Obed Wild and Scenic River Trail

Obed Wild and Scenic River Trail…..7.1 Miles….Difficult
Day two:
Obed Wild and Scenic River Trail…..7.1 Miles….Difficult
Total Miles……20 Miles


The Obed trail is rated as extremely difficult 14.2 mile trail. It does have some difficult sections, but over all it is a good hiking trail with beautiful sights. We started hiking from the Nemo Trailhead and made it to an unnamed creek between Omigod and Obed overlooks where we stayed the night. There is camping at the Nemo Trailhead if you wanted to get an early start the next day. We got on the trail around 10am my time which was after we stopped at the visitor center in Wartburg.

The trail starts following the Emory River and then follows the Obed River. You do not hike along the river, but rather along the bluff next to the river. So you start out going up hill. There are beautiful rock bluffs and some old mining areas. We enjoyed lunch right on the trail.

The first going down to the river is if you visit Alley Ford campsite about two miles in. After Alley Ford campsite, you really need to pay attention to the blazes as they are now few and far between and you can get off the trail as we did on a regular basis. You know the old Outcast short cuts.

You get some tricky climbing and descending parts of the trail on the way to Breakaway Bluff. Breakaway Bluff is a beautiful overlook of the Obed River. After the overlook you are hiking a lot of old roadbed and once again you must keep a look out for the markers. Yes, a few more shortcuts were taken. There are a lot of down trees along the roadbed, which you either climb or skirt around. There were plenty of water crossings this time of year, so water source was not a problem.

As we were working our way through the brush down to unnamed creek, we came across a doe that was standing by the trail just watching us. We had time to enjoy looking at her and took a picture. She wasn’t but about twenty feet from us and stayed there until after we left. It was getting time to camp, so we crossed the creek and set up camp.

It was a wonderful evening of enjoying the fire and company while watching the stars and very bright moon. You didn’t even need a light to walk around. We even had an owl talk to us.

The next morning we slept in and enjoyed camp before heading back out. We thought about hiking to the end of the trail, but decided to catch the other 7.1 miles on another trip. We took a couple more of those Outcast shortcuts on the way out. No telling how many miles we really hiked.

On the way out, we were blessed with being able to see three red tail hawks flying out over the river. We got to see squirrels, chipmunks, and woodpeckers. We hiked down to the Alley Ford campsite for lunch and enjoyed the beautiful afternoon.

After we got off the trail and had a root beer float in Wartburg, we drove to the Lilly Bluff Overlook and hiked the .3-mile trail to the overlook. It is a very nice park and they built benches and a handicap walkway at the overlook.

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