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If you have never been to a historical reenactment or powwow, here are a few things to know. You are encouraged to watch and participate in both events. Know your terminology. The elaborate, colorful outfits worn at the powwow are not “costumes,” explains Dana Logan, Grand Portage powwow chair. The outfits are called regalia, and each piece and part has a meaning and a story.
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Imagine nearly 200 volunteers teaming up with the USDA Forest Service to construct new trails and improve existing sections of recreational trails on the Superior National Forest!
That’s exactly what’s happening this June 21 to June 25 in northeast Minnesota. The Boy Scouts of America’s honor society – called the Order of the Arrow – will be bringing approximately 200 Scouts and Adult Scouters to Grand Marais.
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I sniffed around my garden today and was pleasantly surprised. The ground has been unfrozen for a few weeks and I used my soil thermometer to check the temps. 55 degrees. Perfect. Spinach, peas, lettuce, onions and potatoes will germinate just fine.
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Quit your job, sell your house and set out on a yearlong sailing adventure with your two young kids. It might sound crazy, but Mark and Katya Gordon highly recommend it. So do their daughters, Cedar and Lamar. In 2006 the family pared down their lives and fit everything onto a 34-foot sailboat before setting off for Bermuda via the Great Lakes and the Eastern Seaboard.
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Duluth: Park Point Beach House
The Park Point Beach House offers access to miles of soft, sandy beach dunes. This swimming beach has every amenity short of monkey butlers: pavilions with picnic tables, a playground, permanent restrooms, a sand volleyball court, a soccer field, concessions, cook-out grills, trash cans, a lifeguard (during the summer months), lots of parking (including handicapped and “large vehicle” parking), and, of course, the beach house (which can be rented for wedding receptions and other events). Lake Superior stays cold during the summer, so be prepared for an invigorating swim. Cross the Aerial Bridge and keep driving until you reach the beach.
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As someone who invested his vacation time in the 1990s in backpacking and canoeing across North America, I’d been itching to introduce my young family to the backcountry. My wife maintained one condition: toilet-trained children. So 18 months after our youngest kicked the diaper habit, we reserved our first Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness permit.
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The members of the species Rockhoundicus sapiens can be found throughout northern Minnesota and northwestern Ontario, particularly on gravel roads and pebble beaches. You will often see them hunched over at the water’s edge, picking through wet rocks with the patience and focus of an archaeologist sifting fingernail-size pottery fragments from a dirt pile. They often travel in family groups.
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The first portage of the trip (my first portage ever) started out well enough. There was a nice sloped beach to unload the packs onto and an easy trail to hike. It all seemed quite civilized. Would it really be this easy?
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At the very least, the following list of essentials will help keep your next Boundary Waters canoe trip from turning into an epic debacle. With luck, it will help make your trip an enjoyable adventure.
Planning ahead is the essence of a successful trip. For starters, don’t get on the water without route maps and the required backcountry permit.
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The snow is gone and mud season is almost over. It’s time to pore over a race calendar and choose which running events to target this year. And when it comes to race selection, novice runners and veterans alike are in luck. From the mile to the marathon, from roads to trails, you have a cornucopia of race options that showcase the beauty of the Northern Wilds.
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The dramatic Death Valley segment of the Casque Isles Trail, which snakes along the Canadian north shore of Lake Superior, gets its name from a time when Ojibwe hunters perched on the surrounding hills to shoot moose and caribou below. Pictographs grace a rock face near Worthington Bay.
Despite the distracting beauty, be sure to watch your step. The segment features “some serious ravine climbs,” says Doug Stefurak, president of the Casque Isles Voyageur Trail Club. You will also navigate a shoreline trek on bedrock riddled with deep crevasses only 2-3 feet wide on the surface. “You have to be particularly careful if you have your dog along with you.”
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Spring snowmelt and summer dam releases supercharge the St. Louis River, creating a surging, roaring spectacle for hikers and waterfall-watchers—and a playground for whitewater junkies.
Born near Hoyt Lakes, the St. Louis carves a fishhook shape through northern Minnesota and empties into Lake Superior. While the minimum flow on the St. Louis is about 350 cfs (cubic feet per second), the flow nearly doubles to 600 cfs during peak times, which makes running rapids more challenging and more fun.
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The northern winter deprives me of rock climbing, my favorite outdoor activity. This year, instead of pouting and waiting for the snow to melt, I seized the season as a chance to expand my recreational repertoire. My plan: learn to snowboard with lessons and advice courtesy of six ski areas in the Northern Wilds and transform into a slope-shredding mountain goddess.
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When winter come to northern Ontario and the lakes skim over with ice, many anglers turn to watching hockey or fishing shows. But, with a little preparation, ice fishing for lake trout can provide some of the best angling thrills of the year.
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Dave and Amy Freeman of Tofte, Minn. are undertaking a 12,000-mile journey across North America, bringing over 60,000 children along for the trip.
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Located only 50 kilometers east of Thunder Bay, Sleeping Giant Provincial Park is best known as one of Ontario’s top summer destinations. Evade the crowds and experience a snow junkie’s paradise by traveling there in winter. A rented cabin provides a snug base camp.
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Duluth is blessed with over 120 miles of groomed cross country ski trails within a half-hour drive—a paralyzing plethora of choices. Here are four beginner-friendly local trails that have common traits: easy terrain, a short loop route, and a place to warm up afterward.
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With shorter and much cooler days upon us, hunters in the Northern Wilds turn their thoughts to the out-of-doors and their upcoming pursuit of game. Grouse and archery deer hunters are first in the woods, followed by the duck and pheasant chasers in October. Then comes the granddaddy hunting season in Minnesota (and the entire upper Midwest): deer season. Thousands of deer hunters leave their jobs behind for a few days in deer camp, hoping to lay in a winter’s supply of venison.
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Right now, somewhere in Sweden, caviar (lojrom) from Lake Superior herring roe (fish eggs) is being served in a restaurant or being spooned from a jar onto a cracker or potato slices as a snack. Scandinavians love caviar. Since their own roe stocks are depleted, they import roe from around the world—including our own Lake Superior herring roe. The other parts of the herring are used for fertilizer, aquarium feed and gefilte fish.
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