Vacation in Northern Minnesota

Cliffs of Lake Superior

Last week was our "vacation." Our week with Chris as he took the time off so we could explore the remote world of the water and woods between Canada and the US. It is a place well worth exploring!

Lake Superior

We made it to Lake Superior (great lake #4!) on Friday and took in a hike at Gooseberry Falls State Park. We were hoping to camp there, but the entire state seemed to have the same idea and we felt like we were in a natural Disney Land with how many people were out on the trails! We found a campsite, or I should say, a palace of a campsite in Eckbeck, a campground in Tettegouche State Park. The site had a terraced lawn and a private little path down to a river that was a perfect place to hang our hammocks. Somehow we got lucky as the small campground was full, but the people who were supposed to be there vacated early, though I find it hard that anybody would have left such a campsite unless their child's arm was falling off.

Our Palace for the Night

Saturday we found ourselves hanging on the shore of Lake Superior, being awe struck by the cliffs that you could hike to. We left the shore and headed inland towards the High Falls and were rewarded with a swimming hole like one I've never been able to swim in. The water was a perfect temperature, it wasn't too deep or fast running to feel completely comfortable letting the kids do whatever they wanted, and the dogs could be off leash! We were the only ones there for a while and were only joined by some fellow Labrador lovers, so the pups got in some extra pets as well.

The drive from Eckbeck to Bear Lake State Park was nothing short of beautiful as all of the wild flowers are out in bloom. We pulled into the town of Ely and stopped at the Front Porch Cafe for lunch and picked up a birthday cake for Chris at a local bakery ($6 for a whole cake!). Our campground at Bear Lake was great and just a short walk over to the beaches. We grabbed some canoes and paddled around for a couple of hours in the warm waters taking time to jump out and float under the pine trees. On our cloudy day we headed over to the International Wolf Center and had a big birthday lunch for Chris at a local pub.

Don't tip! This was before we stashed our phones on the shore as Dakota was rocking the boat!

Happy Birthday My Love!

Bear Lake saw us off to Itasca State Park. This has to be one of our favorite stops so far. We biked all over the park seeing Indian Mounds, wild flowers, the lake, and of course the headwaters of the Mississippi. It was crazy to stand in this small river that you could hop across and picture the other end where we stood back in January down in New Orleans. This length of water is such a defining landmark of our country and has shaped not only the way our country operates today, but how it was formed from hundreds of years ago giving birth to towns, cities, and industry. We were also able to rent a pontoon boat for the afternoon and take the kids to the middle of Lake Itasca for some good lake swimming fun! It was beautiful to cruise around under the soaring Bald Eagles. At one point the boys were taking turns driving the boat and Chris and I were sitting back on the couch wondering how we've made it to the point that we can sit and relax as the boys take the wheel?!? We ended the evening at a naturalist presentation around a group campfire listening to animal legends of the Native Americans. Our storyteller grew up with her elders passing the stories down to her and was a natural story teller which left us all wanting to hear more. She also confirmed that we had a mama bear and cubs who lived about a half mile away from us which wasn't surprising as we saw a footprint on our neighbor's van that day! I wish we had been able to see her, but if I have bad luck in any area, it's sadly in animal sightings, so they evaded me again!

Hopping across the Ol' Miss!

Eagle Spotter

Speedster with his 10 hp!

Bear Lake was our last stop in MN, and we crossed the border to North Dakota headed for For Abraham Lincoln State Park. This place is located right on the Missouri River where we watched the blue moon rise up and over the trees and tipis. We were able to attend another naturalist event where we learned all about owls and were able to dissect some owl pellets with other kids. There were probably around 20 kids in all with 10 owl pellets out for dissection. Our boys formed a group with two others and they shut the place down! Owl pellets have gone on their wish list and I see a lot of little bones all over the place in our future! We were only here for a night, but in the morning we took in the tour of the fort where General Custer commanded. I love these things as my heart lives a couple of hundreds of years ago and I totally get into the period costumes and way of life. We also got to tour the home of the Mandan people and the earthlodges they left behind. The Mandans lived in this area up until 90 years before Custer came through with his troops as their tribes were killed off (80%!) by Smallpox. Standing there in the ruins and looking out over the lands they called home for close to 1000 years it was hard to take in the events of the past 300 years. How could it be that just a couple days ago I was standing at the start of the Mississippi in awe of all that America has come to be and now standing 150 miles West completely saddened by how we got here? It is a humbling experience to come face to face with the knowledge of how your own way of life and country that you love has such an ugly past of destruction and heartbreak. I'm still trying to sit with it, and in an effort to do so we made our way over to the visitor center where we got a book titled, "Encounters at the Heart of the World: A History of the Mandan People" by Elizabeth Fenn. I'm really looking forward to some uninterrupted time to sink into it's pages.

1 of what would have been 86

Life as the General

Life in the barracks

We left Fort Abraham for Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Unfortunately, it was full, but we found a lovely little campground in somebody's front lawn. Of course we couldn't go an entire year of life on the road without finding ourselves in somebody's front lawn! This campground was also full, but it seems that some people around the campground lend their yards as makeshift camps (I'd love to see our little neighborhood's HOA debates on that back home!) when the need arises, and it had arose as many yards were being used as a campground. We left the trailer and took a ride in the National Park and we were so happy we did! The landscape is breathtaking (thank you Teddy Roosevelt for all of our National Parks that seem to never leave a disappointed view!). One one side of the park are cliffs and sparse vegetation among little valleys that you can only picture running with water after a desert storm. The other side is rolling hills of grassland that give home to herds of bison and deer and I could have sworn I heard "Home On The Range" playing from the hills. We stopped and watched a herd for over an hour as we were there in the middle of mating season which had the males all snorting at one another as they "tended" the females and we got to see a couple get testy with one another and one kept making advances on a female who kept saying "No." "Umm, buddy? I don't think it's going to work out for you. You need to go find another female!"-Austin our biologist. We ended our week of vacation in Medona at an ice cream shop (of course) and got ready to head to our next stop...Billings, MT!

Taking in the view