Shawnee National Forest

I was getting super itchy for a family vacation, so we decided to explore our home state of IL!  No worries about any states I had always wanted to see the Garden of the Gods in Shawnee National Forest in downstate Illinois, but it never quite made it to the top of the vacation destination list.  The pandemic helped this destination get prioritize and boy was it ever amazing!  It took about 5.5 hours to get there.  The Shawnee National Forest is quite the humongous place, stretching across the entire bottom part of the state.  It is SUPER remote and rural with seriously nobody there.  We hardly saw anybody the whole time we were there.  Every day was better than the last, though, with just tons of gorgeous nature to explore and enjoy.  We could not believe we were in Illinois!  We all loved it so much and want to go back, we didn't see everything we wanted to.  We are Shawnee evangelists now, you all must go!

First stop, Giant City

This is the area that inspired the name Giant City - "streets" between the giant rock formations

So many rock formations for the kids to climb on!  Luke loved Giant City the most, he said.

Claire had build up her confidence to climbing rocks on her own, but she did and then she had a blast.

Luke did not require a warm-up period for climbing rocks

Devil's tower

Fern Clyffe waterfall - we were not in the Spring rainy season where more water would be coming down, but it was still pretty

We stayed at a very nice, centrally located Airbnb.  It had this beautiful fishing pond right next to it.  It was a manufactured home on the property of a wonderful couple who had tons of land.

The fish were plentiful!

The owner brought us farm fresh eggs from his chickens, and fresh veggies that he had just picked from his large garden.

Dad caught the littlest fish, hehe

Day 2 - Cave in Rock on the shores of the Ohio River.  Kentucky was just on the other side of the river.

My little hiker staying hydrated

Rim Rock trail

Ox-Lot Cave

Pounds Hollow lake

What started it all!  My desire to see this beautiful site.

This girl enjoyed the trip - when she wasn't seeing or hearing any bees or flying creatures, that is.

Inspiration Point trail - loving nature!!

Rain, rain go away

Coffee talk on the porch

Bells Springs day - my fave hike of our trip!

The trail took you through these natural springs, it was fun to walk in the water - like we were in Zion National Park again!

Swimming in the deeper parts of the springs

Hiking in our wet suits from place to place

This was a natural stone bridge and it was kind of scary!  Such a big drop off!

There was a strange iron ladder down one of the rock walls that Matt and Luke bravely went down, then convinced Claire and I to do as well - it was a trail shorcut.

We did it!

Rope swing into the springs

Cliff jumping

Picnic lunch

Rickety bridge to the zipline at the horse stables

Claire could not wait to go horseback riding, but then a storm blew in and we had to take a raincheck for Saturday instead.

Since our trail ride was postponed, we drove in the rain down to the Cache River wetlands.

It was so cool!  Such a different landscape - like we were in New Orleans all of a sudden.

Unimpressed kid

Everybody loved the boardwalk-over-the-wetlands section of the hike.  These cypress trees were gorgeous!

Back at the house for a beautiful sunset.

Horseback riding was a go on Saturday, woohoo!

Final hike of the trip - Panther's Den

Panther's Den - we made it

It felt like a fairyland in the forest

Butterflies

We headed to the lake house after the Shawnee trip to keep the vacation vibes going for one more night.

Walking in Kenosha