A to Z Trails: Download this freebie for an A to Z Bucket List of trails around St. Louis! There is also an empty copy in this download so you can create your own too. Happy exploring!
A to Z Trails Bucket List 2025
Top 12 Paved Trails!
There are so many great paved trails in and around St. Louis! The Great River Greenways trail system has over 135 miles (and counting). All of the paved trails in this article are one of these greenways! They run in St. Louis City, St. Louis County and St. Charles County.
Here are our favorite paved trails & where I park:
1.) Mississippi Greenway (Cliff Cave)
Address: 806 Cliff Cave Rd, St. Louis, MO 63129
I park in the lower parking lot by the pavilion. The trail goes along the Mississippi River for a little bit and then goes up the hill to Cliff Cave! There is also a bridge further on the trail that leads to a beautiful overlook.
2.) Mississippi Greenway (Jefferson Barracks)
Address: 490 Bagby Rd, St. Louis, MO 63125
I park by the Missouri Military Memorial and walk on the trail just behind it.
The trail crosses a bridge and parallels the Mississippi River until you walk behind the casino. We love to watch the barges here. This is also the closest I have ever been to an eagle!! It was on a tree branch right next to the greenway.
3.) Mississippi Greenway (Gateway Arch)
I like to park at the Stadium East Parking Garage at 200 S Broadway, St. Louis. It is a discounted rate of $10 for the first five hours.
There are 5 miles of paved trails on the Arch grounds. My favorite area is the Explorer’s Garden, which is North of the Arch! It is so peaceful here.
4.) Mississippi Greenway (Old Chain of Rocks Bridge)
I park on the Missouri side at the new Chain of Rocks Park.
Address: 10820 Riverview Dr, St. Louis, MO 63137
There are restrooms, a parking lot and more security added here with the renovation. I love walking this trail in the winter because of watching the bald eagles! The rocks below the bridge (where the term “Chain of Rocks” comes from) stun the fish as they swim by. This makes for a quick and easy meal for eagles!
5.) Meramec Greenway (Across from Simpson Lake)
Address: 1235 Marshall Rd, Valley Park, MO 63088
I park here across from Simpson Lake. The paved trail has river views along the way! It is worth it to cross the street and walk along Simpson Lake too! Simpson Lake has a flat, paved trail and a playground.
6.) Fee Fee Greenway (Creve Coeur Lake Park)
My favorite spot to park is at the Taco Bell shelter so I can walk by the Dripping Springs waterfall before walking around the lake.
Address: 13450 Marine Ave, St. Louis, MO 63146
7.) Meramec Greenway (Rock Hollow Trail)
I park in the parking lot at Ridge Meadows Elementary School. The trailhead is just south of the school! This paved trail also connects to Al Foster trail, another one of my favorites.
Address: 777 Ridge Rd, Ellisville, MO 63021
8.) Boschert Greenway (Near Fox Hill Park)
I park at Fox Hill Park (3400 Kister Dr, St Charles, MO 63301), we play at the renovated playground and then walk along the storybook walk on the greenway!
9.) Centennial Greenway (Shaw Park)
I usually park at the Treetop playground in the School District of Clayton’s parking lot.
Address: 2 Topton Way, Clayton, MO 63105
10.) Meramec Greenway (Lower Meramec Park)
I park at the trailhead at Lower Meramec Park (Holzers Pk Rd, St. Louis, MO 63128) and walk from there!
11.) Monarch Chesterfield Levee (Near River's Edge Park)
I park by The Factory’s parking lot and walk from there. The trail down the hill leads to River’s Edge park!
Address: 17125 N Outer 40 Rd, Chesterfield, MO 63005
12.) Deer Creek Greenway (Brentwood Park)
Address: 2924 Brazeau Ave, Brentwood, MO 63144
This new park and playground is awesome! We park at the playground’s parking lot and head on the trail.
Enjoy these great trails around St. Louis! Happy exploring!!
St. Louis Hikes Within One Hour
Looking for a great hike within just one hour of St. Louis? These St. Louis Hikes are both fun and kid-friendly. The trails range in terrain and are all great to explore. So grab those hiking shoes and head to one of these trails!
St. Louis Hikes
Castlewood State Park
Looking for the best vistas over the Meramec River? This place is it. Lone Wolf Trail starts with a steep climb up to several beautiful viewpoints over the river. We hiked switchbacks down to a creek before heading back to the parking lot. It is a 1.7 mile unpaved trail. This trail runs parallel to River Scene trail and also a mountain biking trail, so stay to the right after the viewpoints for Lone Wolf. The creek here is shallow and is peaceful, unlike the other trails right along the Meramec River.
St. Francois State Park
Mooner’s Hollow is by far my favorite trail here. A moderate 3 mile loop that has a highlight of walking over a creek and small waterfall at 1.5 miles.
We have spent hours in this creek in the summertime! The trail is unpaved and pretty hilly and we enjoyed the rock formations here.
It does have a fair amount of poison ivy in the summer along the creek (similar to Lewis & Clark trail). Swimming Deer trail (also located at St. Francois) has the best bluebell trail in the area late March/early April. It is truly magical!
Lone Elk County Park
A St. Louis Safari? Yes please! 546 acres of wildlife and trails, featuring bison, elk, wild turkey and deer. This park is free to enter, but there is a cup of donations by the entrance. When it is too cold or rainy to hike (or we just feel like going for a drive), we love to drive through this park to spy for elk and bison. If you arrive right at 8am, a lot of the wildlife will be on the road after the ranger has come through to feed them. My favorite area to spot elk is near the Ralph Foley shelter.
One of the most unique experiences is the Special Access Pass, where you follow the feed truck at 6:30am. It is $20/vehicle and such a unique experience!
Make sure to check out the World Bird Sanctuary next door too!
Cliff Cave County Park
Cliff Cave is located on 525 acres along the Mississippi RIver and named after the cave located on site. The trails are wide, paved and part of the Mississippi Greenway (perfect for bikes and strollers). There are 10 miles of paved trails here!!
To find the cave, we park at the Lower parking lot (all the way at the end of the Cliff Cave road at the Riverside shelter). Walk to the lower trailhead to the train tracks, and then continue on the path to the left after the tracks and up the gradual hill. The cave is .5 miles up on this path! We parked the stroller and followed the short (unpaved) path to the cave. While we couldn’t enter the cave, we had fun looking inside and it was neat to see the water flowing from it.
Rockwoods Reservation
Located in Wildwood, this area was mined for limestone 150 years ago. The Trail Among the Trees trail is my favorite here. It is a 1.9 mile loop, but there is a paved area about .3 miles to a pretty lookout. This trail is partially paved, and the first part is stroller-friendly (doing the trail counter-clockwise). You will have to walk on the sidewalk along the road before arriving at the trailhead. Phone service can be a little spotty here and the visitor’s center is now permanently closed, but portable restrooms are located by the south trailhead.
St. Louis has some great gems among state parks and county parks. Have a blast exploring this beautiful area!
St. Louis Bucket List Hikes
There are so many incredible hikes in the world, and it may be surprising to learn that quite a few of them are right here in St. Louis, Missouri! This list has what I would consider “bucket list” worthy and they are all within 90 minutes of St. Louis. They range in ability levels, length and terrain.
We have hiked all of these with our young children and I would consider these all kid-friendly (Taum Sauk is a more moderate hike, but still doable with kids).
St. Louis Bucket List Hikes
Pickle Springs Natural Area
This is an outstanding 1.9 mile unpaved loop in Sainte Genevieve. There are waterfalls, shallow caves and bluff overlooks. The trail is mostly shaded with some steep inclines. Between the vistas and box canyons, this has a little bit of everything. I call this one the perfect family hike because it has so many fun things to climb, and has creeks and views too! Pickle Creek may be flowing in some spots and it is more rain-dependent. The layered sandstone dates back to 500 million years old, and this Natural Area is a National Natural Landmark!
Hughes Mountain
Have you seen Missouri’s geological wonder, known as Devil’s Honeycomb? Located in Irondale, this is a 1.7 mile out-and-back trail with 387 ft elevation gain. The trail begins going through the woods and glades, and ending on the top of the area’s highest point. At the top, there are polygonal columns of rhyolite that were once liquefied by volcanoes associated with St. Francois Mountains. My kids feel so empowered each time we do this hike, because you actually climb to the top of a mountain! We climbed to the top and enjoyed a nice picnic lunch before hiking back down.
Note, there are no restrooms or garbage cans. A reminder to leave no trace.
Castor River Shut-ins
Missouri’s only known pink granite shut-ins and worth every minute to drive here! We enjoy primitive camping here so that we could see the sunset and sunrise with the pink granite glowing in the changing sunlight. This pink granite is from the Breadtray formation, an igneous formation dating 1.5 billion years old! There isn’t much of a trail here (that we could find), but we like to climb over all of the boulders and look for waterfalls. You can also swim here in the shut-ins too!
Elephant Rocks State Park
It’s not every day you can see 1.5 billion-year-old granite! This area is known for massive boulders. Located in Belleview, this state park has unbelievable views. There is a 1.0 mile paved Braille trail here, as well as lots of opportunities to climb the beautiful granite. We also like to see the old engine house! Instead of hiking on the trail that goes on the perimeter of the boulders, we love to hike up the incline in the middle. The view from up here is breathtaking!
On our last visit, we had the place to ourselves by arriving at 8am. The parking lot was more packed by noon, but it was still pretty spread out on the boulders. The main restrooms are located by the parking lot, and a portable bathroom is across from the playground.
Taum Sauk Mtn (Mina Sauk Falls)
Not only is this the tallest spot in Missouri, but it is also the tallest natural waterfall in Missouri! This 3.1 miles unpaved trail is in Ironton. The trail starts out passing a plaque showing the highest elevation. The trail continues through winding wooden trails to the top of Mina Sauk Falls. It truly is an incredible sight to hike down to the base of the waterfall (with some scrambling). We like to eat lunch on the boulders here before hiking back up to the trail. The trail then goes along a stream and through the forest back to the parking lot!
Hawn is a gorgeous park that follows Pickle Creek. We like to hike the Pickle Creek trail until it dead ends at .7 miles. Then, we crossed the creek and hiked on Whispering Pines to continue the loop back to the parking lot. It was almost a 4 mile hike for us. It would normally be 3 miles, but we picked up an extra hour from hopping on rocks along the creek. The Pickle creek trail follows right along Pickle Creek and the Whispering Pines trail leads higher up the hillside with a neat view looking down at the creek.
Johnson Shut-ins State Park
In Lesterville, this 2.4 miles paved/unpaved Shut-ins trail has beautiful views. The first .3 miles of this trail are wheelchair accessible and lead to an observation platform. The shut-ins and gorgeous teal water are amazing. From here, there are stairs leading further up the trail. I love the boardwalk through the forest here! The trail continues along the creek and offers views of unique rock formations. The rocks can be slippery and sharp in the shut-ins, but sure are the best to swim in the summertime. Note that this trail is not dog-friendly. We enjoy staying in the camper cabins here (right next to the campground).
We are so lucky to have such amazing hikes here in Missouri. I’d love to hear about your adventures! Happy exploring!