Shawnee Hills

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The Shawnee Hills are a region within the larger Interior Low Plateaus physiographic province located in southern Illinois, southern Indiana, and western Kentucky.^[1] In Illinois it rests mainly in an east–west arc roughly following the outline of the southern end of the Illinois Basin. Whereas Mississippian and Pennsylvanian Age rock layers are deep beneath the soil surface in central Illinois, these strata pierce the surface in southern Illinois. The Shawnee Hills are surface expressions of the more weather-resistant limestone and sandstone layers. This formation is due in part to the last glaciation of the Ice Age (which tended to grind down hills and bury them under soil) not reaching this far south.

The Shawnee Hills can be seen faintly from as far north as Vergennes. The westernmost portion of the hills rise south of Murphysboro and continue southward to Olive Branch. Large plains used for farmland separate the hills from the Mississippi River along Illinois Route 3, especially near the towns of Wolf Lake, Grand Tower and Ware. The Big Muddy River cuts through the hills south of Kinkaid Lake, making rocky cliffs that can be viewed by boat-ride down the river.

• Shawnee National Forest
• Dixon Springs State Park
• Cave-in-Rock State Park
• Trail of Tears State Forest

37°30′N 88°40′W / 37.500°N 88.667°W / 37.500; -88.667