Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie
This past weekend, Quigs and I woke up early, got ready for some hiking, and headed down to Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie. This nature oasis is located just 60 miles outside of Chicago. Little did we know the history behind this gem though. Admittedly, I was researching and trying to find a new park for us to adventure at and was shocked that I had never seen or heard of this one. What caught my eye was the bison that had been reintroduced to the prairie back in the 2015-2016 era. With the thought and idea of possibly seeing some bison, I decided that this would make for some great hiking. Being the start of spring, I knew I wasn’t going to seeing the rolling hills filled with lush green grass. We are 100% still in the phase of the new grass just starting to emerge after all the snow has melted with a mostly yellow landscape. While it might not be the most picturesque hike, never doubt the serene beauty and calmness of new life starting to emerge after a cold and grey winter.
The National Prairie boasts an impressive 30+ miles of hiking trails, so I knew that we would have plenty to see and discover. We started our adventure at the Midewin Wauponsee Trailhead, which is located at the upper most northeast corner of the land. This glacial trail, which is a limestone screened trail, provides you with a pretty easy walk or biking surface that is level and flat. It isn’t exactly hiking though, and that is where our real passion is. So after going down this trail for a bit, we made a turn to go onto the Bailey Bridge Trail.
Quigs on the limestone screened trail.
Start of the Bailey Bridge Trail.
Once on the Bailey Bridge Trail, we started to notice structures covered by grass and trees and while interesting, I really didn’t think too much about them. That is, until i began to notice the mass amount of them scattered throughout these fields. We are talking about dozens upon dozens of these buildings in row after row BUT they didn’t necessarily distract from the view all that much because they were built into the landscape and not on-top of them. The word ‘bunker’ wasn’t the first thing that came to mind to describe them but eventually after seeing probably the 30th one, I decided to take a break in the hike and do a quick google search.
A brief history…
These bunkers, an estimated 300-400 in total, were constructed in the early 1900’s and used the the United States Army to store TNT. While we did not see these buildings, research showed that there were other factory type buildings on this land for building ammunition. Today, these bunkers are slowly being demolished to make way for prairie restoration. This process won’t happen overnight though and will last decades. They have also decided to keep a few of the bunkers and factory buildings to preserve that history that existed on the land.
The trails are wide but they are also lined with barbed wire fences and while this may seem like a reason to stay out of the land (most of it actually has public access), there exists these interesting “gates.” I put this word in quotation marks because honestly, this is not what I would consider a gate. There technical name is a walk-through gate. Essentially a wooden A frame ladder that goes over the barbed wire fence. This allows one to pass without getting torn up by the barbed wire, which is great…but why not just use a regular metal gate? The first one that I attempted to climb over (which is pretty easy for humans), Quigs wanted nothing to do with it, so I wasn’t go to push it. But after strolling for a bit longer, we came upon another walk-through gate that had an easier solution to get him to the other side, a real metal gate off to the side that was for cars/trucks. Interestingly enough though, this same walk-through gate was actually placed OVER a small metal gate that would in my opinion, be MUCH MUCH easier to use, for all.
I can’t wait to come explore more of this treasure, especially as it gets nicer outside and the true beauty of the tallgrass prairie grows back from the winter blues. It was a great way to spend a Saturday and for being only about an hour outside of Chicago, it is well worth the visit.
Walk-through gate that led to a bunker field.
Trail marker for Bailey Bridge Trail.
Skull found on the Bailey Bridge.
