It’s a long way to the top … and it’s a long way to the bottom. Roving reporter Matt Crossman takes us on a journey to the highest and lowest elevations in Missouri—Taum Sauk Mountain and the banks of the St. Francis River, respectively.
Hiking
Lake Wappapello is named for a small Wayne County railroad town named Wappapello, reportedly after a friendly Shawnee chief who hunted the area during early pioneer times. Today, Lake Wappapello State Park offers a relaxing hideaway.
From the motocross course to the mountain bike trails to the swimming beach to the campgrounds, there’s a little something for everyone at Finger Lakes State Park. Once a coal mine, it’s now one of Boone County’s most popular spots for recreation.
Parks and trails lace Missouri like cracks in cobblestone, places where you can escape from urban life and commune with nature among windswept glades and shady forests. Missouri’s wilderness beckons exploration.
As you reemerge from your winter shelter to greet spring, you’ll find exciting changes and challenges afoot. And when those April showers arrive, settle in for some adventures just waiting to be rediscovered.
The 132-acre Dillard Mill State Historic Site offers a fully operational turbine-powered roller mill which can be toured and a mill store built around 1899. There is also a day-use picnic area with a shelter and a mile-and-a-half hiking trail through a glade and wooded uplands east of the mill.
You probably know bees are pollinators, and very beneficial to the environment. But how much do you know about bees that live in an Ozark fen— a wetland fed by groundwater, not rain or surface streams? Here’s a chance to bee-come more informed.
By foot is the best way to see Pickle Creek, sandstone landscapes, shut-ins, and distinctive flora. Rose azaleas accent fern-covered ledges and Whispering Pine Wild Area beckons you to discover the wonders this State Park has to offer.
What was once the MKT (Missouri-Kansas-Texas) railroad,The Katy Trail State Park has so much to explore on foot, by bike, or on some stretches, horseback. The trail runs 240 miles over 14 counties. Get out and see the state in a whole new way.
Set Out on a Great Adventure Across Missouri
National Public Lands Day is coming right up, this Saturday, September 24, and all entry fees will be waived at national parks and other federal public lands, including national monuments, forests, recreation areas, wildlife refuges, historical sites, battlefields, recreation areas, and grasslands. The Ozark National Scenic Riverways is also on federal land.
Experienced adventurers show us around five of the state’s most extreme outdoor experiences.
Explore 250-million-year-old rock formations at The Pinnacles at Sturgeon, near Columbia
Bell Mountain offers a 12-mile loop with 1,683 feet of elevation change, respectable for the Midwest. Bell Mountain also offers something that you can’t get anywhere else in the country: the chance to see, in person, the result of more than one billion years of geologic time playing out.
You can get away without going far when you explore the trails of Columbia.
