Lake towns
Cruising around Excelsior
On the Twin Cities' fringe, a historic lake-resort town still draws day-trippers.
On the western fringes of the Twin Cities, the wealthy have staked out Lake Minnetonka.
Nearly all of its 125 miles of shoreline are privately owned, and the summer cottages built by vacationing flour millers and
businessmen — Pillsbury, Northrop, Bell, Loring, Peavey — have morphed into mansions.
But on the southeast corner of the sprawling lake, one town retains vestiges of the Victorian age, when steamboats ferried vacationers around the lake and day-trippers arrived on electric streetcars.
Fishing for finds in Walker
When walleye and shoppers are biting, everyone's happy in this resort town.
In 1896, a St. Paul man named J.A. Berkey came to Minnesota's Leech Lake, threw out his line and reeled in a whole new industry.
"He set up white tents for some men from Kansas City, who fished their guts out and said, 'We’re going back and telling everyone,’ ’’ said Renee Geving, director of the Cass County Museum.
The hook was set. Over the years, Leech Lake’s reputation as a fishing hole grew as big as its muskies, which can be huge. The town that grew on the shores, however, wasn’t called Berkey, or even McGarry, after the town founder, a resort owner who is credited with coining the slogan "Land of 10,000 Lakes.’’
Critter races
In Minnesota resort towns, creatures great and small run for the money.
In June, racing season moves into full throttle in resort towns around Minnesota.
Speeding turtles begin their weekly sprints in Nisswa and Longville. In Perham, the "International'' Turtle Races — the
town says they've attracted competitors and spectators from Africa, Europe, Asia and the Middle East — begin the week
after Memorial Day.
Pelican Rapids holds weekly minnow races. In Cuyuna, ticks race only once a season, but it's a serious event: Veterinarians check for steroid use before the competition.
Alexandria's enigma
This Minnesota resort town has many lakes and one mysterious stone.
There are many colossal lumberjacks, voyageurs and Indian chiefs scattered around Minnesota, all paying tribute to a colorful past.
But there's only one Big Ole.
He stands at the end of Alexandria's Broadway Street, 28 feet of glowering Viking, brandishing a spear and clutching a glistening silver shield that reads "Alexandria, Birthplace of America.''
Waupaca's Chain O' Lakes
Around a historic Yankee town, visitors travel by water and by land.
In the middle of Wisconsin, the village of Rural is just far enough off the beaten path.
Founded by Yankees in the 1850s, it was the halfway point on the Stevens Point-Berlin trade route and once had a mill, an inn and a dry goods store.
But when it was bypassed by the railroad in 1870, the village eased into a slow, genteel decline.
Gawking in Lake Geneva
On a mansion-lined footpath, walking is a spectator sport.
There are thousands of lakes in the north woods, but the most famous one is a stone's throw from Illinois.
Lake Geneva has been the favorite retreat of Chicago folks for 150 years, and everybody who was anybody had a place there: the Wrigleys, Maytags and Schwinns, but also cartoonists, actors, brewers and bottle-cap makers.
Geneva will seem citified to people who vacation on woodland lakes. There's a good reason to go there, though: It's entertaining to gawk at extreme wealth, and there's no better place to do it than Lake Geneva.
Browsing in Boulder Junction
A fishing mecca in northwoods Wisconsin has become a fashionable place to shop.
In a little village in northern Wisconsin, muskie probably is still king.
Back in 1971, city boosters got the U.S. Patent Office to make Boulder Junction the official Musky Capital of the World. After all, the surrounding two counties have the world's densest concentration of lakes, and they still yield 4-foot fish.
But times change. Now, this former logging town deep in the middle of state forest has gained fame as a playground for another kind of trophy hunter.
Lumberjacks and legends
Grand Rapids may not be the Emerald City, but its trees are green, and its lakes glitter.
In northern Minnesota, the logging town of Grand Rapids has produced many legends: prize lumberjacks, such as Gunnysack Pete
and Tamarack Joe, but also an adorable little girl who became famous for her ruby slippers.
Loggers came first, and that era is re-created on the edge of town, on the wooded grounds of Forest History Center. On a summer day there, it may feel 80 degrees and sunny, but really it's a freezing day in December 1900.
Miss Minnie the "cookee,'' or cook's assistant, is showing us around the logging camp under the baleful glare of her boss, Miss Rebecca. We walk by a giant rut cutter, used to make grooves in the ice roads for the logging sleighs.
Summer in Park Rapids
In the heart of Minnesota lakes country, town is a tourist hub.
Ever since it was settled, Park Rapids has been a crossroads for tourists.
The trains that hauled out white pine at the turn of the century brought in summer guests, who were met at the depot by resort owners and taken to the lakes in wagons.
When highways were built, Park Rapids became the gateway to Itasca State Park, 20 miles to the north. After the rail line was abandoned, it became the western trailhead of the Heartland State Trail, one of the nation's first paved bicycle trails.
Bemidji's behemoths
A northwoods Minnesota town changes, but faces stay the same.
In Bemidji, three faces tell much of the town's story.
Chief Bemidji stands facing the lake the Ojibwe called Bemidgegumaug, or "river flowing crosswise.’’ His real name was Shay-Now-Ish-Kung, and he fed the white people who settled on the lake's shores in 1888.
Their settlement became the first town on the Mississippi, which starts 35 miles south in Itasca State Park, winds north to Bemidji, flows through its lake and turns south again.
Chain of Lakes in Minneapolis
The lakes, river and creeks that ring this metropolis are a magnet year-round.
Every big city has skyscrapers. Every big city has museums and monuments. But no other city has as many beautiful lakes and parks Minneapolis does.
Early in the city's history, when its lakes still were considered swampy boondocks, city fathers decided to make their shores
public property.
Today, the most expensive homes in the city face the lakes, but the public — in-line skaters, bicyclists, dog-walkers — owns the shorelines.
Land of big water
On Minnesota's vast Rainy Lake, a little horsepower is a good thing to have.
At the top of Minnesota, there's a spectacular national park — half water and all scenery.
Not only is it beautiful, but it's also the only national park we have, which you'd think would impress most people. But not, apparently, some of the locals.
My husband and I found that out two minutes after we'd arrived on Rainy Lake and were chatting with the friendly young woman checking us into our B&B.
The resort of your dreams
Here's where to look for the perfect place on a Minnesota lake.
In Minnesota, it’s devilishly hard to find the lake resort that’s right for you.
Everyone wants the “best’’ resort. But asking the state tourism folks to tell you which one is best is like asking a baker to pick out his best pastry: They’re all, of course, the best.
You can’t ask your friends. They can tell you only which resort they go to, and that one may be too luxurious/too rustic or not kid-friendly/too family-oriented for you.
Little Crow lakes
West of the Twin Cities, easygoing Spicer and New London make a good beach getaway.
It’s a radical idea, but here goes: In Minnesota, you can go up to the lake by heading west.
These lakes not only are out west, they’re less than two hours from the Twin Cities, in a pocket of the state many overlook.
“It was a secret to me,’’ said Michele Stillinger, a former Twin Citian working as a naturalist at Sibley State Park. “I thought I wouldn’t find anything out here; I was very surprised.’’
Clear Lake tranquility
In a laid-back Iowa beach town, the '50s never ended.
In Clear Lake, the spirit of the 1950s didn't die with Buddy Holly.
This northern Iowa lake town, midway between the Twin Cities and Des Moines, swells with vacationers in summer but retains the laid-back, carefree air of decades past.
On the shores of the lake, classic cars cruise around pocket-sized City Park, fuzzy pink dice dangling from mirrors. Every Saturday and Sunday, the municipal band plays in the bandshell. The Lions Club grills chicken and sweet corn, and a paddlewheeler takes tourists on cruises.
The buzz on Brainerd
Away from the crowds, Minnesota's busiest vacation area can be tranquil.
To hear resort owners in the north woods tell it, Brainerd is the Times Square of Minnesota.
“It’s crazy down there,’’ they say, shaking their heads. “It’s a zoo. We don’t want to be like Brainerd.’’
In Wisconsin, people talk the same way about Door County. Those places are busy, all right. They’re busy because plenty of people like that kind of atmosphere — the restaurants, the golf, the shopping, the fancy condo resorts.
© Beth Gauper, 2007 - 2012 all rights reserved
