The open spaces and vistas are what keep Judy Larson-Clements coming back to the Ice Age Trail.

She volunteers about three days a month to help maintain the trail, and since she first heard about it from a friend in 1990, she's hiked the entire route from Washington to Marquette counties.

So she knows what she's talking about when she recommends taking a walk on the Valley View segment of the trail just 12 miles from Madison.

"It 's neat how there 's an open tract of prairie right behind a subdivision, " said Larson-Clements, a 47-year-old dental hygienist from Madison, "It shows what you can do with open space. "

The Ice Age Trail winds over 1,000 miles from Interstate Park on Minnesota's border in the west to Potawatomi State Park in Door County in the east and features a glossary's worth of glacial land formations. Clusters of uniquely shaped hills like kames and drumlins dot the trail and stand in contrast to the dells and swales that ice sheets carved out.

The trail is one of eight National Scenic Trails in the country, along with more renowned and longer routes like the Appalachian and Pacific Crest Trails, and generally follows the outline of the last glacier to cover the state about 15,000 years ago.

More than 600 miles are for off-road hiking, a lot of which is footpaths through forests or prairies, with the remaining parts on roads that connect those more

bucolic segments. The very ambitious can even walk or run the complete trail, as hiker Jason Dorgan of Madison did in a breathtaking 23 days last year.

What many in the state may not realize is how close the trail is to them, especially for Madison residents. The Madison segments, often more rural than wilderness, are the surprisingly urban face of the Wisconsin Ice Age Trail.

Larson-Clements ' favored Valley View isn 't the only portion near Madison. The Table Bluff segment in Cross Plains and the Verona segment in Prairie Moraine County Park are less than a half-hour 's drive from the city.

A newly placed Madison segment that cuts through the University Ridge Golf Course just 10 miles from the Capitol is now open for hiking and will be fully completed by mid-summer with signs and markers.

But lately, additions to the trail 's off-road hiking segments have been getting more difficult to arrange. "Rising land costs is the biggest problem, " said Andrew Hanson, trailway director for the Ice Age Park and Trail Foundation said, citing the old adage "they 're not making any more of it " in reference to land the foundation has been trying to acquire from willing private landowners.

The foundation has completed the trail across public land, so now it has set its sights on acquiring easements (more permanent land-use agreements), receiving land donations or outright purchasing land that is on or near the trail from property owners.

"The future of the Ice Age Trail is in the hands of private landowners, " Hanson said.

Recently, the impact of construction near the trail has had to be considered when the American Transmission Company proposed a 345-kilovolt transmission line in western Dane county and a developer petitioned to remap farmland for a subdivision in the town of Cross Plains.

Though there have been and will be moments where the trail 's expansion and development butt heads, it has been consistently gaining ground, with the foundation citing a 44-mile increase in the past five years.

State and federal agencies have been doing their part as well. The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has spent $10.6 million since 1988 to acquire land for the trail.

On the federal level, the National Parks Service, as part of the National Park Centennial Initiative, is trying to increase awareness and tourism of the trail by constructing an educational interpretive center in the Devil 's Lake State Park by 2016.

For 50 years the nonprofit Ice Age Park and Trail Foundation has been the primary caretaker of the trail, relying largely on private donations and volunteer help, and has been adding more accessible routes and maintaining the glacial imprint that snaked its way through Wisconsin about 15,000 years ago.

The foundation was formed in 1958 and marked its history with its 50th Anniversary Celebration Kick-Off and Annual Membership Conference last month. Since its founding, it has worked with local, state and federal organizations at to preserve and maintain sections of the trail, and to expand it.

Mike Wollmer, executive director of the foundation, said the trail is important because of its proximity to many urban centers. "It 's a great recreational opportunity to so many people across the state, " said Wollment, who met his girlfriend on the trail. They enjoyed the view from the Table Bluff segment west of Cross Plains so much that they 've decided to get married there this July.

Larson-Clements, plans to finish walking the rest of the trail, remembers Wollmer and his girlfriend Barb.

"The very first time we met, " Larson-Clements said, "I told those two they were a good couple. "

ON THE INTERNET

Ice Age Park & Trail Foundation: www.iceagetrail.org

National Parks Web site: www.nps.gov/iatr

Wisconsin DNR: www.dnr.state.wi.us

Hiking tips: www.iceagetrail.org/ hikeplan.htm

Dane County IAPTF chapter: www.madison.com/ communities/iceage

Mobile Skills Crew (which does trail maintenance) www.iceagetrailmsc.org

MAP IT OUT

The Ice Age Trail Companion Guide 2008 includes a complete description of the entire 1,000-mile Ice Age Trail route. It includes trailheads, and dining and lodging information at communities near the trail.

While the Companion Guide contains written descriptions of every segment of the Ice Age Trail, it does not contain maps. For maps, see the Ice Age Trail Atlas.

The Ice Age Trail Atlas includes more than 100 color maps showing every mile of the route, the locations of parking areas, toilets, campgrounds, shelters, dispersed camping areas, topography and more. The Atlas also includes a gazetteer that describes many of the place names along the trail.

Unlike the spiral-bound 2005 edition, the new version of the Atlas comes in a three-ring binder format, so that updated maps can be added as new Ice Age Trail segments are constructed.

Both publications can be purchased online in the store section at www.iceagetrail.org.

Upcoming events

Today: Mother's Day Wildflower Hike by Dane County Chapter. Meet at 10 a.m. Take Cty D (Fish Hatchery Road) 15 miles south of the Beltline to Cty DD. Turn left and go .8 miles to the parking lot. For more info, contact Nancy Dorl at njdorl@wisc.edu or (608) 424-6774.

June 7: Twenty-one local volunteer chapters, including Dane County's, will welcome members of the public during the "Mammoth Walk," in which participants will collectively hike every mile of the trail in one day.

June 8: Triple Interpretive Hike (National Trails Day). 9 a.m. Hike Observatory Hill, a boyhood haunt of John Muir, which overlooks the remaining prairie at the base of the hill. This hike will be lead by Cathy Franks, who lives at the base of the hill.

For more information or to RSVP, contact Karen Wolenburg at 608-429-4169.