Marble Creek Ozark Trail Section Hike
A weekend getaway on the orphan section of the Ozark Trail
This weekend, I embarked on a little adventure into the wild Missouri wilderness on the beloved Ozark Trail. At this point, the OT and I are more than BFFs. We are at the period in our relationship where we have surpassed the honeymoon phase and have now entered the lover's quarrel stage. You see, the OT and I go way back. She is the trail that taught me how to backpack and showed me that every time I enter her territory, I am just a guest. A visitor, an observer, someone who is humbled by her existence each time we meet. She is to be respected, and if I don’t play by her rules, she lets me know. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been chewed up and spit out while walking through those woods. I learn something new each time I hike there and this trip was no exception.
Before this weekend, it had been about a year since I last stepped foot on the Ozark Trail, and the way we left things wasn’t exactly on the most cordial of terms. If I remember correctly, I had attempted to fastpack the 26-mile Berryman Trail during a massive heat wave (do not do this, seriously). Somewhere along the way, my water filter broke and I almost got heat stroke, so definitely not the best of times. For this trip, I wanted it to be fun and easygoing. I wanted to take my time and just enjoy the journey without the pressure of hiking the trail in a certain amount of time or pushing big milage days. Overall, I think I accomplished these intentions, but the trail still ended up forcing me past my comfort zone and I’ll dive into this a little bit later.
Trail Details
But first, here’s a run-down of the Marble Creek section. For those who don’t know, the Ozark Trail is still incomplete at the moment. It is currently over 300 miles long with 14 sections that are mostly linked together inside the Mark Twain National Forest. There are a few portions of the trail that are still floating alone on the Missouri map waiting to be connected to the other sections and they will stay that way unfortunately until the land is acquired to do so. The Marble Creek segment is one of these sections that sits all by itself in between the Taum Sauk and Wappapello sections. It is 9ish miles one way and travels from the Marble Creek campground to the Crane Lake trailhead. Most of it is just a nice walk in the woods with a few small glades before reaching Crane Lake which features a dam and a shut-in with boulders to play on.
Navigation and Gear
For this trip, the big three gear items I brought were my Nemo Hornet 1 tent, Marmot Nanowave 55 bag, and REI Flash 55 pack. My cookware consisted of an MSR pocket rocket with a small 4oz fuel canister and my Sea to Summit Alpha Cook Set. I also brought my awesome Big Agnes Insulated AXL Air Sleeping Pad as well. Miscellaneous necessities included a Sawyer Mini Filter, Sea to Summit Airlite Towel, and Black Diamond Spot 350 headlamp. Because the trail would be almost 20 miles round trip, I planned to only be out there for one night, so I didn’t have to bring a bunch of food. However looking back, I wish I had packed a few more snacks because I definitely got hungrier than I thought I would. Three of my favorite food items were the Patagonia Provision Mushroom Savory Grains, Aloha Protein bars, and Good Catch Plant-based tuna with oil and herbs. (I plan to make a post all about backpacking while vegan soon, so be on the lookout for that in the future!)
Getting to the trailhead only took an hour and 45 minutes from St. Louis. The drive to any part of the Ozark Trail is always really fun for me because the more rural you go in Missouri, the prettier and more intimate it gets. You can’t beat those rolling hills, lush countrysides, fields with horses and cows, and the occasional “Go Home Biden” sign (insert eye roll). In all honesty, the drive is not bad, but if you intend on making a trip out that way, I would download the route on Google maps ahead of time because cell service disappears about 20 minutes before you get to the Marble Creek Campground. Speaking of the campground, it was a neat little area and I definitely plan to go back and explore sometime! There are at least 15 or so sites that have access to running water, fire rings, pit toilets, and picnic tables. Marble Creek flows to the side of the area and is a spectacular swimming spot with its own shut-in. As far as navigation on the trail goes, I utilized the map of the Marble Creek section on All-Trails and never had any issues.
Day One
As soon as I pulled into the trailhead, I quickly changed into my Altra’s and started lathering all exposed skin with bug picaridin lotion and sunscreen because oh boy was I about to march into a sweltering, tick-infested hellhole. With my pack at its heaviest, I wasn’t super thrilled and felt like a turtle with all my belongings on my back. I remember looking at the trail ahead with my fogged-up glasses and just trying to think about how this was supposed to be fun and empowering. I was a girl, all alone, up against the untamed landscape before me and it felt super intimidating even though I’ve done this dozens of times before. “Bring it on,” I muttered and hiked on.
Very soon into the hike, it became evident that I was the first one on this trail that day because of the abundance of spiderwebs stretched from tree to tree. Some spots were better than others, but most of the time it felt like every two feet I was face to face with multiple tiny eight-eyed little monsters. I kind of felt bad because they were just minding their own business trying to help control insect populations. However, after a mile or two of stopping every five minutes to brush them off my body, my compassion turned into rage. I didn’t have trekking poles to swat them away as I walked, so I ended up carrying small tree branches and waving them around like I was casting a spell. Expelliarmus, stupefy, avada kedavra, I tried it all but they were useless against the relentless arachnids.
The trail leading up to Crane Lake was dense at times but was overall a fairly pleasant hike in the woods following a pine-laden single-track dirt path. During some parts, I would cross or walk along old forest service roads with two tire divots carved into the earth making the trail wider. This isn’t totally uncommon on the Ozark Trail and doesn’t bother me as these roads are rarely traveled. The OT in general doesn’t attract many anyway. In all my time spent on it, I could probably count on one hand the number of people I’ve run into. While out there, solitude is sometimes your best friend or your worst enemy. It’s definitely easy to get creeped out on a solo trip, but at the same time, I enjoy the silence.
As I got closer to Crane Lake, things got a little dicey. A half-mile section of trail was severally overgrown to the point where I was waist-deep in a sea of thick weeds that took a while to trudge through. Coupled with the spider epidemic and the oppressive 100-degree humidity, I was forced down to a two-mile hour pace most of the hike, but when I finally got there, it was all worth it. The lake was gorgeous. The water was half crystal blue with the other half covered in lily pads that morphed into marshland. I ended up setting camp towards the trailhead off a gravel road and took no time to soak the area in. By that point, my legs were dead and my body was beyond exhausted, so I quickly pitched my tent, filtered water, and cooked dinner. I ate next to the lake and watched deer poke around the wetland. Hawks flew high in the sky and frogs called out in the quiet. Every now and then the wind blew and shook the leaves on the trees. It was a nice place to be in the middle of a Midwest summer.
Not the best night’s sleep
As night fell, that’s when the woods started to teem with life…and when things started to get weird. I remember having a hard time falling asleep because my seed-tick-bitten ankles itched like crazy, but that wasn’t the only thing that kept me up. A pack of coyotes howled off and on and each time they did, I started to feel a little more on edge. I knew that the chances of a coyote attacking me were slim, although it was still chilling hearing them call out like that. Then around 12 am, two cars pulled into the trailhead and hung out for a while, which really freaked me out. I wasn’t really sure who it was and what they were doing there. I just hunkered down in my sleeping bag and tried to not draw attention even though I knew they could probably see my tent. As a woman, alone, in the middle of nowhere without cell service, you could see how my imagination went wild with all the different ways someone could take advantage of me.
Eventually, they pulled out of the trailhead and left. I was still pretty shaken up by the ordeal and decided to move my tent further into the woods just in case they came back. As I settled back into my bag, adrenaline was still pumping through me and I was wide awake. It didn’t help that the coyote pack kept howling at the moon during all of this, so every snap of a stick or crunch of dead leaves nearby only freaked me out even more. I ended up finally falling asleep after getting my pocket knife out and keeping two tree limbs near my tent just in case.
Day Two
I woke up intermittently throughout the night; it wasn’t until around 3 am when the woods started to quiet down and fall back asleep with me. The sun crept up into the sky around 6 am and by then I was up and shoving things back into my pack. It was a nice morning as I took my time cooking breakfast and breaking camp near the lake. My goal was to get back to my car by noon before the torturous heat really kicked in, so I began hiking relatively soon. In my original plan, I wanted to continue going around the lake on the Crane Lake Loop trail and then connect back to the OT. But after a wild, almost sleepless night I decided to just stick with the same way I came. The rest of the loop was mostly road walking anyway with little views of the lake, so I figured I’d come back some other time and day hike it. I did however take a side trail down to the dam shut-ins and had fun boulder hopping around the pools of water before heading back to the Marble Creek Campground.
The way back was about the same as the first day; tons of spiderwebs, a lot of sweating, stops to catch my breath and rethink all my life choices, the usual. Although I did pass a trail runner going the opposite direction which was a huge morale boost because that meant he had broken down all the webs for the rest of the hike. No more carrying sticks and casting spells! After that, I was able to pick up the pace and ended up finishing right when I thought I would. The feeling of finishing a backpack trip or section of the OT is unmatched. The best way to describe it is despite my mind running an endless thought loop of Burger King Impossible Whoppers and Taco Bell Black Bean Crunchwraps and my body feeling like someone snapped it in half, there’s still this ache to keep going. This longing for more almost stings as much as my feet do. I peeled my pack off my salt-speckled back and looked over my shoulder at the Ozark Trail blaze. “I’ll be back,” I whispered. This isn’t over.
Closing Thoughts
Before heading home, I treated myself to a dip in the Marble Creek shut-in while reflecting on the past 24 hours. Overall, I thought it was a great trip. The only thing I regret is not completing this section sooner. This little orphan of the OT is probably one of my favorite segments so far. With the cute rock formations, bubbly creeks, and secluded lake, this part of the trail captures a snack-sized taste of what it is like to hike in the Missouri Ozarks. The summer heat kicked my ass though and if I come back to explore Marble Creek again (I totally will) then I’d like to see what it’s like in fall or winter. Oh, and I would definitely bring a machete for the spiderwebs as well.
Hope you enjoyed this trip report!
Be sure to like or subscribe to show your appreciation and leave a comment if you have any suggestions for future posts!
See you out on the trail!