Introduction to
The Grand Illinois Trail
We had been riding area roads and bike paths for a while, when we discovered that we live only a block off of the Grand Illinois Trail and that our wanderings had covered most of the GIT between Lansing and Joliet. The 535 mile GIT caught our imagination, and the more we thought about it, the more exciting it sounded. All of a sudden we found ourselves planning a bike tour!
Our actual route is marked in green
Our Plan
We wanted to ride the entire trail in a continuous two or three week trip, but jobs and family commitments would not allow that much time off. We decided to ride the trail in a number of segments lasting from a few hours to a week. We planned to haul the bikes to some point along the trail, and ride however far time and energy would allow. Another car, either ours or one driven by a family member, would be at the endpoint to haul us and the bikes back to the starting point.
We planned to stay in motels and eat in restaurants rather than camp along the way.
We intended to start easy, with some short morning or afternoon trips, ramping up to overnights and multi-day rides. We though we could cover 40 to 50 miles per day fairly easily.
We wanted to ride the route clockwise, except for the segment from our home in Chicago Heights to Navy Pier on Chicago's lake front. That part would be counterclockwise, giving us continuous view of the Chicago skyline.
We wanted to complete the circuit within a year to get those Illinois DNR GIT Trail Blazer t-shirts, but we also wanted to allow time to smell the flowers, take side trips, and take in events near the route. We estimated that side trips would add about 120 miles to the tour.
Contact the Illinois DNR site. for a hard copy of the checkpoints, the LIB maps, and cue sheets.
An OpenLands Project site has online GIT maps and cue sheets for a counter clockwise trip.
In areas of heavy traffic or road construction, we may deviate slightly from the official GIT route.
Most of our trip reports have a satellite view of our actual route. Click on one of the satellite views to open a web page where you can zoom in on route details, pan along the route, or switch between the satellite and map views. Click the browser Back button to return to the trip report
Our Grand Illinois Trail Adventure
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