Simpsons matriarch Marge Simpson once checked her stressed-out self into Rancho Relaxo to convalesce after a nervous breakdown. We don't have to be ready for the straitjacket before heading to English Landing Park, but the place does clear our cloudy heads. It has the usual park amenities: slides and soccer fields, swings and shelter houses, picnic tables and port-a-johns. But it also rests on the banks of the Missouri River, which allows for plenty of daydreaming just watching the currents. Giant trees shade the playgrounds and park benches. While men and women with athletically toned bodies pound out the 2.7-mile loop, old folks ditch the mall for a walking trail, fathers and sons skip rocks across the river's surface, and mothers push strollers. English Landing is so peaceful, so green and gorgeous, we've decided it will be our forest of solitude, at least for the next year.
