Great Lakes - Day 11 - Tuesday

After adjusting our sleeping location last night, we had a great plan for today.  I have set my alarm every day on this trip but I always end up waking before it goes off.  The sun is usually up by 5:30 and that means I’ve gotten my requisite 7-8 hours of sleep.  The birds start their morning greeting with the sun.  Crows/ravens caw and the little birds have their sweet tweeting and then I’m up.  Today was no exception.  We also fall into a pattern where Lorelei and I shower and dress while Luke and Scott make breakfast.  Today the last of the homemade biscuits from the freezer with eggs and bacon and then we were on the road at exactly 8 AM.  Right on time and the first day of the trip we have had that happen. 

We had a two hour drive to our first stop at St. Croix National Scenic Riverway.  We saw a joke somewhere that there are four seasons in Minnesota; almost winter, winter, still winter and construction.  We definitely are in the construction season.  You can’t go anywhere without seeing the orange and white barrels.  Originally, I had planned for us to rent kayaks and spend the day playing on the river.  However, mother nature had a different plan with the storm that washed out highway 2 near Ashland at Lake Superior and had us taking dirt road detours in Mellen, WI.

We stopped at the visitor center.  Lorelei’s junior ranger was one sheet of I Spy stuff in the museum and then we walked the trail along the river.  The volunteer running the desk was a great college age student and he answered lots of questions I had about the flooding.  There had been 23 million gallons of water flowing per minute when it was at it’s highest.  That is a lot of water.  While no one drowned in the initial flooding, a guy from up Minnesota who stopped to take a picture from the road slipped and fell into the water and has been lost.  The visitor center is very close to a hydro electric dam and it was very powerful to see that much moving water.  We heard that there was supposed to be a heat wave coming through Midwest region and temps were already in the 80’s by 10 AM so we were happy to return o our air conditioning and move on to the state capitol. 

St. Paul was about an hours drive.  I usually allow 2 hours for most historic sites and national monuments in my planning and the quick visit to the riverway had us an hour ahead of schedule.  We saw that the capitol was closed off and I went online to find out why.  A three-year restoration project that should finish in 2017.  This is the first capitol in the 30 that we have visited that has been closed and fully under construction.  This was our indicator that we were definitely in the construction season.  A quick picture and we were on the road another 40 minutes into Minneapolis to hit the Mississippi River.

We pulled into a parking lot at the Mill City Park and managed to fit the camper in just one spot.  We decided to go ahead and make lunch.  There was a nice breeze coming off the river but it mostly just served to move the hot air.  We finished lunch and headed into the St. Anthony Locks and Dam visitor center.  There was quite a view from the top of the old control room/observation deck.  We just missed the tour but we didn’t want to leave Yeti too long in the camper even though the windows were open.  We walked out on the old railway bridge that had trains that ran all the way out to Glacier National Park that has been converted to bike and walking path.  We got to see the flour mill ruins and some spots that would make interesting places to visit if we ever get to come back to the twin cities.  Pillsbury and Gold Medal Flour are both here and we’d really like to poke the dough boy. 

After a few pics and ranger badge #111, we headed out to the campground just south of Minneapolis.  We stopped in to Walmart to grab some groceries on the way.  We were WAY ahead of schedule and pulled in to camp about 2:00.  This was perfect because we badly needed to do laundry and a refreshing dip in the pool was needed by all of us.  Dinner, laundry and swimming done, I retired early and left Scott and the kids up playing cards.