We made a good departure from Duluth, after dumping right at our campsite and hooking up the Jeep. The weather was overcast again, and Joe had put on some warmer clothes including jeans. I was still in denial about fall arriving, and wore shorts--but I did put on socks and sneakers for the first time, and had to wear a long sleeve top and a sweatshirt. It was definitely getting cooler! We got onto US 53, and that was our route for about 100 miles. We stopped for lunch at a big shopping center in the town of Virginia, MN (another state-state combination name), where we were surprised to see an Einstein's Bagels restaurant. But we resisted temptation so that my diet wouldn't be immediately sabotaged-- I can't resist bagels! Instead we ate in the RV. Then after walking the dog, we stopped across the highway so I could drop my postcards into the mail at a post box in front of the grocery store. And then, back on the road.
The only stop after that was a quick one at a ranger station for the Superior National Forest. I was hoping for some maps and information, but unless I spent $14, the map I needed was not available. I also found out that there is a legal dispute between the US Government and the state of Minnesota about who owns the forest immediately surrounding the National Park--i.e. in the area where we would be. The ranger told me i could NOT camp "dispersed camping" style (i.e. anywhere in the forest that i wanted) because the state did not allow it. (If it is federal land, it IS allowed--but there is no definite decision as to whose land it is.) I had hoped to find a free dispersed spot, but decided that was not going to work.
I could see we were likely to be arriving at the Visitor Center at Lake Kabetogama at 4pm and it closes at 5:00. Unfortunately, we missed the turn, adding 20 more minutes to our drive. We arrived at 4:30, after passing another Visitor Center at Ash River. I said as we passed, "Should we go there instead?" But Joe said no, let's just go on to Kabetogama. Well, after missing the turn and arriving in a cranky mood, we found that the Visitor Center at Lake Kabetogama is CLOSED from Wed-Saturday. The park website did not mention that important bit of information! So the Ash River site IS open Wednesday-Saturday (the other one is open Sunday-Tuesday), and we could have stopped at that one.
As we made this unhappy discovery, the sky opened and we had yet another brief torrent of rain--something we've just started taking for granted up here lately. We decided to camp at the nearest place-- Woodenfrog State Forest Campground. Well, that was the best decision we made all day. Our campsite here is surrounded by nothing but trees (all the sites are spread apart, and almost no one is here anyway, so we are all alone.) The lake is nearby, but we are just in the trees, and it smells great and is so beautiful.
It's a primitive site, though-- no electric or on-site water. So Joe decided to run the generator so he could use the microwave to defrost something for dinner. That's when he discovered that sometime in the past week or so, the generator's exhaust pipe had fallen off. Unfortunately, that makes us leery of using the generator, since the exhaust will be right under the RV and is toxic. We ended up having hot dogs for dinner, since that required no defrosting (just put them in a skillet and cook!) But now we need to find a new exhaust pipe.
We woke up and decided on a plan for the day. The site fee was good until 4pm. So instead of taking the RV, we drove the Jeep down the road (30 minutes) back to the Ash River Visitor Center. We spent about an hour there--first watching a video about the park, and then going down to the lake. It is absolutely gorgeous up here, really. The park is mostly water, and most of the activities are boating, or boat rides. The boat rides are over for the season. We don't have a boat. (We weren't going to start kayaking at this point-- we BOTH put on jeans this morning and wore sweatshirts all day... the temperature is in the 60s.) But we did spend time admiring the views of Lake Kabetogama and the peaceful atmosphere of the park.
After an hour or so, we headed back north (all this is back and forth on Route 53), past the RV's location, up to International Falls, MN. This is the northernmost point of the state, and across the river (where, supposedly, there are falls, but you can't see them because of the international border crossing) is Canada. Our goal was the NAPA, to see if they had a part that would work for the generator. Unfortunately they did not. I made another disappointing discovery as well-- the Walmart which I thought was in International Falls turns out to be in Canada! A mere mile and another country away. Between Covid and not having passports, we were not going to cross the border. So we stayed in town, looked at a couple of other auto repair places (no one had what Joey is looking for), ate some lunch (BBQ brisket at the snack bar in one of the auto repair places), went to the grocery store, stopped at the post office to mail more postcards which I'd bought at the park, and finally at around 4pm, came back to the campground. There, we paid for another night, and went for a walk in the woods.
Like I said, this state forest campground is beautiful. The lake is right here, and we found a lakeside path to walk on as well as the trail in the woods. So we have photos and we are relaxed and since we have such a flexible agenda, oh well. It was just "one of those days." Gotta have them sometimes! Tomorrow we will get up early and head for Bemidji and the headwaters of the Mississippi, and then, we'll see where we end up for the night. After that: book it for Montana.
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