Ten Mile Creek SFWA and Hamilton County SFWA

After 3 years of visiting state parks, we knew it was time to finally start making our way down south. Labor Day weekend of 2023, we did our longest trip yet. Four full days, dedicated to 7 parks close to Mt. Vernon, IL. The first day we started by going to Ten Mile Creek State Fish and Wildlife Area and Hamilton County State Fish and Wildlife Area.

Ten Mile Creek SFWA is located in McLeansboro, IL. It is 5 hours away from Chicago, 2 hours and 45 minutes away from Springfield, or an hour away from Carbondale. This park is very large at 5,820 acres, mostly consisting of places to hunt and fish.

The land this park is on was purchased in 1988, with the intent being to reclaim the land which had been strip mined for coal. In the years that followed, those reclamation efforts have resulted in new vegetation and new lakes. The terrain is quite varied because of all these efforts.

As far as we could tell, hiking is not a prominent feature of this park. There are places to view wildlife, but hunting is far more prominent. We found a small pond next quite close to the entrance that we were able to walk around, but because the hunting is so popular, we didn’t want to just start wandering around looking for trails. Still, it wasn’t bad, considering some of the parks we’ve seen that didn’t have trails.

With no trail options at Ten Mile Creek, we headed to our second park of the day, Hamilton County SFWA. This area is also known as Dolan Lake, and is about 8 miles away from McLeansboro, a mere 20 minutes away from Ten Mile Creek. The IDNR focuses very heavily on the boating, fishing, and camping as the main activities, but we found the hiking to be excellent. Using Alltrails, we were able to navigate the Chapel Trail and Sloan Trail Loop.

It was a beautiful day, hiking the 1.8 mile trail. It was very shady the whole way through, with very clear, wide trails. Definitely a good option for someone new to hiking. This particular trail is only close to the lake for a very small portion, but we didn’t mind. It was still a nice, relatively short, peaceful walk through the woods. At the very end, we came across the reason it is called the Chapel Trail: a simple cross and two benches in front of it. It was not something we expected, but a noteworthy addition for a person of faith should they need it.

After we finished up hiking for the day, we headed to The Hop Brewery in Christopher, IL. They have a relatively small selection of craft beer that they rotate through, but they have managed to make some very unique flavors. The stand-out was a beer made with butterfly pea blossoms, which made the color a very intense purple. Definitely give them a try if you are in the area.

We felt both of these parks were pretty great. Although Ten Mile Creek was definitely better for hunting and fishing, the quick walk around the pond was still nice. Out of the parks we have been to that don’t have hiking as a prominent activity, we felt that Ten Mile Creek was the best one so far. Hamilton County was also excellent, we couldn’t have asked for much more from the hike. The woods were shady, the trail was well maintained, and it didn’t feel like too much with the weather getting hotter. We feel that both parks are worth going to.