On a cloudy Saturday morning, March 29th, 17 hikers, with leader Chris Drone, left the Shawnee Mart parking lot and went to the west edge of Eddyville, to take off on their weekly hike. There were no new hikers for this particular week. Everyone was an experienced hiker.  We steadily moved out, and work our way “down” for a bit, crossing a few small streams.  The trail had a few small muddy spots, but, nothing too major. We made sporadic stops to look down at Hayes creek, then eventually crossed it. Water was flowing, but, not heavily, so it was easily crossable. We got to Petticoat Junction, where there were horse tie-ups and 1 of the picnic tables put out by the River to River Trail Society and Backcountry Horsemen of Illinois chapter. We stopped for an early lunch bite, then proceeded on down the trail. We had heard thru social media to be on the “lookout’ for a lost sandal, and, sure enough, we found it. One hiker took it to get it back to its owner. We continued down wider trails/old roadbeds, until we came to Crow Knob, where there was yet another picnic table put out by the 2 aforementioned groups. We took the group picture there in front of the rock formation. We also picked up almost 25 lbs. of trash along the way…it was carried out by 1 hiker, David Simmons. We got out of the woods juuusst in time for sprinkles to start. Prior to the start of the hike, 3 pickups had been situated along Cedar Grove church road to return the hikers to either the start of the hike or to Shawnee Mart. 

Next weeks’ hike, on Saturday April 5th will be meeting at Wildcat Bluff, southwest of Vienna, Illinois and led by Megan Henderson. 

Until then, “See ya’ll On the Trail”