Wander at Will: Hitting the trail for Woods Walk

Editor’s note: This story is part of our Wander at Will series, which is designed to inspire you to enjoy the many recreation opportunities in your Will County preserves in whatever ways you are able to. Whether you’re a well-traveled explorer or just starting your outdoor adventures, digital marketing coordinator Meghan McMahon hopes her first-person adventures will help you find new ideas, tips and hidden gems to make it easier to connect with the outdoors all year.

It's definitely not sweater weather just yet, but fall is here, at least by one definition of the season. And with the arrival of fall comes the arrival of Woods Walk, the Forest Preserve District's annual hiking challenge. 

The premise of Woods Walk is simple: Hike seven of the 10 selected Woods Walk trails to earn the 2026 commemorative medallion, this year featuring a deer. There are two ways to log your hikes: digitally using the Goosechase app or offline using the Woods Walk Hiking Guide, which can be picked up from one of five Forest Preserve visitor centers. 

In my years working at the Forest Preserve District of Will County, I've been to just about every improved preserve and walked just about every trail. Just this year, while completing my Wander at Will adventures, I've logged many, many miles on our trails. But I've never completed Woods Walk, at least not how the popular hiking program has been designed. In the spirit of trying new things, I've decided to give it a go this year. 

And with that challenge accepted, I decided to do my first Woods Walk hike of the season at Hickory Creek Preserve's Hickory Creek Barrens Nature Preserve. I picked this trail as my first one for a few reasons. First, it's a 3.5-mile hike, the second longest of this year's trails, and I thought it would be good to get a long trail checked off the list to start my experience. It's kind of a hilly stretch of trail, too, at least by northern Illinois standards. I also wanted to start with a trail that had a good mix of habitat types. Hickory Creek Preserve includes a little bit of everything — woodlands, grasslands, savannas, the creek and other wetlands — and the trail at Hickory Creek Barrens showcases a lot of it, so it seemed like a good place to get the full Woods Walk experience. 

The day I chose for my hike was a hot one, with the heat index predicted to hit more than 105 degrees. I thought about changing course and waiting for a cooler day, but anyone who knows me well will tell you I am as stubborn as they come and once I set my mind on something it's hard to get me to change plans. I did make one concession to the heat by starting as early as possible, earlier than I usually head out on the trails. 

Despite the early start, it was still a hot and humid walk, but it was an enjoyable one. The Woods Walk trail at Hickory Creek Barrens starts in a prairie but quickly enters a nice woodland, one of my favorite stretches of forested trail in the preserves. This particular span of trail feels far removed from the hustle and bustle even though it's really just steps away from a busy stretch of Lincoln Highway that runs through New Lenox. 

In this wooded segment I saw quite a bit of wildlife — deer, chipmunks, squirrels and rabbits. I didn't see a lot of birds, but I could hear them in the distance. Blue jays were dominating the symphony, as they always seem to be, but I also heard a few red-headed woodpeckers (my favorite woodpecker) and eastern wood-peewees. 

One thing I saw a lot of was spiderwebs, particularly near the creek. The intricacy of some of them was almost breathtaking, made even more so by the rays of sunlight from the rising sun giving them an almost glowing quality. It made me wonder if spiders ever stop to admire their work after they complete a web. (I know they probably don't, but I like the visual I have of it in my head.)

After crossing the creek, the trail cuts through a more varied portion of habitat that's a combination of grasslands and woodlands. I had hiked this stretch of trail not all that long ago, in mid-July, and I was surprised by how much had changed since then in these prairie areas. Most noticeably, everything seemed so much taller. And browner, particularly the grasses. 

Mixed in with all the grasses are a lot of wildflowers. Some of the flowers that were blooming on my last visit still were, although some, like the purple coneflowers, are looking pretty spent these days. But a whole new round of flowers have come to life since my last visit, including the wildflowers we tend to associate with late summer and early fall. The goldenrod is just hitting its prime, plus I saw my first asters of the season.

The Woods Walk path at Hickory Creek is an out-and-back, so once I checked in at the Woods Walk sign at the turn-around point I headed back to where I started. Out-and-back hikes are not always my favorite because they can be a little repetitive, but one thing I try to do on these walks is focus on just one side of the trail on the way out and then the other side on the way back. One of the Forest Preserve's interpretive naturalists suggested this a few years ago, and it's a nice trick to break up the monotony. 

It took me a little more than an hour to complete the 3.5-mile route at Hickory Creek Barrens. I tried to keep up a brisk pace when I was walking, but I made a lot of stops along the way to take a picture or get a better look at something. One of the nice things about Woods Walk is that it's approachable for all types of walkers. If you treat your walks as workouts, it's a good way to find new trails to add to your rotation. If you are a stop and smell the roses kind of walker, you'll enjoy the varied scenery you can see at the different preserves throughout fall. 

Some of my remaining Woods Walk hikes will come as part of my Wander at Will adventures. For example, I'm planning to visit Prairie Bluff Preserve in a few weeks because I think September is when it really shines. And Keepataw Preserve is not a place I visit often, so it's been on my list of preserves to visit this year. A few of the other Woods Walk hikes are at places I like to walk in my free time, so I'm sure I'll get to Rock Run Preserve and McKinley Woods in due time to check those off the list.

If we pass each other along the way, stop and say hello. I'd love to hear how you are enjoying Woods Walk and spending time in the preserves.