This is a beautiful forest preserve with lots of different elevation. The hills are great for different types of activities to get your body moving. The paths are paved and well marked. The scenery at any type of year is also beautiful. Positives: Beautiful scenery; plenty of areas to park; bathrooms available but closed due to COVID; around busy streets so you are not alone in the middle of nowhere, busy; near a hospital Negatives: It crosses a lot of streets, I know that it's not easy building bridges over every street, but it does add concern for safety; not as many spots with benches to take a seat (not a big deal); part of the path runs along a busy street, which may be a bit dangerous for some areas It's a very pretty area and I enjoyed the path. read more

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The good: -Easily accessible. Simply park your car by the equestrian parking and the trail starts right there. I'm sure there are other easy entries as well -Nice long trails for the good workout/run -Decent for biking -Good markers guiding you along the trail The bad: -Most of it is out in the open. Doesn't have that enclosed forest boulevard feel -Again, since it's open, it gets unbearable to walk after 11 due to the sun and heat -Wild grass growth all over the main trail path -Markers have no distance mentioned on them. That's just sad now.. -Lot of fake white stone gravel everywhere. Just why.. I've been to some good unpaved hikes in NC and none of them have this Decent trail overall but you're better off trying to find some other place. I need that nice cool natural forest feel, like the NC trails. If you know of any such place, let me know!! read more

Poplar Creek Forest Preserve - Rare to see this kind of tree path. It's mostly sort of barren - Hiking Near Me - Hoffman Estates, Illinois

This is one of those places where you just kind of have to say, "it's all relative." This isn't California. There's no ocean and we have sh*tty weather most of the year. In fact, last week this place was pretty much all swampland and flood/sewage overflow. There's no mountains to be seen and the closest you'd get to any elevation would be an old, covered landfill hill with methane pipes every few yards. Because of the season, the trees and foliage are pretty barren and ugly. I actually saw exponentially more cigarette butts littering the small area of land where we played frisbee than trees when we drove the entire perimeter of the park. Truly sad. There are trails for hiking and biking, which is great since I just invested in a bike and am currently re-learning how to ride it, but you have to cross some pretty major and high-traffic streets to get from one part of the preserve to the other, so you have to be extra mindful of safety and the notoriously crazy Schaumburg-area drivers. On our last visit we just wanted to get outside and throw a frisbee for a while. They had enough wide open spaces to do that and there were several areas where you could park (unlike Paul Douglas Preserve) so that was nice, but lush and green it certainly was not. It was bumpy and rather littered with many reminders that you're only a few yards from strip malls and traffic and "civilization". We didn't see many people here, just a single biking family, a couple who nearly got creamed by traffic trying to cross the street to the other half of the preserve on their bikes, a woman with a lawn chair in front of her parked truck with the hood popped and several cars that pulled into the lot to throw away old Corona and Coors Light boxes in the forest preserve's garbage cans. Definitely not the nature-immersion we'd been looking for, but I guess it's better than winter when it's hard to get out and do much of anything comfortably here, and it's definitely better than nothing. Hoping this place is a bit more scenic come the official warmer temps and summertime. read more

Poplar Creek Forest Preserve - Big open spaces for frisbee. - Hiking Near Me - Hoffman Estates, Illinois

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Well, this is a suburban vs. urban nature retreat, but still part of the Cook County Forest Preserve system. I joined an organized hiking group here one Sunday for a hike. Except for being criss-crossed by big suburban roads with considerable traffic, this is a great place to hike, with a varied landscape, a pond in one area, picnic spots and some beautiful vistas. Once inside, you forget the surrounding busy-ness. The hike we took was around 2 hours and we must have covered a good 7-8 miles in the Preserve. And there are various starting points and signs to guide you. If you do get lost, you'r only going to end up in a well-populated suburban neighborhood. So after a day of mad shopping at Woodfield Mall or that great Indie Swedish Temple of IKEA, and someone tells you to "take a hike", you can just head west on Golf Road and do that here. read more

Poplar Creek Forest Preserve - Could Oz be just over that hill? - Hiking Near Me - Hoffman Estates, Illinois

I've driven up Rt59 for years and noticed a trail with a small, old cement bridge with two lion heads sculpted in. It always sparked my curiosity and I finally put two wheels to path here this week. The paved exterior bike trail here is a tad over 9 miles long, in one large circular loop. The trail is well marked and well taken care of. Sites along the path range from lakes, prairie, wide open spaces and sheltered wooded areas. Several points of parking can be found on multiple sides of the parks acreage with the largest being on Rt 59, near the western most point of the paved path. I especially enjoyed the hilly spots found in multiple portions of the trail. As for the sculpted lions, well I came across those as I was finishing the outer trail. There was a sign that probably advised about their history, but I was on a roll and didn't stop to read it. Did manage to snap of shot of it though. Happy trails. read more

Poplar Creek Forest Preserve - Hiking Near Me - Hoffman Estates, Illinois

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BEWARE OF TICKS! I mean lots and lots of ticks! I know that all wooded areas have ticks, but between two of us, we had to remove 10 ticks after our hour walk. There are a few different trails that you can take here, and some are better well kept than others. Today we parked at the Equestrian Parking lot on Schaumburg Rd, and took the yellow trail, which is not very well maintained at several spots throughout the almost 4 mile course. There were many areas where the grass was much too tall and I'm certain that had a lot to do with the amount of ticks that hitched a ride on us. Loving the outdoors, I do what I can to repel bugs, but I will add finding better maintained trails to that list. I've spent 30 minutes searching for any more, but I still have that creepy crawly feeling all over. read more

Huge thanks to Teddy Roosevelt for understanding the importance of setting aside land for nature preserves. I mean, have you seen the strip malls nearby on Barrington road? The Poplar Creek forest preserve is a sweet haven from the surrounding suburban sprawl. The paved trail is actually a 9 mile loop, complete with a pretty intense hill in the middle. I've seen deer, snakes, coyotes, hawks, red winged black birds, finches, praying mantises and butterflies galore. You will also come across other human beings, but it's not like Busse woods where there are traffic jams on the path. If it weren't for the handful of mildly dangerous street crossings, I'd give it 5 stars. read more

About 45 mins. from downtown Chicago - an easy drive to a great hilly trail for biking or hiking. Next to Waterfall Glen - this is my favorite trail. read more

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I would have given this a 4 star because of the highways interrupting it however the unbelievable amount of wildlife you see here made it a seven star trip. Most of the reviews discuss the paved trail. I did just under 8 miles on the unpaved trails and was very pleasantly surprised. There were turtles and snakes sunbathing in the path, an eagle over head along with other assorted birds. Dragonflies and butterflies danced all around pop-up wildflower patches and deer wandered about. There were more bodies of water than listed on the map and it was unforgettable. About 2-3 miles of it are gravel so wear sturdy supportive shoes and enjoy! read more

Used to live on 9 acres south of Rt 58. Rode my horse on the north side in the fields and woods. Stopped to pick apples off the many trees. It was a quiet, stable- filled neighborhood with some great families.. That was in 1969-1972. Wood field Mall was the closest shopping. How things have changed , but I'm glad it is there still for people to get some sense of peace and quiet. read more