September 2001
"Located along the picturesque St. Croix National Scenic Riverway, Wisconsin's oldest state park provides scenic views of the riverway and the steep-sided gorge known as Dalles of the St. Croix. An Ice Age Interpretive Center features a 20-minute film, photographs, murals and information about the great glaciers."
St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin
http://dnr.wi.gov/org/land/parks/specific/interstate/
This is by far the best campsite we've ever had. It was situated on the end of a cal du sac, along the St. Croix river. This was the only site on the cal du sac, so we had plenty of privacy. It was a huge site and a quick walk down a hill and you were on large flat rocks right on the river.
We didn't start our trip at the park though. Since this was the first time we traveled this far, we decided to get a hotel room the first night. We stayed in Bloomington, Minnesota in a very basic hotel room. I found the cheapest room in the area. Since we were so close to Mall of America we went to check the mall out on our way to the park. We weren't there very long and everyone made fun of me for buying a shirt with one sleeve.
Another thing that made this trip so memorable, was it was Sarah's first trip. This was the first of our many adventures together. She was also our first medical mishap. We had just started out on our drunken nature walk when she took a sip of her beer and was stung in the lip by a bee. I had a box of benadryl in my camping stuff and my mom had written on it take two for bee sting. What she hadn't taken into consideration was that we were drinking. Sarah was out like a light. She woke up hours later in a dark tent by herself and freaked out before realizing what was going on. The rest of us continued on our walk. There was some pretty rough terrain we had to cross. Andy was helping me up a cliff and kicked me in the face. Sarah's sting injures were worse. This was a great park and I would highly recommend it to anyone. We sat by the river and had campfires on the rocks, explored the cliffs, and had a great time hangin out at this park.
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| Fabulous hotel we stayed at in Bloomington, MN |
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| Rochelle |
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| Ahhh stop taking pictures of me! |
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| Mall of America |
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| Sarah |
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| Andy and Chris bored out of their minds while I shopped for the one armed shirt. |
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| Me, Sarah and Rochelle at the theme park in the mall |
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| Driving to the park. Not sure if this is St. Paul or Minneapolis |
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Site #40
Best site ever! |
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| Chillin on the site |
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| St. Croix River |
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| Lake O'Dalles |
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St. Croix River
I believe this was down by our site. |
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| Creek that ran past our site |
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| Sarah, me and Rochelle by the lake |
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| Me by the river. This was right below the site. The only downfall to this site was you could hear semi trucks jake braking on the bridge above me at night. |
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| Chillin!!! This is what it's all about! |
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| The gang |
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| Start of our nature hike |
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| More hiking. |
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Old Man O'Dalles
There's a face in the cliff, although it's kind of hard to see in this picture. |
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| This park was on both sides of the state line. In fact we went to the MN side first thinking we were at the WI park. |
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| Rochelle and I hiking on the cliffs. |
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| Taylor Falls Queen |
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| An old fireplace in the woods. |
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| Hangin by the fire. Notice we've got two fire pits pushed together. Maybe this site used to be two sites accounting for why it was so big. |
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| Rochelle by the camping post. |
