Minnesota - Day 13 - north to Detroit Lakes

Country Campground, Detroit Lakes

Tuesday, 13 September 2022

today's route

As you can see, we drove pretty much directly north by northwest, heading up to an area I'd heard was overloaded with lakes.  Specifically, the town of Detroit Lakes is in one of 2 areas in Minnesota that has more than 400 lakes within 25 miles.  So, yeah, overloaded.

I crossed the Mississippi River which, here, is very wide.  I mention it because we're only one or two hundred miles from its source, so it was a surprise to see it so large already.

Google had given me some convoluted directions for navigating the Monticello area: go right here for a mile, then go left on a road that would acquire 4 different names along its 4 miles, then turn left on another road.  But I discovered those roads didn't exist.  At all.  Fortunately, I noticed that the last left turn, according to Google, would be one that I'd crossed back before I'd started the convolutions.  So I turned around and went back and turned on that road and that's all I had to do.  What on earth could Google have possibly had in mind with those directions?  I really do wish I could meet one of their algorithm writers so I could show him the bizarre results this program has been giving me.

I passed through towns as small as Aldritch, pop. 35, and as large as St. Cloud, pop. 65,842.

I'd planned a stop at Little Falls, "Where the Mississippi Pauses."  It used to "pause" because of the little series of waterfalls that were noticed centuries ago by Native Americans, and as early as 1807 by explorer Zebulon Pike; now it "pauses" at the gates of the dam that gave the city hydroelectric power, before continuing through the dam's chutes.  

I'd intended to stop here because I'd noticed they have a dog park.  Well, actually, Google's map of the town said there was one there, but someplace else online said there wasn't, and then I found a local news item from a couple of years ago saying the local city council had approved funding to fence in a new dog park, so I took a chance.  And it was there.

It was a nice big park with trees and lots of places for Dext to sniff.  And after a bit a young woman with a black border collie type joined us.  She said she'd had the dog only a few days and at first was reluctant to let her off the leash while Dext was there.  But the dogs clearly wanted to play with each other - at least, it was clear to me and I assured her that's what she was seeing - so she let Athena off the leash and both dogs had a great time chasing each other around the park a few times.

Driving to the park, Google took us to a street with a steep downhill to it, and at the top was a sign saying, "No Sliding On Hill By Police Order."  I'm guessing that's a winter-oriented sign.

I saw a billboard that said "Great Balsa Fire!" and "Rapala" and had a drawing of a fishing lure.  None of that meant anything to me - I just thought the pun was funny - but I now know that Rapala is a long-time name in fishing lures, and especially those made of balsa wood.  Sportsfishing must be a big deal around here.

I heard on the radio that Canadian wildfires are causing problems for the upper third of Minnesota because of smoke messing up air quality.  I don't expect to be up there until the end of the week, so maybe the Canadians will have gotten the fires under control.

The road took me through a town called Motley, pop. 680, established in 1880, followed by a town called Staples, pop. 2,989.  An odd pair of names.  A historical marker said Motley got its name either in honor of John Motley, American diplomat, or when a railroad official saw the group of frontiersmen gathered at the depot he exclaimed, "What a motley crew!"  (You get to pick the reason.)  And Staples was named for a timber harvesting family.

The whole drive today consisted of small towns alongside trains, lakes of all sizes everywhere, and mixed woods with just a hint of yellow coming in.

The town of New York Mills, pop. 1,199, had an auction with a very large parking lot that was completely full.  I don't know what they were auctioning.  And I can't figure out where the town's name came from.  Apparently there's a town in the state of New York with the same name, but this town in MN was settled primarily by people from Finland, so I wouldn't have thought they'd have brought this name halfway across the continent with them.

I saw a billboard with a picture of a red barn with a Tin Man lookalike standing in the barn door and a caption that read: "Ever see a bot on a farm or ranch?  Neither have we."  It's an ad for Farm Bureau Financial Services, apparently about insurance.  But I honestly can't see the connection.

The town of Frazee claims to have the World's Largest Turkey, but it wasn't along the road and I decided not to go hunt for it.  I did see some large chicken farms.

Fortunately, despite the way the day started with lousy Google directions, their directions to tonight's campground were perfect.  This was good because it wasn't exactly easy to get to, there was nothing around but lakes and cropfields, and I didn't see a single sign.  I got lucky.

But the campground, once I got there, was pleasant and comfortable, and these days I don't ask much more than that.