Guidance for riding the Grand Illinois Trail

My wife and I are planning to ride a portion of the Grand Illinois Trail Next week.  The plan is to take the Metra to Joliet, then ride to the I & M trail.  Has anyone on here done this before?  What route did you take from the Metra station to the trail and how far is it.  

Once on the trail we're heading to Starved Rock to camp for the night.  The second day, we are planning to ride to the Hennepin Canal Trail, then head North on the Hennepin Canal Feeder Trail that runs up to Rock Falls, then riding to Lowden State Park to camp for the second night.  Does anyone have experience riding in this area?  Is the feeder trail clearly marked?  Its hard to find much info about it.

From there, we'll take a short ride to Rock Cut state park and camp for the third night then either ride to Harvard and jump on the metra or ride out to IL Beach State park and camp again and ride back to Chicago the next day.

Any suggestions or guidance you have about the I&M or the Hennepin Canal trail would be appreciated.  I've never been out that way before so I'd like to know what to expect.

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Permalink Reply by Bob Kastigar on May 29, 2010 at 3:58am
I've done this before and I have a couple of suggestions:

1. You can use Google maps to find your way from the Metra Station to the trail start. It's relatively simple, since what you want is a short way over the Illinois River, then follow the path/road through the park on the west side of the river all the way south. A slight up-hill, the south or southwest to where the trail begins just north of Rt 6 and Brandon Road.

2. Generally, the I&M Canal Path is good but not great. There are several paved roads that parallel the trail you might want to take for a while. Not Rt 6 tho.

3. The Canal Path is probably closed between Buffalo Rock State Park and Utica. There's a car parking area to exit the path, take Dee Bennet Road to Rt 178 (stop and see the Starved Rock Dam) which you're probably going to take to the Starved Rock campground anyway.

4. Go back to Utica to pick up the path to LaSalle, where the path ends at Lock 14 and the Illinois River.

5. Take Rt 6 to Rt 29, just west of Spring Valley. Take Rt 29 to Bureau Junction, where the Hennepin Canal starts. Don't go to Hennepin, the canal has been removed. Don't go through DePue either. It's a nice town, but a terrible ride on a gravel road to get there from Srping Valley, and a very big uphill climb to get back on Rt 29 to Bureau.

6. The Hennepin Canal Path is very nice, and nicely maintained as well, much better than the I&M Canal. On the way you'll find a state park building with a history of the canal. (The Panama Canal was designed after they studied the Hennepin Canal first.)

7. I haven't ridden the feeder canal path, but it's easy to find and very well marked to get onto it. You'll ride west, path the large area there the sections join, then a sign will direct you north, over the canal to the north side and then back east a short distance to join the path.

My home town is Peru so I've made this trip a couple of times. Dig out some of the links at
http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/kastigar

Let us know how the trip was, when you return.

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