ILLINOIS BEACH STATE PARK

Yesterday I had a plan. I needed to see a good customer in the Milwaukee area which in ideal traffic conditions is just about 90 minutes from home.  Afterwards, I planned on turning around and crossing the border back into Illinois and visiting Illinois Beach State Park. This state park is yet another place that in 23 years of living in Chicago, I have never seen. For a guy who gets around as much as I did, crisscrossing the countryside, visiting multiple states in the midwest, I didn't seem to get around that much. This beach park which is run by the state didn't seem to be kept up too much. This was part of the charm. The beaches were nearly deserted. Old concrete barriers set in place to break and/or minimize waves were tossed and tumbled and looked like they might have been set in place a century ago. I am used to seeing all kinds of things washed ashore, but on this beach, it was as if whole trees had somehow landed. The 'driftwood' on this beach was the real deal. Unlike a more commercialized beach, there is no one responsible for removing it. 

I enjoy hiking. I would never be able to hike the way I do without the MapMyWalk application that I use. This application marks each step I take and marks out the path I have chosen. It is the electronic version of dropping breadcrumbs so that I can find my way back to my starting point. On the hike yesterday I was just following the path of the beach and marinas heading north. Before I knew it, I had re-crossed the state line and I was back in Wisconsin. Naturally, I need to head south again to return to the beach. That explains this photo.

This hike started in Illinois. As I 'left' the state, I needed to re-enter it.

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This ten mile hike had me re-trace my steps for the first two miles and the last two miles. Again, I ask myself: When did a ten mile hike become my minimum daily requirement?

Your Food Diary For:

Thursday, August 11, 2016

BREAKFAST	Calories kcal	Carbs g	Fat g	Protein g	Sodium mg	Sugar g
Omelette - 3-egg Omelette With Cheese	425	0	21	28	650	2
Generic - 4 Sausage Links	250	3	22	10	612	0
Maltomeal - Honey Nut Scooters, 2 cup	240	48	3	6	420	18
	915	51	46	44	1,682	20
L U N C H
Sushi - Shrimp Tempura Roll	200	2	1	0	25	0
Tomato and Mozzarella	200	3	17	8	121	2
SPINACH SALAD	200	0	0	0	0	0
	600	5	18	8	146	2
D I N N E R
Read - 3 Bean Salad	300	65	0	5	1,500	40
	300	65	0	5	1,500	40
S N A C K S
Chocolate Peanut Butter Nutrition Bar	210	24	7	14	270	15
DARK COCOA MELTING WAFERS	300	33	18	4	61	29
UNSWEETENED BANANA CHIPS	200	19	12	2	6	1
	710	76	37	20	337	45
Totals	2,525	197	101	77	3,665	107
Your Daily Goal	3,417	427	114	171	2,300	128
Remaining	892	230	13	94	-1,365	21
	Calories kcal	Carbs g	Fat g	Protein g	Sodium mg	Sugar g
	*You've earned 1,487 extra calories from exercise today

If every day were like today...   You'd weigh 203.9 lbs in 5 weeks     

Your Exercise Diary for:

Thursday, August 11, 2016

Cardiovascular	Minutes	Calories Burned
Walking	174	1,487
Add Exercise Quick Tools
Daily Total / Goal	174 / 30	1,487 / 590
Weekly Total / Goal	907 / 210	9,121 / 4,130

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Illinois Beach State Park - stretching 6.5 miles along the sandy shore of Lake Michigan in northern Illinois - offers a full range of recreation opportunities at one of the most unique and beautiful natural settings in America. 

Illinois Beach is the only remaining beach ridge shoreline left in the state, with dunes and swales, sprawling marshes, forests of oak and vast arrays of animal life and vegetation.

This information was lifted from www.stateparks.com

HISTORY OF THE AREA

Long recognized for its complex geological structure, unique flora and spectacular beauty, the Lake Michigan dunes area originally was, in the 1700s, part of the "Three Fires" of the Algonquin Nation: the Potawatomi, Chippewa, and Ottawa. Prior to then the area had been occupied by the Miami.

In the late 1600s French explorers first visited the area as part of their survey of what was then known as the Northwest Territory. By the time Illinois became a state in 1818, the area was full of transient hunters and trappers. In 1836, a treaty was made with the local Native Americans, who were moved westward, and the area became part of Lake County.

During the Civil War what is now the northern unit of the park became Camp Logan, a Union prisoner of war camp. This installation went on to serve as an Army basic training center through World Wars I and II (when it provided ideal conditions for practicing tank maneuvers), and, in the late 1940s, was turned over to the Illinois National Guard.

Preservation efforts were considered as early as 1888, when Robert Douglas, a Waukegan nurseryman, and Jens Jensen, a famous landscape architect, discussed making it a regional park. With industry advancing from the south, sand mining ravaging the dunes, and parts of the surrounding countryside succumbing to pasture and homesteads, legislative efforts to save the area finally began in the 1920s.

In 1948, the state finally acquired the first parcels of what is now Illinois Beach State Park. In 1950, the Illinois Dunes Preservation Society was established to protect the natural qualities of the area, and through its efforts and the efforts of the Department of Conservation the area south of Beach Road was dedicated in 1964 as the first Illinois nature preserve. The northern unit, from the Commonwealth Edison power plant to the Wisconsin border, was acquired between 1971 and 1982.

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