East Bluff Trail

Devil's Lake State Park is Wisconsin's most visited state park, and the East Bluff Trail scaling its dramatic quartzite bluffs is the signature hike of the entire state system. The bluffs rise 500 feet above a glacially dammed lake formed when the last ice sheet deposited terminal moraine material at both ends of an ancient river gorge, trapping Devil's Lake in a nearly perfect oval of still water. The East Bluff Trail begins at the north shore parking area and climbs immediately through a talus field of massive pink quartzite boulders, the ancient seabed of a shallow Precambrian sea that was buried, metamorphosed, and subsequently tilted to near-vertical by Penokean mountain-building. Named geological features along the route include the Devil's Doorway, a natural arch formed by differential erosion of the quartzite beds, and Balanced Rock, an enormous erratic perched at an improbable angle on the bluff rim. Views from the bluff top encompass the entire lake and its surrounding moraine landscape, with the Baraboo Hills extending in every direction as a sea of oak-hickory forest. The trail surface alternates between bedrock scrambling requiring hands and steel cables at the steepest sections and comfortable forest path on the bluff top. Fall color here peaks in early October.