Past Events
Join
our newsletter
Starved Rock and Matthiessen Tour 2007
A personal tour with Emily
The ADVENTURE begins after a short drive from Fox River BNB to the small village of Utica, IL at a soap shop called Kristine's Shower.
Emily Goes Shopping!!
We stopped at Common Grounds Book Cafe to check out Julia Messina's excellent coffee and unique books. A comfy couch and a relaxing atmosphere await you!!
And just next door, we checked out one of the local wineries for some very good wines...Illinois River Winery
And just up the road about 4 minutes, just past Starved Rock, we arrive at Matthiessen State Park!
After a nice ride along a road that quickly turned into forest, the first thing we seen as we arrived at Matthiessen Park was this cool cabin/fort as you can see below.
Emily loved the other cabin just to the side of the fort and wanted her picture taken again. So camera shy ..
Here is the stairway leading down into the park. A beautiful, easy entrance into the forest!
Plenty of signs and walkways made an easy tour
We seen these sandstone cliffs with ferns growing out of them everywhere
Lots of trails to get away on!!
Beautiful canyons, waterfalls and streams all along the way! If you look closely at this picture below, you will see two people playing on the sandy beach in the distance. This will give you an idea of how massive and awesome these cliffs really are!
Walked into the box of the canyon just to find lots of surprises!
...like a cave that was carved out by time just to find out that it is only now about 4:20 :) About an hour and a half into the journey.....
Yeahhhhh!! This is what I was looking for..... A lion on the right and someone with the time on the left... :)
Then you start feeling a bit PRIMAL!!! Just starting to relax and feel like,,,getting primal.. This statue carved by probably hundreds of different visitors over time is atleast wearing a smile :)
Sometimes, rarely, everything just comes together beautifully in life for a few seconds and I was right there when it happened! Check out this photo I took of Emily with the waterfalls just behind her. The light and all was perfect!
I almost forgot that we have a climb to make to get back to the main trail. Ahh, it will be good exercise!
A shot of the bridge from below before we climb..
We made it to the top without a problem just to meet this happy couple.. and breathe. I got so caught up in a friendly conversation with them that I lost track of Emily.. The adventurer! So I just took a guess at the direction she might have gone and went that way...
Probably went this way...
and after a short hike we met by the exit. There were plenty more trails to see but she was in a hurry to go and see Starved Rock as well.. So we stopped at Papa Murphs Irish pub for a quick pizza, hot balls and a vodka cranberry.. Yum
Keep Checking Back for the rest of the adventure!
| Rooms/Rates
| Packages and Specials |
Parties | Guest
Feedback | Scrapbookers
| Weddings |
| Things to do | Your
Hosts | Home | Virtual
Tour | Policies | Newsletter
| Hill Billy Directions
|
|
Fox River Bed and Breakfast Inn 3367 E 2072nd Rd. Ottawa, IL. 61350 Phone 1 (815) 431-9257 E-mail: Charlotte@foxriverbnb.com |
Copyright ©2005-2008 Fox River Bed and Breakfast
Revised April 21st, 2008
Website Content, Interior Photos, Guest Feedback Photos, Exterior Photos, Color Enhancements and the overall apeal of this website is done meticulously and on many sleepless nights over coffee and cookies that I sneak from Charlottes secret stash spots. Bobby Joe
Website Hosting, Code, Scripting, Excellent team assistance and a little bit more tweaking the untweakable is done by Sam at Compass Point Media
Please enjoy the peaceful face and the unseen behind the scenes we have created for you.