Our home sits on a forty-three acre parcel of land named NEKTOSHA. The property is land-locked and only accessible by a small road about 1/4 mile long. Scenic trails crisscross the property which is home to about 3000 evergreen and deciduous trees, some of them 30 feet tall, and two large ponds. Since the property has been undisturbed for more than thirty years, wild-life abounds. The area provides rich vegetation and ample shelter for a large variety of birds and for raccoons, opossums, coyotes, skunks, foxes, and whitetail deer. The diversity of fish in the two ponds amazed us as much as the quacking of the large frogs we discovered at the edge of the two ponds.
Nektosha is located South of Route 60, North of Everrett Road, East of the Des Plaines River, and just West of Highway 94. It is part of the village of Mettawa in Lake County, Illinois. The village of Mettawa is only a mile wide and three miles long with a total area of approximately 14 square kilometers (or about 5.5 square miles). At the 2000 census, the village had 367 residents of whom 20 percent owned horses. Tall trees and large lots continue to line the few main roads of Mettawa.
When we purchased the property in 2006, we named it NEKTOSHA because the area was originally settled by Potawatomi Indians. Nektosha means “horse” in the Potawatomi language. We moved into our new home on September 5, 2010.