Kim Williams Trail- March 1, 2026

Participants: Steve Schombel, David & Julie Kahl

I like to occasionally do some of the trails closer to home, to remain familiar with the scenery and environmental changes with them.  In a normal year, this trail at the north base of Mt. Sentinel, would be crunchy ice, but after a month of way above normal temperatures the only ice we really saw was the spring in the cliff face about 1/2 mile/0.8k up. We parked by the Van Buren St. Bridge and set out on the old Milwaukee Road railroad bed (1907), that still sports some of the RR paraphernalia. At first it runs along the river, with the Jacob Island Dog Park across a channel. Lots of people with their dogs over there. It’s always nice to see dogs having so much fun. For the first mile/1.6k, the trail was in the shade of Mt. Sentinel, while the river was sun lit. It was noticeably colder than other parts of the trail. Ever the fly-fisherman, Steve was checking out the river for its mud load. It seemed a bit muddy, but it was hard to tell with the angle of the sunlight. Not too far into the canyon, some river flats of various widths start to move us back away from the, still, clearly visible river. We saw a few homeless camps in the brush. At about 1 1/4 miles/2k the Fire Fighter’s Trail comes down from the saddle between Mt. Sentinel and University Mt. Given the steepness of the canyon walls, it would seem to be a daunting climb, but it’s not too bad, as it traces some flatter areas higher up in the canyon. We heard some people up on the trail talking. Now, we had some sun shine and it was warmer. We had been kinda looking for buttercups, people had been reporting seeing them in other places, but we saw none. We went 2 1/2 miles /2.02k up and turned back, 5 miles/8.05k, was a good day for the first hiking foray of the year, for us old coggers. Now, the river was in the shadow of  Mt Sentinel and had changed color. We noticed that one of the housing projects across the river had fireplaces in each unit. It also had a park on the river bank with people taking advantage of the beautiful afternoon. This trail is well used, but was never crowded. People on bikes, people with kids and dogs, and as we were getting back towards the trail head, two guys were setting up a top rope to climb an over hanging section of the cliffs. Two guys were at the upstream point of the dog park fishing in the side channel. A big white dog was swimming in the river. A nice Sunday afternoon stroll to reminds us why it is we live here. Julie Kahl