Day 0 and Day 1
Labor day long weekend is the last long holidays before Thanksgiving. This time I thought I would visit Minnesota. So I planned a trip to Voyageurs National Park. It is about 10hrs drive from my place. As the name suggested this park is primarily built for accessing through boats. As I could not do much of the water activities, I thought a visit to a very popular state park in Michigan - Porcupine Mountains State Park (a.k.a Porkies) would compensate that :)
I did few hiking trails in Voyageurs. Most craziest things were colorful mushrooms. They were everywhere. I was really fascinated by their gorgeous colors. Not many ppl actually were hiking in those trails, so I enjoyed the serene beauty of mother nature. It has been raining during that week, so the color of the leaves in the trees, color of the moss and of course the smell of the soil after the fresh rain were spectacular.
To my surprise, two of my old friends (who now live in Minnesota) agreed to join on a very short notice. They brought a bbq kit with them and after our hike we enjoyed bbqing in a picnic area. Oh! yes, it was lamb :)
I camped in the Echo lake area. As usual I got there when it was dark :P When I started to put my tent down, it started to drizzle. After an hour that drizzle became a thunderstorm. My poor tent somehow survived the whole night (I was surprised). I never realized that it could rain so hard !! This national park has five pack of wolves. So sleeping inside my tent with thunderstorm outside and listening to wolves howling -- it was quite an experience !
Next day I met Tim, Bret and another friend of them. They were from northwest side of Minnesota.
Tim and Bret were actually taking preparation for their upcoming marathon. I also met with the only bar owner in the town, Dan. He was very nice and kind enough to let me use his telephone to make a call.
Here are the pictures from the park Flickr Album
Day 2 and Day 3
Next day I drove another 5.5 hrs to reach Porcupine Mountains State Park in Upper peninsula, MI. This is a state park right next to lake superior, the largest of the great lakes in North America. It was five already, so I quickly put down my stuffs in the designated camping spot and started hiking so that I can see some waterfalls.
The campground was beautiful. It is in the west side of the park and called Presque Isle campground.
But again thunderstorm came to sing with me but this time with a larger musical band. Around 2am in the morning I discovered that I was floating with my sleeping pad inside my tent, water everywhere. I was cold too. So I had to abandon the plan to sleeping inside the tent for rest of the night. Instead I went and slept inside my car :)
Next morning I did few hikes. Among them, Lake of the clouds was really pretty. Around 3pm I got really hungry and was looking for food inside the park. But I was unable to find a place to eat. I planned to drive a bit outside (towards Silver city) and discovered an awesome roadside food stall "Curbside Kitchen". Foods were delicious. This was a homemade food joint that run by Nancy and Bob, who were super nice.
After that, I went to the beach along the superior lake and Iron river. The color of the water at the junction were really cool. Then I went inside the park again and did my final trail to the summit peak observation tower to take a look at the park from high above. It was very beautiful. I could sense that the fall has started and the color of the leaves will begin to change soon. Undoubtedly, this park will be a gorgeous place to witness the fall colors. I got back home around 12 am and with my leftover lunch I finished the day with a great dinner :)
Here are the pictures from the park Flickr Album
Labor day long weekend is the last long holidays before Thanksgiving. This time I thought I would visit Minnesota. So I planned a trip to Voyageurs National Park. It is about 10hrs drive from my place. As the name suggested this park is primarily built for accessing through boats. As I could not do much of the water activities, I thought a visit to a very popular state park in Michigan - Porcupine Mountains State Park (a.k.a Porkies) would compensate that :)
I did few hiking trails in Voyageurs. Most craziest things were colorful mushrooms. They were everywhere. I was really fascinated by their gorgeous colors. Not many ppl actually were hiking in those trails, so I enjoyed the serene beauty of mother nature. It has been raining during that week, so the color of the leaves in the trees, color of the moss and of course the smell of the soil after the fresh rain were spectacular.
To my surprise, two of my old friends (who now live in Minnesota) agreed to join on a very short notice. They brought a bbq kit with them and after our hike we enjoyed bbqing in a picnic area. Oh! yes, it was lamb :)
I camped in the Echo lake area. As usual I got there when it was dark :P When I started to put my tent down, it started to drizzle. After an hour that drizzle became a thunderstorm. My poor tent somehow survived the whole night (I was surprised). I never realized that it could rain so hard !! This national park has five pack of wolves. So sleeping inside my tent with thunderstorm outside and listening to wolves howling -- it was quite an experience !
Next day I met Tim, Bret and another friend of them. They were from northwest side of Minnesota.
Tim and Bret were actually taking preparation for their upcoming marathon. I also met with the only bar owner in the town, Dan. He was very nice and kind enough to let me use his telephone to make a call.
Here are the pictures from the park Flickr Album
Day 2 and Day 3
Next day I drove another 5.5 hrs to reach Porcupine Mountains State Park in Upper peninsula, MI. This is a state park right next to lake superior, the largest of the great lakes in North America. It was five already, so I quickly put down my stuffs in the designated camping spot and started hiking so that I can see some waterfalls.
The campground was beautiful. It is in the west side of the park and called Presque Isle campground.
But again thunderstorm came to sing with me but this time with a larger musical band. Around 2am in the morning I discovered that I was floating with my sleeping pad inside my tent, water everywhere. I was cold too. So I had to abandon the plan to sleeping inside the tent for rest of the night. Instead I went and slept inside my car :)
Next morning I did few hikes. Among them, Lake of the clouds was really pretty. Around 3pm I got really hungry and was looking for food inside the park. But I was unable to find a place to eat. I planned to drive a bit outside (towards Silver city) and discovered an awesome roadside food stall "Curbside Kitchen". Foods were delicious. This was a homemade food joint that run by Nancy and Bob, who were super nice.
After that, I went to the beach along the superior lake and Iron river. The color of the water at the junction were really cool. Then I went inside the park again and did my final trail to the summit peak observation tower to take a look at the park from high above. It was very beautiful. I could sense that the fall has started and the color of the leaves will begin to change soon. Undoubtedly, this park will be a gorgeous place to witness the fall colors. I got back home around 12 am and with my leftover lunch I finished the day with a great dinner :)
Here are the pictures from the park Flickr Album
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