Northwest Company Fur Post and St. Croix State Park

Today Noelle and I drove on down to the Hinkley/Pine City metro area to check out the Northwest Co Fur Post and (weather permitting) do a little hiking. The fur post was interesting. We checked out the inside exhibits and walked around the reconstructed fur post. We even got to skin a deer.
It was an interesting and stinky experience! We walked the trails there as well and donated a bit of blood to the local mosquitoes.

After the fur post we had lunch at Tobie's (a Minnesota tradition). We then took the deceptively long drive to St. Croix State Park to get in a quick walk before the impending rain started. A quick side trip took us to an interesting fire tower where the views were long and the winds were strong. Our hike was short due to the trail ending at a pool of water whose depth we were unable to determine. We retraced our steps to the car and swatted the mosquitoes as we walked.

Paddling the Bois Brule

Today Noelle and I went over into Wisconsin to the Brule River State Forest to paddle the Bois Brule River. We rented a canoe from the outfitter in town and drove to the Winneboujou Landing where the outfitter came to pick us up and drive us to the starting point of our river trip the Stones Bridge Landing.

Since it was a weekday, and not particularly sunny out, we knew it would be a good day for solitude on the river. Unfortunately, we got rained on. It rained pretty hard for about 15 minutes before the sun came out for a while and dried us out. Along the way we saw lots of interesting birds. We saw about 5 bald eagles, 30 common mergansers, some belted kingfishers, cedar waxwings, a great blue heron, pileated woodpeckers, and American robins. We also paddled past some interesting old cabins, including the Cedars, one of the summer White Houses of Calvin Coolidge. Interestingly, several other U.S. presidents have fished and paddled the Bois Brule including Dwight D. Eisenhower and U.S. Grant.

Besides the Cedars there were plenty of other neat looking cabins. Many of them were complete with elaborate boathouses with many canoes on their docks. It seems like a great spot for a vacation home. While I'm usually not really into seeing civilization while paddling, the rustic architecture and history of the cabins along the Bois Brule added to the ambiance of the paddle rather than detracted from it.

Superior Coast Hike

I pulled out the ol' Wisconsin Hiking Guide this morning looking for a hike close to home and the Superior Coast hike jumped out as a logical adventure. At around 10:15 I threw my day-pack into the car and headed into Superior. I made a quick stop at my old place of employment, the Challenge Center, for a visit. It was nice to see everyone and many of the people there seemed excited to see me. It made me feel good.

After the visit, I drove out of town and onto route 13 for a drive to my destination. Soon enough Becks Road was into view and I turned up the road and followed it to the beach. At the beach I first stopped to eat lunch and then followed the beach east hugging the shore. There were few footprints in the sand, at least human footprints. There were however, plenty of deer tracks, raccoon tracks and some type of wild dog tracks.

I was able to walk on the beach most of the hike, but there were a few times where trees blocked the entire beach and I was forced to wade in the lake. Luckily it was nice and warm and the cold water felt pretty good. I stopped at a point where the beach was totally eroded away and ate a snack there before retracing my steps back to the car.

Eagle Mountain: Minnesota's Highpoint

Parker seemed quite surprised to hear loons in the middle of last night. Noelle and I were delighted. It was chilly when we woke up this morning and the inside of the tent was wet with condensation. We decided to leave the tent set up and pack up everything else in the hopes that while we hiked the tent would dry out.

We hit the road to the Eagle Mountain trailhead at 7:15. About a half an hour later we were on the trail. The hiking started out relatively flat with a few sections that passed over swampy areas on boardwalks. Soon we entered the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. The trail began to get a bit rocky and rugged but there were no real climbs until we reached Whale Lake.


At Whale Lake there is a nice view of the false summit of Eagle Mountain. The trail climbed pretty steadily up to some nice views of the wilderness area. There were no roads or buildings to be seen anywhere, just trees and scattered lakes reflecting the morning's blue sky. A short time later we reached the summit, marked with a historical marker.
We spent some time resting there before heading back down to the car. Parker did great, the 7 miles round trip was his longest hike to date.

Once we got back to the car, we returned to the campground where we packed up our dry tent. We then headed into Grand Marais for gas and pizza at Sven and Ole's. The drive back to Duluth was anticlimactic. We stopped at Tettegouche for a short hike to Illgen Falls before resuming our trip back home.

Road Tripping Up the North Shore

Today Noelle, Parker and I packed up the Subaru and headed northeast up the North Shore of Lake Superior. We had a few stops planned along the way to a few waterfalls that we learned about. The first stop was Beaver River Falls. Next we headed further up the Beaver River to Glen Avon Falls. From the Beaver we headed further up the coast to Caribou River State Wayside. It was a short hike up to the very impressive Caribou Falls.

A short drive from there took us to the Cross River. The falls there are right off of highway 61. We took a side trip to see Father Barraga's Cross. The story behind the cross is that Father Barraga was a missionary who was headed up the shore of Lake Superior to treat a group of Ojibwe who were stricken with disease near Grand Portage. At a point near what is now called the Cross River, Barraga and his native guide ran into bad weather and rough seas. They were luckily pushed over the sandbar of the Cross and into safer waters. They responded to their luck (or divine intervention) by placing a wooden cross at the mouth of the river. The wooden cross was later replaced with the current stone one.

From the Cross we headed through Grand Marais and up the Gunflint Trail to Devils Track Lake and a nice little campground. Our site has a little trail to the lake with a nice view. There are some loons swimming around as well. We're hoping to hear them tonight.

Wild River State Park & Minnesota's Interstate State Park

Noelle and I had days off together which will be a rarity this summer and so we decided to go on a little road trip for our days off despite a forecast of rain. yesterday we headed south out of foggy Duluth and headed for the warmth of east central Minnesota. It turned out to be more than warm though. More like downright hot.

Our first stop was Wild River State Park, where we hiked along the St. Croix River to the Old Nevers Dam site. There were lots of wildflowers in bloom. The usual spring varieties including trillium and columbine were seen. We also found a large eagle feather along the trail.


From the dam we hiked back to the car along the paved Old Logging Trail. Parker did a great job despite the heat. We got into the car and turned on the air conditioner for the first time this year. Our next destination was Minnesota's Interstate State Park. We got a campsite and set up camp before walking the River Trail to the world's highest concentration of potholes.
We spent some time poking around there before heading into Taylor's Falls to The Drive-In for rootbeer floats. We returned to the campground via the Railroad Trail.

It rained pretty hard last night with a fair amount of thunder and lightning. When we woke up this morning it was sunny though, and so we decided to hike the Sandstone Bluffs while the tent dried out. The hike was scenic but quite buggy. It's definitely mosquito season in central Minnesota! We returned to the campground to pack up our stuff and then hopped in the car and into Wisconsin. We stopped by the St. Croix National Scenic River visitor center in St. Croix Falls to check things out.

Finally we went for a short and buggy hike at the Sandrock Cliffs area of the river near Grantsburg, Wisconsin, before returning to Minnesota for the drive north to Duluth.

Lost Creek Falls

Noelle and I headed over to Cornucopia, Wisconsin again, this time to hike to the small but beautiful Lost Creek Falls. The hike began by following a grassy snowmobile trail, but soon the path became more defined and the wildflowers quite numerous. We saw trillium, lady slippers, blue-bead lilly, and a few others. The falls were in a nice secluded location; a little sandstone gorge decorated with flowers and moss.

It was a short hike, a round trip of only about 3 miles, after which we drove to the mouth of the Brule River and took a chilly walk along Lake Superior. It is cold along the lake, but interestingly just about 100 miles away temperatures are in the mid-90s.