworth
Park Ranger, Glacier Rodge
Bennett Wadsworth is talking with Communications Coordinator, Virginia Gordon
About me
My mom was heavily pregnant with me and wanted to visit family in New York. She was advised it would be better not to travel, but she went anyway. And that’s why I came to be born in Manhattan, even though my family lived in Arlington, Texas. That’s where I grew up. It was fun growing up in Texas. I was outdoors all the time. I would ride my dirt bike with friends, and sometimes ride a friend’s pony.
Arlington seemed much smaller back then but it has grown a lot. It’s part of the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. I worked hard in high school and then went on to the Texas Wesleyan University, in Fort Worth. It was just less an hour away from home, but I lived on campus. I was a pre-med, and thought I would probably go into medicine and do medical research. I particularly enjoyed my studies in chemistry and I graduated with a biochemistry degree. I faced a decision then as to whether to go on to study for my master’s, or get a job. I actually got a job at a Fortune 500 Bank. This was the late 1980s. I decided to make banking my career and didn’t pursue my master’s. I have sometimes regretted not going into medicine but my mom and step-dad supported my choice. My mom had grown up in poverty and she saw my career in banking as a big step-up for me.
I got married in 1996, and had a daughter three years later. When 9/11 happened in 2001 I thought to myself, I can’t do this anymore, working and leaving my daughter to be brought up by nannies. So I quit work and dedicated myself to raising my daughter. We moved to Colorado soon after, as part of my husband’s work. He was also in banking and worked in corporate training for the western half of the US. We lived in Loveland, which is a little under 50 miles north of Denver, and about an hour south of Wyoming.
THE OUTDOORS
I became even more outdoorsy in Colorado. Everybody seemed to be outdoors all the time. The location was beautiful and I was invited to join a group to go hiking in the mountains. It was so pretty, but I couldn’t keep up. Everyone in the group was experienced walking in the high-altitude air but I struggled to breathe. It was at the height of summer and was very hot. We’d gone to the Continental Divide, the exact spot where east and west splits. The parking lot was full and I parked only about a hundred yards away from the trailhead. But I was exhausted by the time I reached the trail head. I had to let the group go off ahead of me and I lay down on the ground and contemplated my life.
I really wanted to be in the mountains. So I looked around for other groups that might go at a slower pace but I had no success with that, at least to begin with. I had tried about seven or eight groups that were all too active for me to keep up with. But finally I joined a photography group and that was just right for me. We would all stop frequently to take photos of the dramatic mountain scenery. I could keep up with everyone, and I enjoyed the photography too. It became a new interest for me.
As my own fitness developed and I acclimated to the thin high-altitude air, I finally made it to one of the mountain peaks. This was on a hike to Lake Isabelle, a high-altitude lake in the Indian Peaks Wilderness. The lake is at an elevation of just less than 11,000 feet and the entire area is simply breathtakingly beautiful. It was an all-day hike, walking more than 8 miles in the mountain air. We all got some great photos there. Lakeland is also less than an hour from the Rocky Mountains National Park, which my photography group visited many times.
BACK TO TEXAS
After Covid, I moved back to Texas, but to Houston, on the Texas Gulf Coast. I became a volunteer for City Parks of Houston and created a hiking program for women who struggled with fitness or who couldn’t walk very fast. It included women who were injured, or who were very overweight, and we even had a couple of women who had had polio earlier in their lives. We started off with one program a week and walked for about an hour. The program became very popular and we had so many people coming that we had to have a second session. So we would do our first hike between 8 and 9 in the morning, and a second one from 9:15 to 10:15. Later on we added the program at a second park, and had to go to two sessions at this second park as well. We had about 75 women coming out regularly to the program.
A LIFE CHANGE
I suffered an unforeseeable life change that impacted me greatly. I felt a need to get away from everything. I put photos and memorabilia in storage and sold everything else that I owned. I thought about going off alone to hike the Appalachian Trail, but at the same time I saw an ad for a flight to Scotland. When I looked into it, it seemed that the budget for something like a three-week trip was similar for both places, and I rationalized that, well, Scotland doesn’t have any bears. So I went to Scotland.
I flew from Houston to Glasgow. A friend did fly with me, but she walked at a much faster pace than me, so we knew we would separate for the hiking. I stayed in a hotel in Glasgow for a couple of nights, and then headed out to walk the West Highland Way. My friend and I took a 30-minute train ride to Milngavie, which is the official starting point for the West Highland Way, a 96-mile trail that goes north to Fort William. That’s where my friend and I said goodbye.
SCOTLAND
It was May 2 and I knew I needed time alone. I began walking nine or 10 hours a day. Sometimes, I would meet people on the trail, and I encountered a group of ladies who were doing the trail, but were stopping at hostels overnight. I was sleeping rough, in a tent. I had left my luggage at a lock-up in Glasgow and just carried my backpack and tent with me on the trail. The ladies persuaded me to stay with them one night at a hostel. They said the hostels were much higher quality than in older days, as they now geared themselves for an older generation with more disposable income. The hostels had private rooms and bathrooms, so on that fourth night of my trek along the West Highland Way, I had my first shower in days and enjoyed a great night’s sleep.
When I got to Kinlochleven, the end of the penultimate stage of the trail, the midges got me as I walked along a stream. I was bitten by them so much that I thought the midges were worse than any bears I might have encountered on the Appalachian Way. The last stage to Fort William begins with a steep climb and it was hard walking. I finally made it to Fort William on Day 8 and then I spent a couple of days there, sight-seeing, and hiked to the top of the nearby Ben Nevis, the highest peak in Britain. It’s a little over 4,400 feet high and I did it in one day.
I then decided I would continue walking and do the Great Glen Way, which is another trail about 80 miles long, from Fort William to Inverness. I reached Inverness on Day 15 of my trek and did a tour of Loch Ness. Unfortunately, I didn’t see Nessie, the famous Loch Ness monster.
I read about the Cape Wrath Trail, the most challenging hike in Scotland. It’s about 250 miles long and there is no set path, or trail, and it requires treks through river crossings and very rugged and remote terrain. It meant I would have to go back to Fort William, which is the start point for the Cape Wrath Trail. While I was still in Inverness, I received a phone call from my daughter and we arranged to meet up in Ireland. I had to get back to Glasgow, via Fort William, on separate train rides. It seemed to take forever, as there were so many steps along the way. Finally I reached Glasgow and I flew from there to Dublin.
I’d been away for a full month at that point. We had a great time in Ireland. We stayed for three nights at the Wellington Hotel Temple Bar on Dublin’s Wellington Quay, and enjoyed three days of sightseeing in Dublin. Then we went to Cork for a couple of days, then on to Killarney and Galway, then to Derry and Belfast. From Belfast we took a ferry to Glasgow, so I was back in Scotland. My daughter returned home, but I still wasn’t ready to come home yet.
ENGLAND
I received a phone call from the friend who had flown with me originally from Houston to Glasgow. She was back in the States and was checking how I was. She said she had wanted to do a walk in England on the Southwest Coastal Path. It sounded appealing to me. I arranged for my luggage to be transferred from Glasgow to London and then was on various trains for a full three days before arriving in Penzance. I started my walk there and headed first for the stunning St Michael’s Mount, a tidal island with a beautiful old castle and a causeway that’s only accessible at low tide. It’s an amazing place. From there I continued on the path to Land’s End and then Porthcurno.
The law is a little different in England, from Scotland. You are not allowed to sleep rough in England, or pitch a tent, except at designated camping spots. But the proprietor of an ice cream shop and pub at Porthcurno told me that if I walked out to a particular spot at the cove, I’d be far enough away from the tide coming in, and be in a spot where my tent couldn’t be spotted from the town’s parking area. So I pitched my tent at the cove, then went on to Land’s End, and then north about 40 miles to Newquay. By that time I was probably looking a bit rough myself, because when I went into a burger place, the owner seemed to think I was a vagrant, or something. I’d sat at a table, put my bag down and got out my solar charger when the owner strode over to me. He demanded of me, ‘Do you have money?’ I said I did, but he asked me if I was sure of that! I did look pretty dirty, I expect, having been on the trail for the best part of a month, walking nine to 10 hours each day, since I’d last been able to shower. I told the burger place owner that I would pay with my phone, and so I was served what seemed to me to be a pretty delicious burger and chips. I was needing to eat about 5,000 calories a day to maintain my weight, with all the walking.
I stayed in Newquay for about a week. The entire Southwest Coastal Way is about 630 miles long, and I had walked about half of it. I then detoured from the path and went north into Wales, where I stopped at Cardiff and Swansea, and finally to the National Park in Pembrokeshire. There was a campsite at a little town called Devil’s Bridge, and I stayed there for a while. Then I went back into England, and stayed at Stratford upon Avon for about a month. That’s where Shakespeare was born.
ICELAND AND AFRICA
I still wasn’t done. I wanted something different, so I headed for London to get my luggage, and then I flew to Iceland. I was there for about three months, until my visa was due to expire. My daughter’s birthday was coming up, and I wanted to be there to celebrate it with her. So I flew back home, and took her with me to Niagara Falls for a birthday treat. But I still wasn’t ready to settle down. It was early September 2023. I went back to London, and then flew from there to Africa. I spent three weeks there and climbed to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro, the continent’s highest mountain. The peak is about 16,000 feet above the plateau, and more than 19,300 feet above sea level. I was helped by a wonderful team of porters and other people in the group I had joined for the expedition.
BACK HOME
I had been bouncing around Europe and Africa for quite a while and finally realized that it was time to come back to the US. My daughter was now studying in Ohio, so I decided to move here. I became a volunteer at Sharon Woods Metro Park and I discovered how wonderful the Metro Parks system was here in central Ohio. I was interested in working for the park system, if there were any openings. I heard about some openings for part-time rangers and I thought that would be really fun and interesting work. I applied and was interviewed. My interview was on May 22, 2024 and I started working as a part-time ranger at Walnut Woods in July. I loved working with the park manager, Mindi. We developed a great working relationship. I asked her at one point about possibilities of working full-time at the parks and she explained how I should look out for notices and emails from HR about future openings.
In Feb 2025 I saw an email about possible full-time ranger openings at various parks. I applied for an interview and it went well. As I had been working at one of the quieter parks, and some of the openings were at busier parks, I transferred to Sharon Woods to experience one of the busier parks during peak summer season. That was an eye-opener and a fascinating insight into work as a park ranger. I was then offered a position as a full-time ranger here at Glacier Ridge Metro Park. I started my duties here in October 2025.
I particularly enjoy patrolling the dog park here at Glacier Ridge. I love dogs and enjoy playing with them as I talk to their owners at the dog park. There are a lot of regulars who come to the dog park, and I have enjoyed getting to know both the dogs and their owners.
I’ve been to all of the parks, but I haven’t experienced all of them as deeply as the ones where I’ve worked. I enjoy exploring the less common areas of a park. At Walnut Woods, there’s a beautiful old shade tree on the boundary of the park. some way past the park office. It’s an area where deer sit. I find these places after doing boundary inspections, which is necessary to check from any obstacles or hazards, such as downed trees. This old tree has the most beautiful orange leaves in the fall. At Sharon Woods, I really like a particular section on the Multiuse Trail where the tree canopy comes together and offers wonderful shade in the heat of summer, and gorgeous autumn color. At Glacier Ridge, I always have a special feeling whenever I come across any of the old cars that been left here on the land, long before Glacier Ridge became a Metro Park. These old vehicles are rotting away and falling into the earth, but I always feel a sense of intrigue and wonder about the people who might have owned these vehicles and what life may have been like for them back in the day.
LEARNING A LANGUAGE
I am learning ASL (American Sign Language) at Columbus State Community College to communicate with the large deaf community in the Columbus area. I officially started taking classes last May and will obtain my certification later this year.
ANIMAL RESCUES
I was involved in a very dramatic rescue of a great horned owl that got caught in a soccer net just outside Walnut Woods some while ago. It had probably swooped down to hunt some prey and got caught in the net. And then in trying to wriggle itself free of the net, it only succeeded in entrapping itself more tightly. I worked with a colleague to try to free it, and got closer to a great horned owl’s beak than I ever imagined possible. What a magnificent bird they are. We were using scissors and knives to cut away the netting, which had tightly enclosed the owl’s wings. It took us about 90 minutes until the owl was free. It was probably exhausted and shocked, and for about an hour it just sat there, barely moving. And then finally it flew off. What an amazing experience that was.
We sometimes get reports of large snapping turtles that seem to just get stuck in the middle of a park road. Just a week and a half ago we had a snapping turtle stopped in the middle of a park road and no traffic could get past it. I’m not sure why they got stuck. I sometimes think it’s the heat of the road that holds them fast. The asphalt retains heat from the sun, even in early March, and perhaps the turtles like basking with that warmth beneath them. In the past, I have helped move smaller turtles off the road by utilizing a shovel to help move them along. But this one was too big and heavy for that.
Some nearby residents came to the park and told me that they had called the Dublin Police Department about the turtle blocking the road. Another resident said he had a large rug that he was planning on getting rid of, and wondered whether it might be helpful in getting the turtle moved. I said we could give it a try. We managed to coax the turtle to move a little bit so that most of its body was in the rug. And then we dragged the rug, and the turtle, all the way from the road and into the nearby pond it had probably been making for in the first place.
There were lots of kids at the park, watching the rescue. I had to keep telling them to stay back, as snapping turtles can move their beaks and their heads really quickly when they want to ‘snap’ at something. They saw an example of it, at one moment, and that certainly helped to keep them back.
Traveling – places I’ve been, places I’d love to go
Aside from my great Odyssey to Europe and Africa, as already described, I’ve also been to the Philippines, Japan, Okinawa, and France. I spent time in Paris, while in France, but I’d love to go back there to see the French and Spanish Alps. I’d like to see the Black Forest in Germany as well. I’d also love to visit Iceland again some day. I loved both the country and the people, who are incredibly friendly. It’s such a beautiful but also a very relaxing and peaceful place. For me, I’d say it’s a place that quiets the soul.
My favorite food and desert
I don’t cook, but I love food. I eat out a lot. My favorite places are Mitchell’s, and Eddie Merlot’s. They are both steak restaurants. They know what I mean when I ask for a blue steak, which is basically a step before rare, and maybe just a step or two above raw. Basically, a blue steak is one that is very quickly seared on both sides, and the inside is practically uncooked. That’s the way I like it! I usually have it with potatoes and some kind of green vegetable, like broccoli, asparagus or Brussels sprouts. Fillet steaks seem to cook as ‘blue’ better than other cuts. I have always loved sushi too, but I haven’t yet found a sushi restaurant in Columbus, although I’m sure there must be some goods ones around somewhere in the city.
For desserts, I love them all. My favorite sandwich is an ice cream sandwich. It’s hard to say what my favorite dessert might be, but some nights I get a hankering for a really good carrot cake, or maybe a chocolate cake.
My favorite entertainment
I read a lot. I’ve just finished reading Child 44, which is a fictional story of a serial killer in Russia, and the hunt for the killer is hindered by the fact that the authorities won’t acknowledge that they have a serial killer on the loose. It’s set in the 1950s and is a novel by Tom Rob Smith. It’s also been made into a film, starring Tom Hardy and Gary Oldman. Justice prevails in the end. I also read The Picture of Dorian Grey recently, which is the poet Oscar Wilde’s only novel.
Another book I enjoyed recently was Dark Matter, by Blake Crouch. It’s a science fiction story about a professor who wakes up as an alternate version of himself in the multiverse. In this alternative universe, every choice you make leads to a new timeline, so how does a person like the professor get back to their own timeline and own self? It’s a fascinating read.
I’ve read all five of the Game of Thrones books. I enjoyed them, but they were very ‘wordy’ and I thought the TV series was better, except for the last season. They kind of ruined it with that last season. The endings didn’t fit the personalities of the characters at all.
I don’t have a TV at home, but if there are any shows that are making an impact I’ll sometimes subscribe and stream them to my computer.
I go to the movies now and again. The last film I saw at a movie theater was one I really enjoyed. It’s called The Boys in the Boat and it’s about the US rowing team at the 1936 Berlin Olympics.
Another interest I have is watching ice hockey. I learned the rules and have enjoyed watching it ever since. I’ve been to a few Blue Jackets games here in Columbus, and I’d like to watch some minor league teams too, such as the Toledo Walleye, the Cleveland Monsters, and the Cincinnati Cyclones. I didn’t play much sport growing up, but I was a cheerleader in college, for the university’s football and basketball teams.
What Glacier Ridge Manager Jerry Strosnider says about Bennett
“Bennett has been a full-time ranger with us since November 2025. She previously worked as a part-time ranger at Sharon Woods and Walnut Woods. This has been a great benefit to us as Bennett has been able to hit the ground running. She is absorbing all she can administratively and is also taking on ASL classes. Her ASL background has had a positive impact on us as we recently updated our ranger flash cards and Bennett has agreed to conduct ASL type training for future ranger classes. We are looking forward to watching Bennett grow in her role with us.”