A fantastic park is on the far South Side with some cool scenery including a beach. Calumet Park is…read moreone of my lesser appreciated favorites. It just about is as close as you can get to Indiana. Beach of course is the best part about here. The rest of the park has some gardens and hiking trails. Either in summer or winter it's a beautiful place for hanging. It has a few big parking lots. There's plentiful parking meaning it's usually easy to find somewhere. Beach is the most notable feature. This goes along a few miles. Certainly it isn't always pretty around here. There's some ugly old factories, including those across the lake in Gary, but besides that it's beautiful mostly. Be warned about the nuisances here, which include birds and bugs. It's especially bad in the summer. This park is most happening then and has features such as athletic facilities and other fun things.

Beautiful park! Plenty of stone walkways, views of the lake, and trees for a relaxing experience…read more The park is huge and plenty of open space and various amenities, and kiddie playgrounds too. We enjoyed walking the dog and the views

Underrated and beautiful. It's got a fantastic view of the city skyline and there's a whole…read moreindustrial vibe going on but I don't mind it. It's serene and if it wasn't so warm I'd go to it more often. It's good for a long walk but there's no trees along that walk so I'll be frequenting more in the fall va the summer.

Check out this incredible transformation of a quarry into a park in Bridgeport. In between it was a…read morelandfill. Palmisano Park has went through a lot of changes to be sure. A lot of nature of course. There's trails and an interpretive wetlands among the many things to come across while going through. Best to know about the transformation before going. It used to be the Stearns Quarry. The city purchased it in 2008, cleaned it up, and opened it the next year. Has lots of nature to see and more to do. There's more than a mile of paths, including recycled timber boardwalks, and walkways. At first this was the site of a coral reef if you can believe it. Limestone was formed, and there's been fossils discovered here that are now in the Field Museum. In the 1830s it became a quarry, and operated until 1970 when it became a landfill. There's a fishing pond that still has the old quarry walls. After opening this park there was cause for celebration. The community before this had a lack of green space. Have to go here if you like parks that have been restored from abandoned areas. It's quite impressive. There's all kinds of plants and wildlife.

What can I say about forest View that I haven't already tried to squeeze into every other review…read moreI've written? I moved here after looking for a place in Berwyn...only to have my real estate agent drive south of Pershing one day...and suddenly the lots were twice the size! Let's only look here I shouted. I found my house the next day. Forest View is pretty dang awesome. The previous owner of my house was the parks commissioner and it shows! The park on 46th street and Wenonah is lovely it has... -tennis courts -sand volley-ball -a running track -a playground -well manicured path -and more In the winter it even had a skating rink! The next best part? The Forest View Police Station faces the park! There will never be shenanigans in that park, that's for sure! Other notes about Forest View: -nice clean quiet neighborhood -free garbage and recycling pick-up -fabulous library -FV Police -FV Fire Dept. ...all this for 700 people, pretty impressive!

Nice place to walk your dog. I didn't see too many other people there. Most of the forest…read morepreserves can get pretty nasty but this one wasn't too bad. There's a pavilion that's pretty clean and not broken down.

Nice terrain - kind of hilly. 3 miles between 95th and 107th and back. You'll see occasional…read morehorse riders. I feel it's a good workout out in nature. There is a longer option where you make a left and keep making lefts, cross 95th heading north, passing a few ponds.

It is a cow path, not even gravel and rough. It goes thru areas that do not appear safe and no…read morerestrooms.

What's to say about the I&M Canal that hasn't been said already? Well, it's in my backyard and not…read moreyours, so I can just jog/bike/walk right over. Jealous much? You should be cuz this little strip of awesome isn't available everywhere. Look, I read the other reviews, and the super serious bikers knock it because it's flat. And well, it is. But that's perfect for the not-so-serious folks like myself who just want to go for a nice walk outside without worrying about rocks and mud in and on their shoes. We took Pixel and Fedora on the 5k leg on the east (south?) side the other night and they had a ball. Slept the whole next day because their short lil' legs were worn out. Admittedly, there's a bit of graffiti underneath the bridges, but you can't really blame that on the Forest Preserve. Look at some of the wildlife instead. I especially like to watch the turtles sunning themselves on the rocks on warm days. And if you take the northwest path, you won't see the graffiti at all. Yes, there's tons of trails in the area, but this one's mine and I kinda love it.

Nice small beach yet crowded because of the air show. Parking is plentiful and you can bring your…read morejet skis here. Lifeguards on duty and there are tables for eating along with benches scattered everywhere to take in the views.

One of the benefits of living in Whiting is having this beautiful park near…read more It's great for a walk any time of year. You can find some interesting fossils along the beach & I have a nice collection of beach glass too.

Midway Plaisance is another large park in Hyde Park, in and around the University of Chicago…read morecampus. The park connects Washington Park from the west to Jackson Park to the east. It's name comes from its origins as the midway for the 1893 World's Fair Columbian Exposition, as various attractions were laid out along the midway. It was designed by Frank Law Olmstead, the most famous landscape architect of the 18th century and really the originator of landscape architecture as a profession. This park was to be established somewhere in the late 1860s to 1870, but the Great Chicago Fire put a hold on those plans. When the World's Fair came to Chicago, Olmstead and bastion of Chicago architecture Daniel Burnham were given the task of making it a sumptuous event, and Midway Plaisance was a major part of that. Nowadays I find it actually to be a pretty boring park. Someone described it as a big median and it's kind of an apt description. On both sides of the park are UChicago buildings, and you can can sometimes find parking along the sides of the park. There's an skating rink here that's used for different kinds of skating throughout the year. Here's a history tidbit for you: The location of the rink is the precise location of the Ferris wheel, an invention for the Fair. There are various playing/practice fields for soccer and whatnot. You'll find some monuments throughout the park, as Chicago loves its monuments. There's a section called the Reader's Garden, with the Carl von Linne statue. It's not a destination park, but perhaps some of the little enclaves within the park are worth a visit if you're here anyway.

The pleasant Midway runs from Jackson Park to Washington Park, and gives Hyde Park much of its…read moreamazing green space. Designed by architects Olmstead and Taft in the late 1800, the Midway has hosted entertainment and sport since around the time of the Chicago Worlds Fair and it's storied White City. If you like the park, and are interested in learning about it and the surrounding Hyde Park area, I recommend a book titled 'Devil in the White City'.

Palos Preserves has a lot going on. You can fish; in fact, I saw a few people doing that. There…read morewere several people biking through the preserves (some casual, some much more hard core). Walking trails, which is what I was using with the group I was in. Of course, Camp Bullfrog is a major attraction at this site, situated on Bullfrog Lake; you can rent paces for camping anywhere from 2 or 3 days up to 10 days per month. And there's also picnic groves around the place too. There are a few port-a-potties, and there may be an actual restroom with flush toilets a bit southwest of Bullfrog Lake; I forgot to check. Nearby are Sagawau Nature Center and the Little Red Schoolhouse Nature Center, amongst other places. Palos is an International Dark Sky location, so the Forest Preserve District of Cook County sometimes has programs here. There's some hilliness here, and some of the areas I was in were not accessible--though it's possible the campsite is. You should contact them if you are in need of an accessible place to recreate.

Never in a million years would I have believed you if you told me that one of the best running…read moretrails in the USA was in IL. But that's exactly what I found at Palos Forest Preserves. I ignored the Yelp map directions, which drops you in the middle of the street, and instead followed that street until it became a dead end. I parked in the parking lot by the dead end and began my trail there. This ended up being about a 2-2 1/2 hour adventure, at about 16K steps (running half way). The trail has some nice markers to help keep you on the right track, but more would be even better because I ended up doing "eenie meenie minie moe" at several junction points and just hoped for the best. My favorite part about these trails were the inclines and natural obstacle courses. Watch out for the trees though. A couple of the roots reached out and grabbed my foot on more than one occasion, causing me to kiss the ground. I'm certain I heard some giggles coming from the treetops. Cheeky lil bastards. The views were breathtaking during my autumn visits. Very peaceful in many areas and not too crowded, unless you came on the weekend when the bikers take over. They treat it like it's their world, which is very annoying. If I lived in the area, I would definitely frequent these woods with my mountain bike. If running/hiking was fun, biking would be a blast! However, I would remember to share the trails with pedestrians.