50,961,114 acres
Statehood 1858 (32nd)
Capital: St. Paul
Population: 5,706,494 (22nd)
High Point: Eagle Mountain (2,302 feet)
Best time of year: Summer for the state fair and access to the northern lakes
We recently published our guidebook 50 States of Great: Road Trip Guide to America, so we decided to start a new type of blog post where we create a travel itinerary for all 50 states, in addition to our usual National Forest and National Park entries. After starting with Kansas, Georgia, Idaho, and Rhode Island, we decided to do a state that is part Midwest and part North Woods. We made an ambitious seven-day plan starting in the southern Minnesota, with plenty of options to extend the trip.
Day 1
Located in the small town of Austin, this free museum is full of interactive exhibits and photo opportunities, but the best part is that it does not take itself too seriously. Even if you do not like to eat the canned “spiced ham” product, you will come to appreciate its significance to World War II history and pop culture, as well as its amazing gift shop with more branded products than you can imagine.
Niagara Cave or Mystery Cave
Niagara Cave is a privately-owned show cave named for its 60-foot-tall underground waterfall that is only viewable on guided tours. Not far away, Forestville/Mystery Cave State Park contains the state’s longest cave (47 degrees year round) which also offers guided tours.
Optional stop at Pipestone National Monument (click here for our blog post)
If you come into the state from the southwest corner, consider a stop at a spot that people have come for 2,000 years to mine the red quartzite rock (also known as catlinite). The soft sedimentary stone is relatively easy to carve into smoking pipes and effigies. April through October, you can watch American Indian carvers at the National Park Service (NPS) museum demonstrate how to sculpt this soft yet durable stone into hollow pipes and other beautiful ornaments, some of which you can buy in the gift shop.
Optional stop at Laura Ingalls Wilder Museum
Fans of the author’s “Little House” series of books will want to see a replica of the Ingalls’ home in Walnut Grove and some of the family’s historic heirlooms.
Day 2
Indoor shopping malls are still thriving in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis-St. Paul) metropolitan area, perhaps due to the cold and snowy winter weather. The most famous is the Mall of America with its indoor amusement park and 520 stores, making it the largest mall in the western hemisphere (and eleventh largest in the world).
Mississippi National River and Recreation Area (click here for our blog post)
This park follows 72 miles of the great river’s course through Minnesota, from busy metropolitan sections in the Twin Cities to secluded stretches of water where it reaches its confluence with the Saint Croix National Scenic Riverway. In downtown Minneapolis, Minnehaha Regional Park contains its namesake falls celebrated in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s Song of Hiawatha. Nearby, St. Anthony Falls is the only true waterfall along the entire length of the Mississippi River, now controlled by a lock and dam.
Optional stop at University of Minnesota Golden Gophers’ football game
We saw wild turkeys wandering around this beautiful campus that sits on a bluff east of the Mississippi River. Nobody seems to be exactly sure what a golden gopher is (possibly a thirteen-lined ground squirrel), but their mascot Goldie is the cutest in all of college football. Huntington Bank Stadium has one of the best pregame areas with plenty of photo ops and a pep rally held outside the hockey arena, plus we got free Culver’s custard, a clear bag giveaway, and Mystic Lake casino provided free towels and “spinny video thing.” The football team typically schedules their home opener on the Thursday before Labor Day during the Minnesota State Fair.
Day 3
You will need all day to visit America’s best state fair that is held annually the 12 days before Labor Day, welcoming more than two-million visitors annually. The fair has the standard carnival rides, butter sculptures, farm animals, and artwork, as well as stages where musicians, comedians, and magicians perform throughout the day. Some of the unique food offerings include hotdish-on-a-stick, poutine, fried cheese curds, pronto pup, fried pickles, pork chop-on-a-stick, and fried buckeyes (chocolate and peanut butter candy). Since it started in 1979, Sweet Martha’s Cookie Jar has been overfilling buckets of fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies for customers, making up to 200,000 cookies an hour. To wash all that down, you might want to visit one of the stands offering all-you-can-drink milk.
Optional stop at Hell’s Kitchen restaurant
If you are still hungry after the Minnesota State Fair then you probably didn’t do it right, but we will make one of our rare restaurant recommendations for this unique spot in downtown Minneapolis with interesting décor and really good food (try the poutine or walleye bites).
Day 4
Paul Bunyan Expressway
The legendary giant lumberjack Paul Bunyan is a big deal in Minnesota and he has statues honoring him in many towns along the Paul Bunyan Expressway. The 18-foot-tall statues in Bemidji were originally built in 1937 to honor these larger-than-life heroes and continue to be an essential roadside attraction. In Brainerd, Paul Bunyan Land is an entire amusement park built around a 26-foot-tall talking statue of Paul and 19-foot Babe, the latter refurbished after it blew over in a 2006 windstorm.
Chippewa National Forest (click here for our blog post)
The Lost 40 is 144 acres of old-growth red and white pine forest that was never logged due to a surveying error that mapped the area as part of Coddington Lake in 1882. The oldest tree here is more than 250 years old and can be seen on an easy one-mile loop trail with interpretive signs. The trailhead is located east of Blackduck on well-signed back roads that are also popular for snowshoeing in the winter. Nearby, Camp Rabideau is perhaps the best preserved Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp left from the 1930s, with free guided tours in the summer.
Optional stop at Itasca State Park
Lake Itasca is considered the headwaters of the Mississippi River and is located just west of Highway 71 at the beginning of the 2,069-mile-long Great River Road that goes all the way to Louisiana.
Day 5
Roadside Sculptures
Driving north on Highway 71, there is seemingly another great roadside attraction located every few miles. We saw the statues of Uncle Dan Campbell in Big Falls, Jack Pine Savage in Littlefork, the world’s largest crow in Belgrade, and a giant black duck in the town of Blackduck. Right outside Voyageurs National Park, which surrounds Lake Kabetogama, was our favorite—a giant walleye with a saddle for riding. If Kabetogama seems like a mouthful, rest assured that everyone, including park rangers, simply calls it “Lake Kab.”
Voyageurs National Park (click here for our blog post)
The park is famous for its manmade destinations, including Kettle Falls Hotel, Hoist Bay Resort, and the unique sculptures at Ellsworth Rock Gardens. Try to get out on one of Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes via a ranger-led tour or take your own boat to one of the shoreline campsites inaccessible by car (permit required). Reservations can be made for the ranger-guided North Canoe Voyage that lets passengers paddle a 26-foot canoe, just like the French-Canadian “voyageurs” of old.
Day 6
Kawishiwi Falls in Ely
The little town of Ely is the gateway to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (see below), but even if you are just passing through be sure to make the short hike to Kawishiwi Falls below the dam on Garden Lake.
International Wolf Center in Ely
Gray wolves (called timber wolves regionally) reside in the North Woods and while a few lucky travelers might hear them howling, your best bet to see one is at the Wolf Center. It also has a section dedicated to Sigurd Olson, a talented local author and naturalist.
Optional stop at United States Hockey Hall of Fame in Eveleth
As seen on the side of U-Haul trailers, Eveleth is home to this museum and shrine to American ice hockey players.
Day 7
North Shore Scenic Drive
The northwest shore of Lake Superior is a beautiful stretch of cliffs and waterfalls. This 148-mile drive starts at the Canadian border near Grand Portage National Monument and passes on its way to Duluth several nice State Parks, including Grand Portage, Gooseberry Falls, Split Rock Lighthouse, Tettegouche, Temperance River, Cascade River, and Judge C. R. Magney State Parks.
Grand Portage National Monument (click here for our blog post)
French-Canadian voyageurs had to walk their canoes and goods along an eight-mile-long portage to bypass the rapids on the Pigeon River. In 1784, the end of the trail on the edge of Lake Superior became the site of the North West Company headquarters where they held an annual rendezvous, where today visitors can walk around the reconstructed buildings and talk with the costumed reenactors during the summer.
Optional stop at Two Harbors
North of Duluth, the North Shore Scenic Drive passes through the town of Two Harbors where there is a giant rooster at Weldon’s Gifts and a huge statue of Pierre the Voyageur outside the Earthwood Inn. If you press the speaker button at the statue’s base, Pierre will tell you all about the history of the region, but he never explains why he is not wearing any pants.
Day 8+
In addition to encompassing the state’s highest mountain, Superior National Forest also offers scenic drives on the Gunflint Trail (County Road 12), Fernberg Road (State Route 169), and Echo Trail (County Road 116). Vermilion Gorge Trail is an easy 1.5-mile one-way hike to a narrow canyon cut through Canadian Shield rock in the small community of Crane Lake (on the east side of Voyageurs National Park). Not far away down a dirt road, a short trail leads to Vermilion Falls where the same river cuts a narrow channel through the rock.
Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness
Permits for the peak season can be hard to come by for the world’s premiere destination for backcountry canoeing, so plan ahead. This one-million-acre preserve has more than 1,000 lakes with over 1,500 miles of canoe routes and 2,200 designated backcountry campsites. In addition to its famous water routes with numerous portages, a few overland trails exist like the 12-mile Angleworm Trail and the 39-mile Kekekebic Trail, an official part of the North Country National Scenic Trail.
Learn more about Minnesota’s Most Scenic Drive, Wonderful Waterfall, Top State Park, and other categories in our new travel guidebook 50 States of Great: Road Trip Guide to America.
Raven About The Parks 