The Compulsive Hiker

On day 3 I broke camp at Arrow Rock and headed NW to Van Meter State Park.  This place was so quiet and tranquil – a big and welcome change from Arrow Rock and Finger Lakes.  One of the first things I saw after getting out of my car was this little guy:

It was not afraid of me at all, hopped like a kangaroo, and was about the size of a large mouse.  Needs research.

One of the trails is called the Earthworks Monument Trail and it passes through a large earthen structure built before the Europeans invaded.  Here, just read the sign:

Without the sign you wouldn’t  know anything was there but much of the “moat” is still visible:Also on tap was the Loess Hills Trail – a loop around the lake and a nice little trail.  There was a creek bed at the upper end that was just covered in Jewelweed and hummingbirds:

Evidence of beavers:

Looking from the dam to the other end of the lake:

Something new to me – tentatively identified as the fruit of Golden Seal Hydrastis canadensis:And most unexpectedly, blueberries:

Finally, here’s something from the squirrels-will-eat-anything department – part of a plastic park bench:

There is also a trail that leads up a hill to the Vanmeter family cemetery.  Many old stones here, some dating to the 1840’s.  The Oumessourit Wetland Bluff trail goes along the edge of a wetland area at the bottom of a bluff (duh!).  I scared up a bunch of Red-winged blackbirds but otherwise saw little wildlife.  I think you would have to spend some quiet time there to really appreciate it but I wasn’t in that kind of mood.  From the Missouri Overlook trail I was able to see a sliver of water in the far distance.

It was a pretty nice weekend.  I don’t know that any single feature would make the drive worthwhile but the combination of Devil’s Icebox and the Pinnacles should make it a pretty easy decision for anyone within 1-4 hours of Columbia.

The next morning at Finger Lakes State Park, the Kelly Branch trail looked kinda muddy so I decided to go to the next stop and maybe come back afterward to hike it.

The star of the weekend was Pinnacles Youth Park just a few miles north of Finger Lakes.  This is a rock formation created when the Silver Fork Creek doubled back on itself and spent a few million years carving out the rock on both sides, leaving a narrow ridge 1000 feet long and 75 feet high with several windows.  The “front” drops pretty much straight into the creek but the “back” has some ledges and is pretty accessible.  Unless you’re clumsy or acrophobic, that is.

Here’s the front from the picnic area:
In the creek bed, looking upstream…

and downstream:

A closer look at one of the “windows”:

You head to the right, following the creek until you come to the Shelving Rock, an area that has been undercut by the creek.  It’s about 40 feet deep and 125 feet long:

Head across the creek, find the trail at the top of the bank, and go left.  As you climb away from the creek you soon start seeing rocks and then beyond beckon the pinnacles.  There are many old cedars, seeming to grow right out of the rock:

It is possible to get on top of all the pinnacles but some are more difficult and risky.  I’m standing on the tallest of the pinnacles, looking out over the next:

And then looking back:

The trail runs up the center of this photo.  You can climb the rocks but have to come back down to get further along the trail.

I didn’t climb this one.  I didn’t think I’d have trouble going up, but getting down alone with no rock climbing experience seemed too risky.

The last and smallest pinnacle, with the woods beyond:

Once you pass the last pinnacle and enter the woods, the trail follows the bluff to the left and offers several places where you can look back:

Hiking Missouri rates this trail 5 out of 5 for the challenge, and it’s my first “5”.  I have been eager to get here since I first heard about the place almost a year ago.  It’s only about 2 miles round-trip but it’s something I won’t soon forget.    I decided to skip the trail at Finger Lakes and move on to the next stop.

Arrow Rock State Historic Site is a state park built next to an historic town.  There are a couple short trails to see, and the town itself.  I spent the afternoon wandering around here and got a campsite for the night.  The trails are nothing special – certainly not a destination by themselves.

Downtown Arrow Rock.  Yep, that’s all of it:

The one-person jail:

At the overlook on the George Caleb Bingham property:

There were a few hiking trails in the Columbia MO area that I’ve wanted to check out and I had a long weekend with no other plans so off I went on my first solo multi-day trip.  I spent most of Saturday afternoon at Rock Bridge Memorial State Park just south of Columbia.

I started on the Sinkhole Trail.  As expected, it weaved around many sinkholes (which don’t photograph well).  A point of interest here is the remnants of a farm that used to occupy the area.  Here’s one of the two silos:

I ask you: what kind of person stands in the middle of an area pockmarked with sinkholes and says – not once but twice – “This is the perfect place for a large, very heavy and unstable concrete structure”?  On the other hand, it’s still there.

The main attraction here is definitely the very cool Devil’s Icebox.  We start with the natural bridge that used to be the entrance of the cave:

Part of the roof collapsed so now there’s a large sinkhole between this bridge and the cave beyond.  From a platform, you can look down into another sinkhole that serves as the entrance for humans to the cave:

As you descend the stairs you can feel the temperature drop a bunch just in the space of about 5 feet.  At the bottom, you squat down and go about 10 feet in and find yourself in a “room” with a “skylight”.  Looking back toward the entrance:

Looking up:

Looking into the main part of the cave:

I didn’t have a flashlight so I went no further and suspect I would have encountered a gate before getting far anyway.

I then headed off to do a circuit of the Spring Brook and Deer Run trails.  They were nice enough, and in stark contrast to the Icebox were pretty much uninhabited.  I didn’t encounter another person for about 2 hours.

After that, it was on to the Karst Trail.  This started with about a mile of open prairie and on a sunny 95 degree day it became pretty unpleasant.  Once in the woods you see pretty much the same stuff as on the Sinkhole trail but it’s all just smaller and fewer.

I was ready to call it a day by then so I headed north of Columbia to Finger Lakes State Park to find a place to camp.  I was fortunate to get there when I did because 15 minutes later they were full.  This park has about 70 miles of ATV trails and apparently includes a professional-level motocross track.  There’s also a 2.5 mile hiking & mountain biking trail (Kelly Branch) that I intended to do Sunday morning.  As I expected, the area was very noisy.  In the campground motorcycles and ATVs were everywhere, heading to or from the trail, or at a camp site being repaired or tuned.  It was like sitting inside a giant beehive, I think.  It started raining about 7:30 PM and that quieted things.