newman trail sunrise

Newman Trail has its trailhead in the town of Valmeyer Illinois. Near the parking lot of St. John's UCC. The first time you look for it, blink and you miss it. Part of a three trail system in the Salt Lick Point Nature Preserve, you would have to agree that Newman is the least glamorous: No scenic vistas or mysterious glimpses of the old salt mines like Salt Lick Point Trail, no abandoned mine offices or huge boulders on talus fields like Johnson Trail.

But Newman Trail frequently criss-crosses a rock stream bed full of aquatic life and the calming sound of water over rock.

And it offers its own sort of scenic vistas of rocky runoff gullies marching up steep sopes.

And it has its own mysteries on a more natural, elemental level.

Its terminus, where it intersects with Johnson and Salt Lick Point trails, is the rich flat farmland of Monroe County's Mississippi River bottoms.

If Newman Trail can be said to have one distinctive feature, it would be its dense cover of woodland which almost drowns out all reminder of civilisation and surrounds you with only the sound of crickets, frogs and songbirds. Peace and quiet.

A side note: To those few hikers who feel the need to make a deposit - candy wrappers, soda cans, water bottles and cigarette butts - this is nature. Set aside and preserved for your enjoyment and education. It is not your personal trash can. Please respect it.