I will be travelling to Chicago for business early September and I will have a 3 days break (Sept. 10 -> Sat - Sun - Mon) between two work sessions.
I am looking for options to spend the 3 days either hiking or riding with a rented motorcycle, sleeping in my hammock. Depending on the start point I could already get there on Friday evening. Need to get back to OHare on Tuesday morning, so Monday night should be at a place with showers
Basically the plan is to get to a starting point on Friday evening, which should be a location where I can camp. From there I could either make a round trip or use it as a base camp to return every night. I intend to carry my gear, even if I return to the same spot the following night. Camp grounds are not required to be commercial camping sites, any safe camp option, also "wild camping" if permitted is fine.
Hiking : the starting point should be reachable in abt 3 hours from the O'Hare airport using public transport since in this scenario I will not have my own vehicle. I can hike distances of abt 15 miles/day in mountainous terrain or abt 20 miles/day on easier flat trails. But I haven't had many opportunities to get out this year, so I should probably reduce each by 5 miles to be on the safe side and keep it enjoyable.
Motorcycling : usually I ride from dusk to dawn with some stops, so usually abt 8 hours of actual riding time per day. Again depending on the type of roads - preferably smaller scenic ways - this usually translates into 200-300 miles per day. If I chose the motorcycle option, I intend to get the bike on Friday afternoon, so a starting point reachable in 3-4 hours would be great.
Already done last year: southwest trails of the Hiawatha National Forest and the Indiana Dunes.
What would be on your list ?
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