Hike Distance: 4.7 miles      Yearly Hike Distance:  1083.1 miles

Elevation Gain: 438 feet      Yearly Elevation Gain: 136033 feet

My wife and I wanted to get some fresh air since it’s been a few days after her father’s funeral. The temperatures here have been miserable and in the high nineties, and with the humidity in the high nineties. today there was a break in the temperature and we decided to go to the Skokie lagoons nature reserve that is in the northern suburbs of Chicago, in Illinois.

I used to drive my car here, when I was a teenager, and took pictures of this beautiful place. I don’t remember much about it and am happy I could make it back.  I don’t remember the asphalted trails either, but it probably wasn’t here back then.  I used to park along the road and take black & white pictures with my Rolleiflex SL35 film camera.  Good memories although high school was turbulent times!  Gosh, that was back in 1974-1975, and doesn’t feel that long ago. 😦

We parked along Willow road and started north on the trail, which parallels the highway.  It was too noisy so we turned around and started around the lagoons in a counter-clockwise direction.  There were mostly people riding bikes on this day, and it wasn’t very crowded.  There were also quite a few people out on the water in boats!

There were plenty of fantastic views and I took quite a few pictures.  There aren’t many natural places left in the Chicago area, and this is a nice getaway from the hectic live here (which is why I moved away!) I’m sure I’ll be back, as we have a wedding in the near future, and we might just visit again.  A nice break from the stress of this visit and so nice to get fresh, humid Chicago air. haha.