Starved Rock State Park is an Illinois state park located in Utica, Illinois, in rural LaSalle County, Illinois, about 75 miles (120 km) west-southwest of downtown Chicago. The park is 2,630 acres (10 km?) in size and includes 13 miles (21 km) of hiking trails, numerous waterfalls (ice falls in winter) and other landforms. The park contains 18 sandstone canyons carved over the last 12,000 years
. by a combination of surface water runoff and groundwater outflow. Starved Rock itself is a large eroded butte overlooking the Illinois River. French explorers built a fort called Fort St. Louis atop the rock in 1682 but had abandoned it by the early 1700s. Starved Rock was designated a U.S. National Historic Landmark in 1960.
