High Peaks Trail

Dogs Leashed

Features Birding · Fishing · Lake · Swimming · Wildflowers · Wildlife

This hike takes you up and down over a rolling terrain composed for moraines deposited by massive glaciers at the end of the last Ice Age. It crosses or passes various habitats, including forest, prairie, marsh, and lake before ascending to the highest point in this state park. From there you have an expansive view out over the rolling hills that sit on the crossroads between the prairie land ecosystem to the west and the central hardwood forests to the east. On a clear day it's an amazing view.

This route starts at the parking lot at the primitive group camp (look for the blue Hiking Club sign). From there, it goes over a ridge, around the southeast end of Signalness (Mountain) Lake on a boardwalk, and up to the Oakridge Campground. This will take you through Trail Intersections B, C, and D.

From the campground, the trail (now the High Peak Trail) goes southeast toward the highest elevation in the park and consists of two connected loops. Stay to the right (south) at Intersection E and you'll follow the High Peak Trail across an area of rare native prairie and gently up into a hardwood forest at Intersection F. Stay to the right here and continue up to Intersection G. Again stay to the right to continue on to the high point at 1,352 feet.

From the high point you look out over a series of rolling hills (the Leaf Hills) that are the terminal moraine of a massive glacier that retreated from here at the end of Wisconsin glaciation. The glaciers that formed these moraines were up to 1.2 miles thick.

From the summit, continue on the loop back to Intersection G and then F and, at F, go right (northeast) to drop down past the Oak backcountry campsite and a small unnamed lake and up to Intersection E. From here, follow the trail you came in on back to the parking lot at the trailhead.

Squirrels, deer, beaver, wood ducks, raccoons, pileated woodpeckers and occasionally coyotes can be seen. Migratory waterfowl can be seen in the lakes in the Spring and Fall.