Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park | CHICKAMAUGA HIKING TRAILS

Chickamauga Battlefield Trail Map (click to enlarge)

Chickamauga Battlefield Trail Map (click to enlarge)

Hiking is the only way to see many of the monuments at the Chickamauga Battlefield Unit of Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park. It’s actually quite fun to stumble upon one, some of them having artillery pieces alongside. You’ll find yourself surprised and thinking, “Hey! Somebody left a cannon in the middle of the woods!” While certainly not as exciting as finding a Mayan ruin or a ghost town, the discovery of monuments and artillery adds some interest to the hike.

The trail system at Chickamauga is a little different than a traditional trail system in which you can hike on a particular trail to get from one place or another. The system is made up of a mishmash of trails all designated by color: red, blue, green, orange, white, yellow, and beige. Only the Red Trail makes any definable path; the others appear as random segments throughout the park. Be sure to pick up a trail map at the Visitor Center if you want to make sense of it.

Hiking is allowed on all trails in the park. Horseback riding is allowed on the Red, Blue, and White Trails. Bike riding is not allowed on any trails, but you can ride your bike on any paved or unpaved roads in the park.

Instead of hiking a trail by color, the park has come up with five suggested hikes that move you across the battlefield along a number of different colored trail segments (of course, you can hike your own path as well). In essence, the trails become more like a road system. If you drive your car to visit a friend, more than likely you don’t get there on a single road—you take a number of roads. To get to another friend’s house, you might take some of the same roads, but also venture onto different ones. That’s sort of how hiking the Chickamauga battlefield works.

The park’s suggested hiking trails run from 5 miles to 14 miles in length and are based on a historical theme. Maps and information on each hike are available from the National Park Service (links to maps are at the bottom of this page). However, they are without commentary, instructions on how to navigate the tricky parts, and great photos, so be sure to check out National Park Planner’s Suggested Hike.

I estimate that if you hike each of the five Suggested National Park Service Hikes that you would cover about 80% of the trails in the park. However, the problem with hiking all of them is an extreme amount of overlap. For example, more than half the General Bragg Trail is covered by the Cannon Trail. To remedy this, I have come up with three hikes that cover 90% of the park trails but have the least amount of overlap. Two of the hikes are two of the park trails: the General Bragg Trail and the Confederate Line Trail. The third is a modified version of the Memorial Trail, Cannon Trail, and the Historical Trail, which I call the National Park Planner Hybrid Trail.

The General Bragg and Confederate Line Trails have no overlap at all, as they cover different sections of the park. If you hike these two trails plus the Hybrid Trail, while you won’t be covering every inch of every trail in the park, you will be hitting the majority of them. There are so many spurs and offshoot trails that you could be here a week.

Of course, if you are hiking only one trail, just pick one of the park trails and be done with it. I will describe in detail the General Bragg Trail, the Confederate Line Trail, and the Hybrid Trail.

NATIONAL PARK PLANNER’S SUGGESTED HIKES

General Bragg Trail (5 miles/3-4 hours)
Confederate Line Trail (6 miles/3-4 hours)
National Park Planner’s Hybrid Trail (7 miles/4 hours)

Hiking these three trails covers 90% of the park trails with the least amount of overlap

DOWNLOAD PDF TRAIL MAPS

General Bragg Trail (5 miles)
Cannon Trail (14 miles)
Confederate Line Trail (6 miles)
Memorial Trail Map (9 miles)
Historical Trail (11 miles )


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Last updated on July 2, 2024
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