Pics of Oil Creek State Park hiking.

 The trail just runs (mostly) above both sides of the river. It's pretty much a big loop from point A to B , cross and run it in reverse on the other side of the river. There are a couple of bridges on the river where you can cross besides the beginning and end points.

 There's one shelter area on each side of the river.  Those are the only areas you can legally camp so you kind of have to plan your hike around those.  You can reserve and pay for them ahead of time online.

 You can day hike it in sections pretty easily if you have two vehicles if you want.

The map is deceiving when it comes to elevation changes. While it looks like mostly ridge top hiking, the trail will go up to the ridge, maybe follow it for a while then drop almost to the river, then back up again in many places.

I'm guessing private land had something to do with how the trail was laid out.


Forgot to add a word of caution if you're going there in the winter.  The road from Wolfkiel Shelter down to the river and back up the other side of the valley isn't plowed during the winter. (Miller Farm, I think).  It's usually plowed back to the last house for the school bus and mail and kind of plowed back to the shelter parking lot (maybe).

Venture down into the valley in winter at your own risk even with a 4x4.

We drove down there once on the way out to day hike the bike trail a bit and got caught in an ice storm that rolled in on us. By the time we got back to the trucks it was a real bugger getting back up out of there.