Shawnee Hills

Tuesday morning, we headed south into Shawnee National Forest.  Our first stop was at the trailhead for Jackson Falls.  There were some orange jewelweed blooming near the parking area.

Some orange mushrooms were growing here as well.

It was only about 0.1 miles to the top of Jackson Falls.

It's a seasonal waterfall and was dry by late summer.

But it was a pretty area to relax and enjoy the view.

There were plenty of wildflowers blooming in the area.

We spotted some stone mint and non-native Asiatic dayflowers.

After a break, we hiked a short ways down the trail to see if perhaps there was an easy way down.

The cliffs were beautiful, but there seemed to be an easy way down, so not worth it since the waterfall was dry.  We spotted some ringless honey mushrooms on the hike back.

We didn't have far to go for our next stop.

It was a short drive to the Burden Falls Wilderness and trailhead for the falls.  Like Jackson Falls, there wasn't much water at all at Burden Falls.  The upper section of the waterfall was just past the parking lot.

Following the creek downstream a short ways, we came to the top of the lower section of the falls.

Getting to the base from here was difficult, but we found a scramble path to make it down.

There wasn't much water flowing at all, but the cliffs surrounding were really beautiful and made the climb down worth it.

A followed the creek down a short ways, but it didn't look like there were any more drops.

We then climbed back up and returned to the car.

From here, we headed west to Ferne Clyffe State Park.  Parking at the waterfall trailhead, we first hiked the Hawk's Cave Trail past some huge boulders.

Soon we came to Hawk's Cave, one of the largest shelter bluff caves in Illinois.

The rocks surrounding the cave were just beautiful.

It was lightly raining, so we hung out in the cave for a while to stay dry.

When the rain died down, we continued on the trail past more of the cave.

The trail soon looped back around and we finished up back at parking.  Next, we hiked down Big Rocky Hollow Trail past some immense cliffs.

The trail ended at the base of Ferne Clyffe Waterfall.

Even with recent rains, there wasn't much water flowing at all, but still a beautiful area and very easy hike.

From here, we left the main part of the park and headed to the trailhead for Bork's Waterfall.  Regent Lane forded the creek just before the parking area at the top of the waterfall.

I walked back up the road to see the waterfall from the top - there wasn't much water here either.

But we still wanted to make it to the base.  Bork's Waterfall Trail lead down into the gorge and then upstream back towards the road.

It was a really scenic trail with beautiful cliffs lining the ravine.

The trail ended at the base of the waterfall.

Even in the light rain, there wasn't much falling water.

There was a nice shelter cave here that we could hang out in to wait for the rain to pass.

When it did, we made the hike back to the car.

We were getting hungry at this point, so headed to Ned' Shed in Vienna for take-out lunch.  The rain had picked up so we had burgers and wings in the car.  Then we headed back into the forest in the evening and stopped at Trigg Lookout Tower, not far from Jackson Falls and Burden Falls.

The tower looked like it had seen better days, but we climbed up to the top.

The views were beautiful from atop the tower, but it was too cloudy for much of a sunset.

After some pictures, we headed back down and returned to Harrisburg for the evening.