On Saturday, April 9th, Bob Mulcahy led 14 other hikers into the Piney Creek Ravine, which in 2001, was put on the National Register of Historic Places. We had 4 new hikers. I had not been to this area prior to today, and although the day started a bit on the chilly side, things, as usual, warmed up. The area is about 5 miles West, and a bit South of Ava, Illinois. It has several areas of petroglyphs, which are images carved into rock by ancient civilizations. Bob had a booklet and explained & showed us the images to be looking for. There are also cameras,set up by the Illinois Dept. of Natural Resources, to ‘keep an eye’ for possible defamations to the rock art. We stopped at several waterfalls, and Bill Gilmour found a small window/arch. Most of the bluffs that we saw were Sandstone bluffs, but, some of the underlying rocks in the streams must have had different sedimentary composition, because the water, over time, has carved some very interesting features. Also, some of the stream bed rock has exposed colorations that I have observed in very few places. There were a few spots along stream banks that showed either small areas of shale, some were ‘darker’ indicating possible carbon in the rock, and there was  a spot that looked like either shale or mudstone, very fine grained.  The area is a popular spot, because by the time we left, there were 4-5 other vehicles parked along the road. 

This weeks’ hike, 10 am, Saturday, April 16th, will be led by Susan Durfee, is South of Stonefort, Illinois, on the Northern side of the Burden Falls area. Until then, “See ya’ll on the Trail.

Respectfully submitted, 

Chris Drone