Off again but staying closer to home this time. Only about 1 1/2 hours north of the cities is Mille Lacs Kathio State Park. Pretty good size park with good camping - electric or non-electric sites only plus cabins and backpacking sites.
The little snapping turtles are coming out of their eggs and trying to find a home. Have saved about 5 of them so far, but sorry to say we have seen more than that dead either from roadway accidents or possibly drowning from the rains last night as we did have a lot of rain.
Got here on Monday afternoon and usually when we get to a state park, the site is normally vacant (you have till 4pm to move out). The folks in our site didn't roll out till 3:55. They actuall y were wanting to extend the stay and the ranger told them they had to leave as we were waiting on them. Don't think they were too happy about leaving as they tripped the reset on the breakers in the power box. Normally you shut off the power but you don't trip the reset. Anyway we got in and setup.
Tuesday, we took about 2 mile hike down along the river and back. Since any river / lakes within (or border) the state park, you can fish for free. Rum River borders the park along with a couple of hard to access lakes. The river was way low and no easy access with it that low. Oh well, I only do catch / release anyway.
The campground is very nice - big sites, shower house is very clean, as is the park. There are a few skeeters coming out around sunset, but you can expect that in any Minnesota state park.
Enjoyed just walking around the park and the different sections of the campground. There are some really big non-electric sites. Our site was a pull through - that being you do not need to back in to the site. Not a bad site however Gus was not happy as his chair faced the woods and not the road. He likes to see who is going up and down the road.
Wednesday we took off to Mille Lacs Native American Museum and Trading Post. It's a Minnesota Hisotrorical Society site so we got in for free. Very good tour and lot of information on how the early Ojibway settled the land. Well worth the time to visit and take the tour.
On the way back, we stopped at the firetower that is located there at the park. Deb has scampered up three or four of them here in Minnesota. Me on the other hand, am happy to climb up to the first level and view the tree branches. There is something about my size 11 shoes and the the 9 inch boards used for steps that just do not compute for me. Plus I am not a fan of heights and that just adds to it.
It should be mentioned, the original name was Mille Lacs Izatys and not Kathio.
How "Izatys" Became "Kathio"
- The Explorer: French explorer Daniel Greysolon, Sieur du Lhut visited the region and recorded the native village name as "Izatys".
- The Handwriting Error: His poor handwriting caused later readers to mistake the "Iz" at the start of the word for a capital "K".
- The Final Corruption: Further transcription mistakes turned the rest of the word into "athio," creating the composite word "Kathio," which has no actual translation or meaning
Spent the remainder of the day just sitting around, enjoying the campfire, playing Yatzee, and taking Gus around the campground.
Headed home today, 10 September, and noticed that price of gas has jumped. We saw regular unleaded at 4.39 / gallon at all the Casey's with diesel at 5.99 / gallon. Lowest I saw coming back was 4.19 a gallon at a SA.
