BADLANDS OFF ROAD PARK, Attica, Indiana

This Off Road Park has 700+ acres and was opened in 1995. The area is a dense network of about 300 miles of trails criss-crossing throughout the park. Troy, the owner, also runs an offroad store and shop on this property where he builds heavy duty rockcrawlers. He can also help you in case you break something on the trail. There is a $15 fee for one day, $20 for two days (prices may change). The park is open 363 days a year, only closed for Christmas and Thanksgiving.
Various events are also hosted here, like the upcoming rock crawling championship in July 26, 27.

To reach the park, we drive south on State Highway 41 from Chicago to Attica and take a right at the first cross light. We find the park easily on our right just outside the town (there is also a sign). We arrive at the office/store/shop, chat a little with Troy, and soon we are on our way to explore the park on our own.
The Park features large sand dunes, sand cliffs, woods, mud, a creek and an old quarry - plenty of fun for everyone (see map). Trucks are allowed on all trails, although some spurs might be too tight and are used more by ATVs and dirt bikes. The quarry offers some exciting rock crawling and no bikes or ATVs are allowed in this area.
We cruise through the sand dune area and drop down a steep, narrow passageway into the dense woods and to the creek that flows slowly along the bottom of this small valley. The lush trees with their fresh, bright green leaves create a maze easily passable by bikes and ATVs but it is a challenge to find the right line to get a truck through. We make our way over the muddy terrain and through the creek until we find the dirt road which leads to the quarry. We spend some time in the flat portion checking out the various trails and obstacles before we attempt the first one. This area is mainly designed for heavy-duty rock crawling with intensively modified rigs but we find some sections we attempt with our vehicle.
As you can see on the pictures, we lost quite some lift on the back of the truck. The almost 20,000 miles accumulated over the last three months with that much weight made the leaf springs sag drastically and we are almost back to stock height. This, of course, limits our offroad ability but we still accept the challenge to try out some of the obstacles. After playing around for a bit (and, fortunately, without breaking anything) we explore the northern end of the park. Here are the sand cliffs and we also venture to check out the mud holes in the forest but (we've learned...) do not attempt to go into deep pits.
Finally, we return to the office and check out the shop and the rigs that Troy builds.

Overall, Badlands Off Road Park is a very nice example of a privately owned OHV area which appeares to be larger than it actually is because of the network of trails and the countless variations of trail combinations.
And if you can't wait to explore this park by yourself but don't have the proper vehicle, just ask Troy to build one for you...

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Directions:
From Chicago go south on State Route 41 into Attica, make a right at the first cross light, straight through the 4-way stop sign, half a mile on the right.