Rock Island State Trail and Snakeden Hollow State Fish and Wildlife Area

For Memorial Day Weekend 2025, we visited Galesburg for a quick overnight trip, visiting the two closest parks: Rock Island State Trail and Snakeden Hollow State Fish and Wildlife Area. Rock Island ST is a 26 mile long trail spanning several towns, but starts in Alta, IL (just north of Peoria) and goes north to Toulon, IL. Snakeden Hollow SFWA is in Victoria, IL, just over 3 hours west of Chicago, or 30 minutes west of Galesburg.

The Rock Island State Trail is the second state trail we have been to for this project. We certainly cannot walk the full length of it, so we decided our best course of action was to start at one of the points of interest, walk for about a mile and then turn around. The land the trail goes down used to be a small train line, but by the 1950s operations had ceased due to lack of use. The land was first acquired by Peoria’s Forest Park Foundation, and then deeded to the state in 1969. It was the first railway conversion completed by the IDNR, and was officially dedicated in 1989. 

We chose Wyoming, IL as our starting point. The old train station building is still there, and we felt it was a good landmark to show off for this park. After taking a few pictures, we started hiking in earnest. This part of the trail is forested, but still runs along farmland that you can see through the trees. The trail is very well defined and has clear markers every mile.

Walking the full trail length would certainly be ambitious, but this trail is also great for people riding bikes. In fact, there was information on the trail about libraries nearby with access to bike servicing kits. The part of the trail we hiked was not difficult at all, though the scenery did get somewhat repetitive. Still, we would recommend this trail to more inexperienced hikers, as long as you are keeping track of how far you’ve gone and have a good understanding of your own limits for when to turn around.

We only did one park per day this time, so the next day we visited Snakeden Hollow SFWA before heading home. This park is another one that is primarily known for hunting and fishing. Usually parks designated for hunting are really difficult to access or get around, but this park was the exception. Although the parts designated for hunting still seemed hard to get to, the lake was really beautiful, and it definitely seemed like a great place to be on the water. The parking lot was pretty crowded and nearly everyone there had brought a boat. 

Hiking is not listed as an activity on the IDNR’s website, but we did find a gravel road that went along the lake. It looked like it was primarily for maintenance vehicles, but it does offer unique views. Particularly interesting was seeing the other side of the dam, as well as the smaller bodies of water. Although this park is not designed for hiking, we still had a very good time walking around and enjoying the lake in our own way.

The first brewery we went to on this trip was Reserve Artisan Ales. This is a pour your own style place that offers delicious and unique beers that they brew themselves, but also features several other beers from around the state. We really enjoyed coming here and chatting with the owners about parks and beer and Illinois.

The second brewery was Iron Spike Brewing Company. This brewery is housed in a former fire station, and has both craft beer and serves food, so we decided to have dinner there the first night. They have a pretty good selection of beer brewed in house. However, it looked to us like they had far fewer options due to the paper menu being incomplete. The full menu could only be accessed with a QR code, or by looking at the tap list on the wall. It just seemed odd to be handed a paper menu and for it to not be complete. The food and the beer was still delicious, and a great way to end the day.

Both Rock Island ST and Snakeden Hollow SFWA were fun parks to visit. We never know what to expect with state trails, but we had a really good time here, both on the hike itself and learning about the rich history of the trail. Snakeden Hollow may not be a great hiking destination, but it is a fantastic place to simply be outside and enjoy a gorgeous morning either on the water or simply next to it.