Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area, Kentucky

Date	Distance	Time	Elevation Gain	Average Moving Time	Year to Date Miles
5/14/2025	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	156.1 miles

Parking: 

• n/a

Map:

• Gaia GPS

Directions:

• n/a

Leaving St. Louis, we chose Land Between the Lakes as our stop on our way to Tennessee. It's a big park and it looked really promising as we drove down the main road through the park. I had seen something about bison in the park, so when we saw the sign for the bison and elk prairie, we had to stop. Seeing bison is on my bucket list. This is an interesting place. You pay $5 to enter a fenced in area. No hiking is allowed in the fenced in area. You basically have to stay within 10 feet of your car, and inside your car if bison or elk are within 200 feet. You drive along a loop road passing by woods and prairie. They tell you the most likely time you'll see them, which is early in the morning, and then one hour later in the evening than we were there. We decided to go for it anyways. We did see a few elk and many turkeys, but no luck on the bison. So, they remain on my bucket list.

We continued on through the park and drove down a dirt forest service road to one of the two manmade lakes that surround the park. The road was in bad condition - so deeply rutted I almost backed up. We reached the lake, and I let Krumm out to run into the water. There was a lot of trash on the shore, some in the water, and a bunch at a campsite. Ugh. The water was muddy too. I threw one stick for him and put him back in the car. 

We drove to a boat launch area closer to the main road and parked. Well, that area had trash as well. I sat in our car, and Glen went for a hike. He said the first mile was paved and in full sun. Then he went onto an overgrown trail - Gaia showed it as a trail, but he said it was barely there. He then found 3 ticks crawling on himself in the car. And after getting undressed in the hotel, found 2 more attached ticks. Ewwwww. When we were first driving through this park, we had high hopes and thought it might be a place we'd visit again. Nope.