Hayes Canyon Campground

Eddysville, Illinois - Shawnee National Forest

We are in Illinois, so we are officially out of the South. It must be so because I ordered some sweet tea and hush puppies at a local diner and was rather disappointed. This is a rather large campground.

The horses have uncovered smallish corrals, but they prefer these over the box stalls because they can see all around themselves.

We had full hook-up and the back-in campsite was pretty nice. We had minimal cell service and the internet came and went. There is WIFI at the front office and you can sit on the porch and access the internet, etc.

There is a round pen so we were able to turn our horses out and let them stretch their legs a little.

We did two rides. On the first day, we did a Ride and Eat - riding to Shotgun Eddy’s - a local diner, located in Eddysville.

The food was decent and not too expensive.

They have high lines set up next to an outdoor pavilion, so you can sit and eat and watch your horses. They have a live band most Saturday nights.

The trails in the Shawnee National Forest are quite beautiful.

Ari and I both enjoyed riding the trails. The horses liked it as well because the trails were pretty easy and they didn’t have to work too hard.

There are easily a hundred miles worth of trails. We will be exploring different areas of the forest as we plan to visit two other campgrounds. There are a dozen or so horse campgrounds all about the area, so we can move from one campground to the next to explore the trails. I pared it down to three campgrounds. Our next campground will be the Double M.