Riding Indiana's Versallies State Park

Published on this site: December 3rd, 2006 - See more articles from this month

Versailles State Park is the second largest state park in Indiana with 5988 acres of property. It is quite scenic and the terrain varies from old overgrown fields and flat woods to some steep hills and hollows.

For horseback riders day riding only is available at this time but we are hopeful that overnight camping for horsemen will happen in the future. The state has run a 6 inch water line to the proposed camp location and this camp is in the master plan.

The Day Use area offers water, hitch rails, picnic tables and grills. Porta Johns are available during the normal riding season. The parking area has a solid gravel based surface and all the roads leading into the day use area are paved.

The 25 miles of trails are mostly shaded by hardwood trees offering some spectacular fall colors. The *A* trail 7.5 miles in length and *B* trail with 4 miles are the original trails. There are two crossings of the Fallen Timber Creek neither crossing is difficult unless there has been very heavy rain the night before.

Trails *X*, *Y* and *Z* are newer and some spots can be a little muddy during wet weather. The park is working on hardening these areas. The *X* trail of 6 miles does cross under US 50 thru a large tunnel that has a small stream running thru on one side. The tunnel is large enough that horses will pass through it with out trouble. The *Y* trail is a loop off the Z trail and of short mileage.

Versailles also has a 230 acre lake good for fishing, a large swimming pool and good size family campground. None of these areas are accessible from the horse trails. There is also a 10 mile mountain bike trail but in a completely different area from the horse trails.

Versailles State is located on US route 50 one mile east of the town of Versailles with the entrance on the north side of the highway. There are wide turn lanes into the park entrance allowing traffic from both directions easy access.



Ron McCoy - MailTo:[email protected] is a cowboy and legendary storyteller now living in Queen Creek, Arizona. Ron has been riding for more than 60 years and has never fallen off. See hundreds of horseback riding articles at http://horsebackridingarticles.com