River To River Trail Alto Pass to Hwy 51

The River to River trail in southern Illinois is composed of both trail and road hiking.  I  I plan to thru hike the River to River trail in 8 days averaging 20 miles per day next year (2014) in mid February. The days will be short in February and I cannot afford to lose time backtracking to pick up the correct trail.  So, I am hiking as many of the actual trail sections as possible between now and my February thru hike.  I plan to hike from Grand Tower to Alto Pass on the first day.  The only trail section is the 6 mile Godwin trail through the Clear Springs and Bald Know Wilderness areas of the Shawnee National forest.  The rest of that section is hiking approximately 15 miles of gravel and paved roads.

I plan to hike to Giant City State Park on the 2nd day.  I am considering renting a cabin or at least camping in park's campground (with access to the showers).  However, I do not know what facilities are open at the park in February.  Also, this would only be a 16 mile day which would leave me with a couple of 22 mile days later on the trip.  I may to another 4 miles that day and camp closer to Rocky Comfort road (approximately 4.44 miles from the Giant City State Park lodge.

The second day will begin at Alto Pass (still not sure where I will camp that night).  Here is a link to my track at alltrails.com

http://alltrails.com/tracks/r2r-trail-section

To hike this section of the River to River trail, I parked at Cedar Lake and hiked south to where the trail jumps off Cedar Street coming out of Alto Pass.  So when you look at the track the River to River trail is actually on the west side of the lake (coming back up from Cedar street I took the Cedar Lake loop trail on the east side of the lake - not part of the River to River trail).  So from Cedar Street, you would turn left (north), stay to the west side of Cedar Lake, cross the causeway (going east) and follow the trail to Rowan Road.  From Rowan Road you will road walk to Hwy 51.  The next blog will pick up from Hwy 51 and take you to Giant City State Park Lodge.

Starting in Alto Pass, you hike out of town on Cedar street.  The trail leaves the road after about 1.3

Treatment Plant (gone too far)

Trail head north through summac

miles just before the water treatment plant (there was no blaze indicating  There is a small bridge on the road just after the trail leaves the road and the waste water treatment plant is on the left just pass the small bridge.  If you go over the bridge and can see the house and treatment plant on the left, you have gone too far.  The trail going north is cut through head high sumac and at the top of the hill you will find an orchard.

Wide mowed path on ritght

Orchard - stay to right side

Stay to the right side of  the orchard and you will see the trail leaving the orchard to the right (not blazed).  I is a wide moved path going downhill to a farm field.

Gate in opposite corner

First small field 

At the bottom of the hill you enter a small farm field and you will walk along
the edge of the field.  You will walk straight toward the tree line and then turn left headed for the opposite corner from where you entered the field and cross the creek bed.

You then enter a larger field and again you need to get to the opposite corner.  You will see a gate in that corner.  The River to River trail continues from that point.

Trail blaze near field gate

Stay right and cross creek bed

Now the trail is in the timber with private property to the right (there is a fence just to the right of the trail in this area).  The next fork in the trail is just before you cross the next creek bed.  You will veer slightly to the right and cross the creek.  This intersection was not blazed at the time I hiked the trail.

View down trail towards creek bed

The next intersection is a choice between going along the east or west side of Cedar Lake.  I do not have a picture of that intersection but you will stay to the

Left takes you to a trailhead

left.  The actual River to River trail runs along the west side of Cedar Lake.  The Cedar Lake loop trail runs along the east side and does cross the River to River trail eventually.  You will walk along the edge of Cedar Lake and then the trail hits a T intersection.  If you go left, you will end up at the Cedar Lake trailhead.

Go right (see R2R blaze)

You want to go right and you will cross over the Cedar Lake causeway.

Go left at top of hill

The next trail junction is another T with the Cedar Lake loop going left and

Looking back down trail toward causeway

the River to River trail going left.  The picture on the left shows the slight incline at the junction.  The trail continues at the top of that hill and you want to go to the left.  The picture on the right is a view looking back down the trail towards the Cedar Lake causeway.  I don't remember seeing a blaze at this junction either except that the trail to the right was marked as Cedar Lake Loop trail.

Go left

The next intersection was well marked and you go left.  The trail going to the right looks more worn but the trail to the left (least traveled) is the River to River trail.  Note the blaze on the tree at the very right edge of the photo.







The Cedar Loop trail hooks back up with the River to River trail at this point.  You continue straight
(or slightly left).  The other trail runs south (right fork).

Go left (no blaze visible at this intersection)

The next intersection is not blazed and you will go left.  Shortly after you take the left fork you will cross a creek bed.

At the end of this trail (just before the trailhead), the trail enters a cut in the timber for a power line.  You will walk though this cut for a few hundred fee and end up at the Lirley trailhead.

From the trailhead, you will head north up Rowan Road, turn left on McQuire Road and then right onto Old US Hwy 51.  The trail apparently leaves Old US Hwy 51 and head south (go right off highway) just before in intersects with Hwy 51.  I have not hiked the short section of trail which then crosses Hwy 51.  I have picked up the trail where it crosses Hwy 51 and hiked east.  But I have not looked for the trail from Hwy 51 to Old Hwy 51.

This section of the River to River trail from Alto Pass to Hwy 51 is 10.53 miles.  I provided a link to my track at alltrails.com earlier.  You should consider joining alltrails.com if you are not already a member.  You can select any of my tracks (or someone else's track) and use it as a GPS trip guide.  I have provided a screen capture of the track below:

Remember that the River to River trail follows the west edge of Cedar Lake and then crosses the causeway.

River To River Trail Southern Illinois

R2R Blaze

The River to River trail is located in southern Illinois.  It is approximately 150 miles (other sources put the distance closer to 160 miles).  You can Google the trail name and find a number of references to the trail.  I have put a few of the better links below:

http://www.meetup.com/Chicago-Thru-Hike-Backpackers/photos/12764592/202779452/

http://www.meetup.com/Chicago-Thru-Hike-Backpackers/pages/River_to_River_Trail_Map_and_Guide_and_Resources/

http://www.fs.usda.gov/main/shawnee/maps-pubs

http://rivertorivertrail.blogspot.com/ (not updated since 4/28/2010)

Jon Voigts has a River to River Trail pocket guide with good information and GPS waypoints.  The mapping coordinates use the Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) system with map datum NAD27.  So when you plot the waypoints, make sure you are using the correct system and map datum (otherwise your waypoints will be off significantly - yea I figured it out the hard way).  The world standard is datum is World Geodetic System 1984 or WGS84 based upon the North American Datum of 1983- NAD83 (no difference between the these two).  Must USGS topo maps are based on the North American Datum of 1927 or NAD27.  The difference between WGS84 and NAD27 can be as much as 200 meters.  Unfortunately, if you go to the website rivertorivertrailguide.com - Google warns you of the presence of malware and recommends not proceeding to the site.  I looked in my copy of the guide for a phone number or address but there is no other contact information.  There is also a guide from the River to River Trail organization (there website has been down forever).  You can order their guide at Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/River-river-trail-guide-Elizabethtown/dp/0964643529

My goal with this blog is to provide another resource for those planning to hike the R2R trail.  I live in Cape Girardeau, MO.  The western trail head for the R2R trail is Grand Tower, IL.  Grand Tower is across the Mississippi and north of Cape Girardeau on Hwy 3.  I can reach sections of the trail in half an hour.  

I intend do a thru hike of the entire trail February of 2014.  In preparation for that thru hike, I plan to hike as many sections as possible (focusing on the trail portions rather than the road sections).  I intend to develop a pictorial guide to the trail providing guidance on the direction to take at various junctions and forks in the trail.

I have hiked most of the Godwin trail but not the entire trail because the western portion from the trail head to Hutchins creek was badly grown up this summer.  I will hike that section later this fall once the vegetation dies off.  My first mistake on the Godwin trail, starting at the Western trail head near the La Rue Ecological area, was to miss the first turn on the trail.  You only go about 3/4 of a mile and you reach your first fork (if you are looking for it).  You should go right at this fork but the left portion of the trail looks well trodden (the right fork was grown up).  What I missed was a wooden sign on the left edge of the trail (at that junction) that showed the left fork was actually the King Hollow trail.  Here is a link to that track on alltrails.com   http://alltrails.com/tracks/9620-godwin-trail



You can see from the track that I hiked down the King Hollow Trail some distance before I began to question the trail.  It became increasing overgrown and washed out.  I began to think I was simply following some upper drainage.  So, I turned around (and yes Donna - I backtracked but I was not lost).  I then notice the King Hollow Trail sign and went right onto the R2R trail.  But I was running out of daylight and the trail was overgrown.  So I returned to the Jeep.  The trail junction is blazed with a silver diamond on the right side of the trail.

The first half of the Godwin trail traverses the Clear Springs Wilderness area of the Shawnee National Forest.  This wilderness area covers 4730 acres and was designated as a wilderness area in 1990.  The western trail head is located on forest road 236 (Pine Hills Road) just north of Wolf Lake, IL.  It is approximately 6 3/4 miles from the eastern trailhead to the western trail head.  The Clear Springs Wilderness area stops at Hutchins Creek (about 3 miles in on the trail).
Then you enter the Bald Knob Wilderness area covering 5,800 acres.  I have not hiked in from the western trailhead to Hutchins creek yet.  I have hiked to the creek from the western trail head but did not cross the creek.  The creek crossing would be the only confusing area on this portion of the R2R trail.  Although not well marked (it is my understanding that the number of blazes

are limited in wilderness areas), the trail from Hutchins Creek to the eastern trail head is a well defined trail and gets more distinct the closer you get to the trail head.  Here is a link to my track of the Godwin trail within the Bald Knob Wilderness area http://alltrails.com/tracks/godwin-trail-west-half.  There are two other trails that intersect with the Godwin trail close to the eastern trailhead but they are will marked as the Bridgeman trail (heads north) and Ranbarger trail (goes south).  The trails in this area offer several options for loop hiking from 6 to possibly to 20 miles (depending on how you combine them).  However, as I found out on the King Hollow trail, some portions of these trails look like goat paths and can be heavily overgrown.  This area is thick with poison ivy as well.

Once I hike the entire Godwin trail (which I will do later this year).  I will update this blog with details and photos of how the east and west portion of the trail hook up at Hutchins Creek.