Northern Minnesota is one of the most beautiful and underrated places I have ever been.  Being a Minnesotan my mom, sister, and I would go camping at the state parks on Lake Superior where we would skip rocks on the lake and see who could stay in the water the longest. For those of you that aren’t familiar with Lake Superior, it is the coldest fresh water lake in the United States where the average temperature is about 45-50 degrees. It is also one of the largest lakes in the U.S extending into Canada with tons of amazing parks and camping opportunities. My sister and I would have contests of who could lay down in the water longest, we rarely made it past 15-20 seconds.

 

One of the most fun parts about going camping up in this area is the drive up. We would often stop at Tobie’s on Interstate 35 to get cinnamon buns and snacks, even though the drive is only about 5 hours from Minneapolis. We used to have an Alaskan Husky named Toby so I think it just became a tradition to stop there and honor our late pup. All along the way we would comment on the newest construction and sing along to Brooks and Dunn, even though we all are completely tone deaf.

 

Lake Superior is different, especially the beaches. There is no sand. If you don’t like rocky beaches, skip this lake. But, seriously, who couldn’t like rock beaches? They are fantastic and so much fun. We would play ‘rock people’ and set up entire villages made of rocks and pretend that the families were on vacation camping out like us. After spending a couple hours relaxing on the rocky, breezy beach we would head back to our site to build a campfire and cook dinner. We always got the hike in sites so our car was about 1/4-1/2 mile away in a separate parking lot. My mom and sister are all about camping as far away from everyone else as you can, they hate the hustle and bustle of the bathroom and hearing people partying all night. The best part about this is when the sun falls beneath the horizon and all the stars come out, it truly is rewarding. Sometimes we would walk down to the edge of the lake and just listen to the waves (it sounds similar to the ocean) and watch the stars.

These are some of the best family memories I have from being a child, I am a very lucky woman to have a family that loves me so much. They also love travel and adventure as much as I do, so we never just sit around and wait for life to happen. We go seek it out, and photograph it all along the way.

****The first two photos were taken on the way to the North Shore of Lake Superior, on the Mississippi River. The last three photos were taken on Lake Superior and the waterfall is just inland from a river heading towards the lake (I can’t remember the name of the river, I want to say the Baptism River).