Tag Archives: indiana state parks

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Hoosier Hikes: Indiana’s First State Park

Semester over, I jumped on my escape vector … I70 West to Indiana!

Most of my week was spent visiting with my sister, Rowena, in Bedford, and my Mom’s house on the farm in Springville. Tuesday, however, was reserved for hanging out with my son, Logan, who had the day off of work!

Logan met me at the Bloomington transit center after taking the bus down from Indianapolis. On the way up to the transit center, I had stopped off at Kroger for a few snacks…a tub of hummus and loaf of pita. We were set!

Off to McCormick’s Creek State Park! This is Indiana’s first state park established in 1916 and lies just off of Highway 46 between Bloomington and Spencer. I must also add that this is the first state park I ever remember visiting. I remember a family reunion at which I was allowed to drink whole bottles of pop WITHOUT sharing with anyone and a playground that included a “tornado” slide. 🙂

My son had never visited this park and I had never done any hiking here, so this was a great opportunity for both of us!

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We pulled into the gate, paid our $7 entrance fee, and found the trail head for Trail 5 to Wolf Cave. I believe I have mentioned the pragmatic trail naming in another post about a visit to Indiana State Parks… 😀

This trail is wide, flat, and impeccably maintained. I heard that one can rent an all terrain wheel chair at this park and go out on the trails in it. Impressive! Now, that I see the condition of the trails, it makes a lot of sense! Although, there are a few places along this trail that could be challenging regardless.

We started down the trail, admiring the sinkholes on either side of the path. Significant dips, honestly, it makes you wonder about the ground you are on! Sinkholes are typical for the southern Indiana karst landscape. This is limestone country and this park contains a limestone canyon, complete with waterfalls and interesting rock formations.

Reaching Wolf Cave, it looked unimpressive to me. A slit of an opening down low on the hillside. We crouched down and entered the cave. Ahhhh, a small puff of cool air hit my face, nice! We pushed a little further into the cave but did not go through to the other side because the opening requires a bit of wiggling…yeah, not really into the claustrophobic squeezing through small openings things. So we backed out crouching, into the sunlight, saying goodbye to middle earth for the moment.

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The trail took us around the hill and descended down to a creek on one side. Then, oh wow, the back of the cave loomed on the hillside! A natural bridge opening with chambers that jutted off to either side. This is beautiful! I would love to see it after a hard rain as it looks as if the water runs right out of the cave into the creek. Absolutely gorgeous area!

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We spent some time exploring before trudging back up the hill to the car. It was now getting muggy, so we took a short break before heading across the road to Trail 7 that would take us down the hill to the White River.

Trail 7, another beautifully kept trail, follows the edge of the canyon on its way down. There is one steep, rooty part of the trail, just before the river, but it is short and at the bottom, one can take a left to take Trail 10 across the creek and beyond. Of course on the way down, I managed to start choking on a bug that had made the unfortunate decision to plunge itself into my throat. That was seriously unpleasant and no amount of drinking water was washing that bastard down! I was tearing up, choking up, practically throwing up, and still…ugh. I finally shook the coughing after I found a place to sit and eat a snack of hummus & pita.

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My son was still standing and I asked if he wanted to sit on the bench to which he replied, “I don’t sit in the woods in Indiana.” I should have heeded that advice…chiggers got me on my foot and around my waist. Yes, I had on bug spray that specifically indicated that it repelled chiggers, in addition to ticks, mosquitoes, … WHY DO I GET CHIGGERS EVERY TIME I HIKE IN INDIANA??? WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY?

Putting aside my issues with bugs on this hike, it was lovely. It is obvious that a lot of pride goes into the maintaining of the trails at this park. Very much looking forward to a return visit! Hike On!

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Poking Around at Pokagon State Park

Ah, Indiana in the winter…always a pleasure.  Don’t get me wrong, I love visiting my family around the holidays, but the weather, not in the slightest.  I hail from southern Indiana, where winter is more survived than enjoyed.  I did not grow up skiing the slopes or even sledding a whole lot.  I do remember being cold as heck huddled up to the barrel stove (built by Dad) in the cabin (also built by Dad).  I also remember slipping and sliding, in my shiny dress shoes, as I negotiated an ice laden porch in terror and my Dad lighting fires under my Mom’s car to warm it up enough to start so she could get to work.

And then there was Sara W.’s mom, who slipped on the ice and broke her hip.  She couldn’t walk for a really long time…and as I remember, the Methodist church built that ramp out back so she could be wheeled in for the service.

I want a more positive view of winter.  I really do!  I want to learn to love it, because I only have a maximum of 50 of them left in my lifetime.  😀  Therefore, I planned my visit to Hoosierland this year with a specific purpose: Do something that equates to winter fun.

Enter Pokagon State Park.  There is a toboggan ride!  It showed up on my Facebook feed since I follow Indiana State Parks…and it kept showing up…and I kept thinking about it.  I posted it to my son’s page, “Hey! Doesn’t this look super fun?!”…as insurance, I posted it to his girlfriend’s page too, “OMG, doesn’t this look like a blast?  Let’s all go on Christmas Eve!”  To which she responded that yes, it would be fun, but Logan (my son) would probably not ride.  Sounded like a challenge to me…

I made reservations for December 23 at the historic Potawatomi Inn at Pokagon State Park and literally prayed that 1) there would be snow on the ground but 2) there would not be a blizzard to keep us from going.

An old postcard of the Potawatomi Inn

With my niece in tow, we headed out to Terre Haute to pick up my son on the 23rd.  Two hours and a coffee shop stop later, we had him in the car.  Turn around, get on I-70 headed back east across the state to Indy, then north on I – 69 to the park.  No snow, but I drove north in a cold, dark, yucky rain for 3 hours before reaching our exit north of Angola.  But Hurray!! Food was still being served, there was SNOW on the ground, and sun was in the forecast for Christmas Eve!

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Nothing like a hot buffet with really good food!

 

Getting up early we headed down to the buffet and gorged ourselves, then headed to the Toboggan Ride!  The line wasn’t long, but we had to wait for the park staff to finish their inspection of the ice.  It was very cold, but sunny.  I looked at the slide with nervous anticipation – it was steep!  I would have fun, I would not freak out, I love winter, I love winter…

We got the toboggan.  Jesus Christ, this thing is heavy.  Well, this is why we have children, yes?  We managed to get it up the stairs to the beginning of the ride…and to contort ourselves into the requested riding position.  Niece in the front, son in the back, me in the middle, legs intertwined like we were playing some sort of weird twister..Here. We. Go!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was scary BUT a ton of fun! We got up to 38 miles per hour before shooting out the end onto the snow covered lawn of the inn.  The line was pretty long after our first ride, so we opted to turn in the toboggan and take a hike instead.

Midwesterners seem to be incredibly pragmatic in naming their trails…we took Trail #3 as it went to one of the few spots with a descriptive name “Hell’s Point”.  The trail was short (2.2 miles) but had nice variety to it as it traversed marshes and woodlands.  Hell’s Point wasn’t as interesting as I had hoped, but it didn’t matter.  I was spending time with my son and niece, in the snow, in the cold, and I was loving it!

Of course, coming down from Hell’s Point on the stairs, all I thought about was Sara W.’s mom and breaking my hip…Hike On!