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• One in 1,000
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• The buzz on Brainerd
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• Summer in Park Rapids
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• A week at the lake
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Break on the lake

In Minnesota, the traditional full-service, family-run resort is alive and well.

In my family, we take care of ourselves. In fact, my ancestors not only didn’t have servants, they were servants.

So when I finally went to a full-service lake resort one summer, I felt a little like an imposter.

Luckily, that only lasted about 10 minutes.

After spending many years at what quaintly is called a “self-catering’’ resort, my children and I tried something different — a vacation at Minnesota's Driftwood Resort, on Upper Whitefish Lake near Pine River.

When Driftwood opened for business in 1902, all resorts provided meals as well as other services for their guests, many of whom came from distant states and were quite affluent. It wasn’t until the 1920s, when middle-class families could head north in their new automobiles, that housekeeping cabins began to sprout all over the state.

Today, only a handful of full-service, all-inclusive resorts are left in the north woods, and even fewer are family-owned and -operated. Even among those, Driftwood is an anomaly, especially for the Brainerd area: It offers all the amenities the big resorts do — pool, golf course, meals, supervised children’s activities — but has remained medium-sized. Owned and run by the Leagjeld family since 1959, it retains an old-fashioned family atmosphere that is increasingly rare.

When we arrived late on Friday night, Tim Leagjeld was there to show us our cabin. “We missed you at dinner,’’ he said. Dinner turned out to have been prime rib and shrimp; we made it to breakfast the next day, however, and after that our table next to the fieldstone fireplace always was set with a mug for my coffee, and the waitress automatically brought my daughter a large glass of milk.

At 10 a.m., a bell rang; it was time for pony rides. Tim’s mother, Sue Leagjeld, breeds Pasofinos and was taking the littlest kids in a cart, whipping around the circular drive but slowing for anyone lying in wait with a camera, which was nearly all the parents. Then the kids who had signed up for the pingpong tournament went in to practice, and at 1:30 p.m. children and parents went to the tie-dying workshop. At 3 p.m., a capture-the-flag game kept the kids tearing around the resort for an hour and a half.

With so much going on, we barely missed the sun. It was rotten weather, gray and too chilly to swim in the lake, but we were too busy to grumble. It’s in bad weather that a full-service resort shows its value — any lake resort is a fun place on a warm, sunny day, but one with lots for kids to do on a bad day is a godsend for parents.

The next day, there were pony rides again, and at 11 a.m., my son Peter and I went up to the tennis courts, where the pro, Jane Gilchrist, fed us balls for an hour and a half. Her drills were ingenious, and I was amazed at how well Peter did. “The brain doesn’t learn in negatives,’’ she said. “You have to be careful not to say ‘Don’t.’ That’s like a stoplight to kids.’’

After tennis, the kids from a big family reunion invited Peter to stay on as their goalie in the field hockey games. Then, while he was watching the pingpong finals, I took out one of the kayaks and paddled it to Lower Hay Lake, passing a heron along the channel.

Before I left, I launched canoeists Betty and Charles Carr of Richfield, who started coming to Driftwood in 1960. Now their children are grown, but they still vacation at Driftwood.

“We like to be around the little kids,’’ Betty Carr said. “And they treat you like someone here. We’ve been to other places’’ — she smiled ruefully and shook her head — “but we came back here.’’

Darlene Thiessen of St. Cloud and her husband, David, also were regulars, returning every year with their five children, their spouses and 21 grandchildren, scattered between Minnesota, Texas and Tennessee.

“We had a vote last night — do we want to go to another place next year, because now we have older ones,’’ Thiessen said. “But no, we voted to come here.’’

Over the years, the Leagjelds have found a formula that works. “When we go to sports shows, the other resorts are always picking our brains,’’ says Ted Leagjeld, who cultivates the thousands of flowers that adorn the property and, in a Viking helmet, helps serve dinner in the Norwegian-themed dining room.

“The pony rides — we’d never be able to do without those,’’ he says. “We have parents who say their kids never stop talking about it all winter. Or bingo —  that’s just an old thing, but we couldn’t do away with it. Liquor — we’ve had guests tell us, ‘If you go to that, we’ll stop coming.’ ’’

The golf course is a lot of work, he says, but guests love it. The meals are a lot of work, too — which is why many successful full-service resorts, he says, are owned by families, who can put their kids to work in the kitchen and elsewhere.

“Those are the ones that have been passed down from one generation to another,’’ he says. “They know they can succeed in doing that kind of resort.’’

The oldest family-owned resort in the state is Ruttger’s Bay Lake Lodge, founded in 1898 by Joe and Josie Ruttger and passed on to their son Alec and his wife Myrle, their grandson Jack and his wife Ann, and now to their great-grandson Chris, the general manager.

“I’ve grown up here and learned from my parents, and I know they did the same,’’ says Chris Ruttger, who vividly remembers the “great big open smile’’ his grandfather used while shaking hands with guests. Now, however, Bay Lake Lodge has joined the ranks of the biggest resorts, with a championship golf course to allow it to compete with the big resorts in nearby Brainerd. Now professionals are in charge — a food and beverage expert, a personnel director, a retired teacher for the children’s program.

“We kind of have to bring in that expertise,’’ Ruttger says. “The trick is to do all that and still keep it personal.”

Three hours farther north, on the Gunflint Trail, Bruce Kerfoot of the Gunflint Lodge also aimed for the discriminating guest. He hired a chef to prepare sophisticated cuisine and replaced the original cabins with units that each have handmade Amish furniture, VCRs, fireplaces and either a sauna or hot tub. And all guest requests, he says, must be answered with a “yes.’’

“It adds an extra twinkle and a smile to people’s faces when they realize we will solve all their problems,’’ says Kerfoot, who graduated from Cornell’s School of Hotel Administration.

It’s a far cry from the days when his mother, legendary outdoorswoman Justine Kerfoot, ran the resort. That’s when “luxury'' meant a strip of carpet around the outhouse hole, and the first visitors in spring often had to patch the single phone line, which moose tended to snag and drag.

“She was proud that I raised the bar, but she didn’t understand it,’’ he says. “Finally she scratched her head and said, ‘I don’t give a damn if I understand it; it seems to be working, and we’ve got a lot of happy people.’ ‘’

At Gunflint, another generation is poised to take over: Bruce and Sue Kerfoot’s son Lee, a former Marriott executive, now is manager.

Up on quiet Crane Lake, near Voyageurs National Park, Goldie Pohlman has three children running her resort, founded by her parents John and Millie Nelson in 1931: Jay; Jerry and his wife, Brenda; and Jacque Eggen and her husband, Butch. Nelson’s Resort is one of the last old-time fishing resorts in the state but has survived, says Jerry Pohlman, because it anticipated modern trends with excellent food, impeccable cleanliness and a family atmosphere.

“When my grandma and grandpa started the resort, they charged $3 a day, or maybe it was $5 a day, per person, and everyone told them they were nuts, they’d never get that, it was too expensive and they’d never make it,’’ he says. “So we were different right from the beginning.’’

But, he says, the family still has had to adjust to guest demands over the years, most recently keeping the dining room open from 6:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. to accommodate fishermen.

“This world is full of choices now,’’ he says. “If we don’t give it to them, they’ll go elsewhere.’’

Chris Ruttger, who is part of a Minnesota resort dynasty — his cousin Fred Bobich runs Ruttger’s Sugar Lake Lodge in Grand Rapids, and his cousin Randy Ruttger and his wife, Tina, run Ruttger’s Birchmont Lodge in Bemidji — is well aware of escalating expectations.

“Ever since Disney World opened, people expect a more professional atmosphere,’’ he says. “The whole world is becoming more corporate. So we’re always trying not to lose sight of our personality.’’

Trip Tips: Full-service resorts

In peak season, rates for a family of four vary from $3,000 to $4,000 or more per week, including one or more meals and activities. Most offer cabin-only rates, and rates are cheaper in May, early June and late August and September. Ask about packages, midweek specials and partial weeks.

Driftwood Resort: It’s notable for beautiful grounds, fine food and activities that include free golf on the nine-hole Norske Course. Dan and Donna Leagjeld now run the resort, helped by their teen son Conner, a fishing whiz. (800) 950-3540, www.driftwoodresort.com

Gunflint Lodge: It’s a contemporary-looking resort at the end of the Gunflint Trail on Gunflint Lake, which straddles the U.S.-Canada border. It offers all the amenities, including naturalist activities, wilderness canoeing and horseback-riding. (800) 328-3325, (800) 362-5251, www.gunflint.com

Ruttger's Bay Lake Lodge: It's large, with villas, condos and cottages on lake and fairways, but has a more traditional feel. Activities include pontoon cruises, wine tastings and water skiing. (800) 450-4545, www.ruttgers.com

Nelson’s Resort: The resort on Crane Lake offers proximity to Voyageurs and a variety of packages. (800) 433-0743, www.nelsonsresort.com

Other family-run, all-inclusive resorts: Fair Hills Resort near Detroit Lakes is run by Dave, Dan and Steve Kaldahl, the brother and nephews of Driftwood’s Sue Leagjeld. It has a championship golf course, the Wildflower, and its rates, which are a little lower than the big Brainerd-area resorts, include evening entertainment, golf on a nine-hole executive course, fishing boats and the use of sailboats and windsurfers, as well as instruction. (800) 323-2849, www.fairhillsresort.com.

Lost Lake Lodge, near Nisswa, is a small, quiet boutique resort known for its fine food. (800) 450-2681, www.lostlake.com

On Gull Lake, Cragun's, (800) 272-4867, www.craguns.com, and Madden's, (800) 642-5363, www.maddens.com, are large, golf-oriented resorts. In Bemidji, Ruttger's Birchmont Lodge retains a feel of old-fashioned gentility, (888) 788-8437, www.ruttger.com. In Grand Rapids, Ruttger's Sugar Lake Lodge is a newer resort, (800) 450-4555, www.ruttgerssugarlake.com.

Other all-inclusive resorts: In Nisswa, Grand View Lodge, (800) 432-3788, www.grandviewlodge.com, www.thepines.com. Near Nisswa, Breezy Point, (800) 432-3777, www.breezypointresort.com. In Alexandria, Arrowwood, (866) 386-5263, www.arrowwoodresort.com.

Last updated on August 4, 2008