St Croix State Park

We have been consistently traveling long distances over the past few weekends and decided it was time to take it easy and travel closer home. So we picked out the 34,000 acre St Croix state park located in Hinckley. This also happens to be the largest state park in Minnesota.
If you want to rest your tired feet and yet see some place, this would be it.
We took the 12 mile drive along the rustic road inside the heavily wooded area to see the fall colors. It was past peak and many of the leaves had already fallen or had turned brown. The entrance to the park (which was a good 4 mile) displayed the best colors.

Thro' the forest green


autumn comes to a close

I wouldn’t say, it was even half as good as Lutsen, but we can’t crib, can we.
We got up the 136-stair steep Fire tower for a scenic overview of the forest around us. There is a small landing on top of the tower to observe the whole forest and can accomodate a maximum of six people. I was very scared to climb up initially but somehow managed and it was truly worth the effort.

View from Firetower

It was almost 5:30 pm by the time we completed the trail and we wanted to go canoeing down the St.Croix River but it was closed for the day.
You can take a canoe trip ranging from one to four hours through the National Scenic St croix riverway and it costs anywhere between $30-$40. Check this website for further details. We plan to do this sometime soon.:)

towards the evening