Voyageurs National Park: Paddle to Gold Portage

Today a friend from work and I had an opportunity to do some paddling in the park. The plan: put in at Woodenfrog State Forest Campground and paddle to Gold Portage to check out the rapids there. We arrived at Woodenfrog to light winds and cool temperatures, a perfect start to a day on the water!

From land I had scouted out a route using some landmarks I could identify. We would head for a point between Cemetery Island and another island just to the east that is unnamed on my map.

We ended up navigating right to where we wanted to be and after passing through the islands veered slightly to west, passing between the large Rottenwood and Chief Woodenfrog Islands. Shortly thereafter we found the entrance to Gold Portage. We paddled the Gold Portage stream with the current.

It was very easy going and the scenery was very pleasant.

We made our way further and further downstream until we came to a sign marking the rapids that lay ahead, along with a dock.

We pulled our kayaks up on the dock and put on some bug spray for the walk along the portage trail to the rapids. Along the way we saw some purple fringed orchis,

and lots and lots of deer flies. The flies were very annoying. At one point my friend said I had about 100 of them flying around my head. We spent a few minutes admiring the rapids

and then started to make our way back to the dock and our waiting boats. We were back on the water shortly.

The paddle back upstream was a bit more difficult than the paddle into the rapids,

but nothing too bad. After exiting the stream we took a short side trip to Day Use Site K10, Hacksaw Pass. The map says it has a sand landing and so I thought there might be a nice sand beach to swim at, but the shoreline was choked with cattails and so we simply moved on. We passed some interesting islands

and slowly made our way back to Woodenfrog Campground. The wind picked up quite a bit for the last 1/2 mile of paddling. We were paddling into it, which made for some slow going. Finally we made our way into the shelter of the point the campground lies on and then quickly to the beach. There was a big family of ducks waiting there to greet us upon our return.

Living Prairie Park

Since my parents are visiting, I took a few extra days off. We decided to get out of town for a bit and opted for a trip up to Winnipeg. Today, for the last day of our visit, we decided to head over to the Living Prairie Park and Museum for their Monarch Butterfly Festival.

We arrived a bit earlier than the 12 noon start of the festival, and so we began our visit at the playground.

Sierra enjoyed climbing a "rock formation"

and especially an old dead tree.

After some time at the playground we headed over to the nearby prairie remnant for a walk among the grasses and wildflowers.

There was lots of purple prairie clover

and wild bergamot,

along with some milkweed,

a sunflower-like plant

and even some goldenrod in bloom.

Noelle and I walked a little bit further than the rest of the group and found a mass of feathers on the ground.
It appears a bird became someone's dinner.

Around noon we headed over to the festival, which quickly became very crowded. Sierra made some butterfly wings, some antennae and even painted some big bluestem in the parking lot with chalk paint.

Then it was time for lunch before heading out of town and back to International Falls.

Exploring Winnipeg's Assiniboine Park

Today we spent the day exploring Winnipeg's Assiniboine Park, and impressive expanse of urban park in Manitoba's largest city. My parents were along for the visit.

Our first stop was the Leo Mol Sculpture Garden.

Next, we headed over to the English Garden, with its proper, manicured flower beds.

We continued on to the Duck Pond

and the Pavilion.

We cut through the Nature Playground, which we had visited previously,

and got some ice cream before heading out.

As I had mentioned, this was not our first visit to Assiniboine Park. Noelle, Sierra and I had visited in late May and toured the zoo,

 with its impressive Journey to Churchill exhibit.

The polar bears were definitely the stars of the exhibit,

and it features a glass tunnel you can walk through that the bears swim over and around.

However, there were seals and other animals also.

We also found the Winnie the Bear sculpture during our last visit.

It's a wonderful park and I would guess we will probably be back to visit again some day. Perhaps next visit we will explore the Assiniboine Forest section of the park.