Exploring the World with Pokémon Go: Wadsworth Prairie Nature Preserve
Since I was visiting family up in Illinois, I took the opportunity to visit Wadsworth Prairie Nature Preserve. This is the next part of the Des Plaines River Trail.
Mile Marker 4
The Wadsworth Prairie Nature Preserve is only safely viewable while hiking the Des Plaines River Trail. No need to have separate posts though so even though I titled this as a park post, I’ll be using my mile marker headers to break up the sections of this adventure.
Unlike the swamps down in Central Florida, the marshes in Northern Illinois are much more open and have much less tree growth covering everything. But don’t be fooled by these green spaces. This is still marshland and much of it is either water or ground only in the most literal sense. Make sure to stay on the trail if you choose to explore it.
The Des Plaines River has lots of marshland that feeds into it. And all along the way it gives way to beautiful scenery that is quite different than many adventures on this blog. Its a shame that I can’t visit Illinois more to check these places out.
4 Miles down on the Des Plaines River Trail. And there are plenty more to explore. After all this trail takes people all the way from the Wisconsin Illinois border to Chicago and even beyond.
Mile Marker 4.25
Wadsworth Prairie Nature Preserve continued to impress as I made my way down the trail. It was a beautiful day too. Not too hot and a wonderful lack of rain to damper everything. In Florida one can expect both at any time. Here in Illinois, you get a fair warning first.
Despite how this might look, I am not far from civilization at all in these photos. I could hear traffic from US Route 41 the entire journey. Instead, this area is a small preserve that showcases what this part of Illinois was like before most of it became suburbs of Chicago.
The Mile Markers are inconsistent on the Des Plaines River Trail so sometimes I find smaller ones between the large ones. For example, Mile Marker 4.25 is visible on the above pictures. No guarantee that I’ll find more though.
Mile Marker 4.5
Wadsworth Prairie Nature Preserve covers a large area of Wadsworth. For those who don’t know Wadsworth is a little town about 50 Miles from downtown Chicago. Its almost closer to Milwaukee Wisconsin despite technically being a suburb of Chicago.
This section was a bit less open than before. The marsh nature of this entire region was more clear. Obviously I was not going to wander off the trail here. Much less any of the areas
Mile Marker 4.5 ended up being marked on the trail too. I was almost done with this part of the adventure. But there is a whole lot more trail with many parks dotting it to go.
The final section of Wadsworth Prairie Nature Preserve too me much closer to US Route 41 and also towards Wadsworth Road itself. Given the matching names, it should be clear that this is the major local street. I do like that there are signs warning bikers and hikers that there will be an at grade crossing. Sometimes going across busy streets is dangerous. Even more so when the crossing might appear around a bend and hidden by trees.
The entire Des Plaines River Trail so far has been a fun adventure with very different environments from the hikes down in Florida. There are only a few more parts of this trail that I have seen before and then it will be all new sights for me and for those who read my posts.
Pokémon Go
Let’s take a look at how Wadsworth Prairie Nature Preserve measures up in Pokémon Go. Its been a while since I explored this trail. And the last time I was here, Pokémon Go was a little disappointing. Not this time though. Strangely almost as if the game was plotting something, the moment I moved past my last stopping point, the spawns and to a lesser degree the Pokestop frequency increased.
The spawn rate was great in fact. Lots of Pokémon to catch from the start of the hike until the end. If you stock up on plenty of items ahead of time, Wadsworth Prairie Nature Preserve is a pretty good spot to catch Pokémon. And while there are a few Pokestops and gyms, namely at the mile markers, its very possible to run out. Don’t let that take away from the experience though. This is a perfectly valid and high spawn spot to play Pokémon Go.
I hit best buddies with my last buddy, so now you all are gonna see Garchomp for a bit. Hope you all don’t mind a land shark Dragon. For more than a bit in fact.
Here I am at the end of this adventure. I am still missing a hat which will be a problem when I continue hiking in Florida. Better get another one soon. I might be able to check out a few more trail sections while in Illinois, but I am only here for a little while and came for a family wedding. I’ll have to devote some time here just for hiking.