Great River Bluffs State Park

Great River Bluffs is one of my absolutely favorite parks in Minnesota. In my opinion it is vastly under rated and under visited. After college I had gone a few years with out spending much time at parks. One weekend, I just up and went to GRB, after that I was hooked, and determined that I needed to do some exploring. The picture on the Left is Queens Bluff as seen from Kings Bluff with the mighty Mississippi in the background.

One of may favorite things about GRB is that it usually is not buggy, which is ironic, because on this particular visit, it was really bad. I don't think that is common though.

If you have no been to the bluff country before, I can only say that it is breathtaking. GRB gives you a great place to see and explore the bluffs. The park map shows 10 view points, and I recommend that if you go, you take the time to see all ten. If you do so you will have hiked about 8 miles. If you just do 1 trail, do the Kings Bluff Trail. There is also a campground that is fairly private and not crowded, some cool wildflowers and migratory birds. This is a great place to see eagles.

The park offers both goat prairie and hardwood forest. The park makes for some good Timber Rattler habitat, and they are in the park. Don't worry, they are timid and will usually flee, long before you know they are there. If you are real lucky, you might see one sunning itself on a hot summer day.

On the right is another view of the Mississippi River, taken from one of the observation points. As you might expect from the bluffs and hardwoods, this is a great park for fall colors. In the winter this is also a good cross country skiing park. Given the parks proximity to Rochester, Winona, and La Crosse, I am a little surprised that the park is not more visited. But for now it is a well kept secret that you can take advantage of.

Banning State Park

Banning State Park is too often thought of as a way-side rest area between Duluth and Minneapolis. This is too bad, because the park is a destination in and of itself. Ironically, we happened to stop at the park on or way from Duluth to Minneapolis.

So that note aside lets discuss the park. Banning is located near Sandstone, Minnesota. As far as I know the only other thing in Sandstone is a Federal Prison. The entrance to the park is right off Interstate 35, ans as such is sometimes used as a place to rest.

The park features the Kettle River, Hiking, Canoing, Kayaking, an old quarry, a bat cave, Wolf Creek Falls (pictured above) and some great camping. Both times I have been at this park, I also discovered it has mosquitoes...

In all there are about 14 miles of hiking trails in the park. My favorite hike is to take the the Wolf Creek, High Bluff, Quarry Loop, and Skunk Cabbage Trails to form a loop. Also be aware that this is also Black Bear territory so don't fall asleep in a pile of leftover food. Clean up, because if you don't a bear kills you because you were a slob, that would be a tragedy (not you but when they had to kill the bear)...

The basic campsites are OK, but they tend to be buggy and don't offer much privacy. But this park has some spectacular sites as well, but there is a catch. You will need a boat to get there. There are 3 Canoe campsites that can be accessed from the Kettle River. The river also offers some excitement via some swift rapids.

I wasn't aware that Banning offered great wildflowers, but as the picture to left shows, the park was putting on a pretty nice display the weekend I was there. These flowers just went on forever. Though I didn't see anything, I would suspect that the parks proximity to the Kettle River would also be conducive to predatory birds such as Bald Eagles. I also have yet to make the bat cave, but I guess that is something for the next trip.

Carley State Park Revisited

As promised I returned to Carley State Park to check on wildflowers. As of Saturday, there were still many flowers yet to bloom, but the Blue Bells were out in force.

Here are some Pictures:

Leaves returning to the trees near the Whitewater River:
Blue Bells on the Forest Floor:

Large areas filled with Blue Bells:

Carley State Park

Carley State Park has been affectionately referred to as Whitewater State Park's overflow. And about 50 weeks a year I completely agree. The park is often neglected as Minnesota continues to not allow conservation funding to keep pace with inflation. I don't think I have ever seen a ranger when I have visited the park. Some of the trails are sorely in need of maintenance. Pictured on the right is the Whitewater river which passes through the park on its way to Whitewater State Park.

But for a couple of weeks every spring Carley is a superstar. Carley has some of the very best wildflower displays in the state of Minnesota. On this visit we were too early. Based on the appearance of the forest floor there will be an incredible wildflower display around the first week of May. The picture on the left is an image of one part of the forest floor. Everything you see is a growing wildflower. When they bloom it is spectacular. In particular Carley is famous for Blue Bells.

This is one park that I can say beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I have hiked every mile of trail. Really, this park has only about 6 miles of trail and the trails are not particularly difficult. As for recommendations, I would recommend doing the hiking club trail in the spring when the wildflowers peak. Also take a little time and just relax down by the river. There is camping at this park and the campsite is usually not crowded and is quite.

I did notice that some trails are currently closed and it appears the the park boundaries have recently changed. The park was originally formed after the state received the land as a gift. On of the key reasons the land is significant is the presence of native White Pines. While White Pines are native, they are now rare in Southeastern Minnesota. The DNR recently announced long term plans to include Carley in a 50 mile bike loop.

I number of birds can also be seen at Carley. The link below will bring you to a through checklist. I don't claim to be a birder, so I'll let you look at the list and make your own judgments.

http://files.dnr.state.mn.us/outdoor_activities/state_parks/carley/bird_checklist.pdf

The town on Plainview is near by and is also a neat town to visit. The town is thriving due to a surge in corn prices, strong local businesses, and it's proximity to the high paying jobs of Rochester. Lodging and Food is available in Plainview or Elgin.

As was the case at Forestville and Whitewater, spring flooding did some minor damage in the park. The picture to the right shows a concrete segment that has been moved by high water.

I can't emphasis this enough. Get too Carley at the beginning of May to see the awesome display.

Top Spring State Parks

Here are 3 picks for top Minnesota State Parks in the Spring from About.com. These are solid picks, but a little Twin Cities biased if you ask me. I would also recommend any of the North Shore parks, because the rivers and falls are near their peak flow. In addition some of the parks in the western part of the state offer good birding this time of year.

I hope to visit Carley this spring to view the wildflowers. If you haven't seen the blue bells in bloom, they are spectacular.

http://usparks.about.com/od/stateparksus/a/MNspringparks.htm

Nerstrand Big Woods State Park

Well today was a wonderful day to visit a state park. And as a bonus I actually remembered a camera for once, so I will be able to provide a couple of images. We started our day with a picnic at the shelter which was needed to to some afternoon showers and a vicious wind.

Nerstrand Big Woods state park protects a portion of the once 5000 acre big woods section of Minnesota near the town of Nerstrand. The park is host to large hardwood trees including oak and maple. As a result this can be a nice fall color park to visit. Also 50 types of wild flowers, additional ferns and mushrooms can be found. The Prairie Creek passes through the park and is picture on the left at hidden falls.

The park features a nice visitors center, a fairly quiet campground, and 11 miles of hiking trails. in the winter this becomes 1 mile of snowshoeing, 6 miles of cross country and 4 miles of snowmobile trails. The areas around hidden falls tend to get many visitors because of the ease of access, however as with most parks as you venture further from parking, the trails get more secluded.

This is one park that I can honestly say that I think I hiked every mile of and as such have some recommendations. If I were designing an ideal day hike I would choose to take on either the North half or the South half of the park. The park is divided by highway 29. On this particular day we hiked a large loop through the North half of the park consisting of most of the Hidden Falls, Fawn, Hope, and Beaver Trails. These trails are very well maintained and offered easy passage over rolling hills through varied hardwood terrain. The wild flowers were just starting to come out and peak wild flower viewing will be in the next couple of weeks. The picture below of my wife and dog was taken on a portion of the Hope Trail.

We did some additional hiking into the Southern half of the park by taking the White Oak Trail to the Maple Trail and then to the Basswood Trail back to the Hidden Falls area. Some warnings here: The trails on the south end of the park are nowhere near as well maintained as the the Northern trails. The Maple trail was unbelievably muddy and you just sank into it. Even my dog looked a little disgusted. Also one of my irritations is when signs are posted in the wrong location. At the intersection of the Maple and Blue Beech Trails there was a sign indicating a junction with the Fox Trail. this was absolutely wrong. The Fox Trail was half a mile to the East. Fortunately I knew by my map that this was a mistake.

Loops of varying length can be made in the Southern half of the park by linking together portions of the Maple, Blue Beech, Basswood, Ironwood, and Fox Trails. All of these trails pass through wonderful hardwood forest and you can go wrong with any of them. However if there has been some recent precipitation, I would recommend staying to the North as those trails hold up better.