Heading to the headwaters

– Everything is an Adventure: Column by Julia Wolf –

For the first time in nearly eight years, I got to take a multi-day vacation with my parents. Traveling was something we made time for every year, through my middle and high school years, and we got to see a large chunk of the United States and Canada, with our road trips.

My dad decided last year, that he would like to see the headwaters of the Mississippi River. Since that is just in Minnesota, and people travel much farther than we would have to in order to see the landmark, we decided we should go. At the time, I had a Minnesota State Parks pass and suggested we go before that expires.

A February trip got nixed, because apparently, my dad didn’t just want to see the headwaters, he wanted to walk in them. Yeah, I didn’t want to walk in a lake in Minnesota, in the dead of winter, either.

When our schedules aligned over Labor Day weekend and the weather was supposed to be nice, we decided we better go. My mom did reserve a hotel room for the first night, because I wasn’t sure we’d be able to find one last-minute, on a holiday weekend. For everything else, we decided to fly by the seat of our pants.

We stopped at Mille Lacs Kathio State Park on our way to Lake Itasca, for a picnic lunch and to walk around for a while. I camped at the park last fall, so I knew what the highlights were and made sure we hit them.

We did a couple little nature loops, saw the archeological dig sites and climbed the fire tower for a view of the nearby lake.

There is apparently a pretty large animal population at the park, because this time, we saw a woodchuck, a deer and a bunch of different kinds of birds. Last time I was there, I saw a beaver swimming in a pond aptly named the beaver pond and some grouse flew up beside me when I was walking the trails.

From there, we headed to our hotel near Lake Itasca, so we could get an earlier start at looking over the park the next day.

Lake Itasca is really pretty, so we stopped at lookout points along the east side of the lake, as we headed toward the headwaters. I also walked in the water while we were at the swimming area. Like any true summer vacation, I tracked some sand home with me in my shoes after that adventure.

The headwaters center and the headwaters itself were both popular over the holiday weekend. It was kind of cool to be able to walk across the Mississippi River, right where it starts. They had larger rocks and a log to walk across, but with the beautiful weather, many people opted to just walk through the water.

On the way back toward home, we stopped at Jay Cooke State Park. It was absolutely gorgeous, with waterfalls and a swinging bridge.

The final stop was at Banning State Park, where we walked along the river, learning about the history of quarrying in the area, until we reached a little waterfall.

After visiting four parks in three days, we were ready to relax at home. It was great to get to travel with my family again and see a bunch of new places.