September 2023, Northern MN

Thursday, September 21st

We typically like to do a Northern MN trip every year. When really depends on if we want to go for the changing of the leaves in September or for a little cooler / less people birthday trip in October. This year we decided to go for the leaves and a little late anniversary trip. We loaded up and left after work getting to Duluth around 6pm! Time for some chow. We went to Vita Pizza which is our go to and favorite wood fired pizza in Minnesota. After this we checked into our hotel, The Suites and Waterfront Plaza. We dropped our stuff and walked around the boardwalk the rest of the night.

Friday, September 22nd

We woke up, had free breakfast and hit the road! Headed up Hwy 61 we stopped at a pull off to get a glimpse of Split Rock Lighthouse. It was a little foggy but still pretty and worth a short stop. After Split Rock we went up to Beaver Bay and then headed inland on Lax Lake Rd. We stopped at a boat launch on Lax Lake to just take it all in! It was very pretty and quiet. Then we made our way to George H. Crosby Manitou State Park and did a hike to Manitou river. The leaves were super pretty and the trail was great. We just hung out at the river for a while taking pictures and trying to take some selfies with the pretty cascading waterfall in the background. Then we went to Caribou Falls and did that hike which we like a lot. Pretty easy trail and then down a bunch of stairs to get to the bottom of the waterfall. After that we went to Britton Peak which is another one that we do almost every time we come up. Next we went to North Shore Winery and head a couple beverages. The wine was.. Well Minnesota wine. The Cider was just okay too. The grounds were really cool though! We headed to our lodging for the night which was Eagle Ridge at Lutsen. It is clean, in a good location and decently priced for the North Shore. After putting our stuff away we went to the Gondola to go up to the top of Moose Mountain. There is a cafeteria at the top with overpriced appetizers and drinks. After we got back down we went back to the room and hung out for the rest of the night. The fog was pretty dense as you can see in the pictures pretty much at every where we went today which was kind of a bummer because the leaves were at peak color.

Saturday, September 23rd

Today we woke up and hit the road early to do some more inland scenic cruising. We started by going up Caribou Trail to Caribou Trail Trailhead to get a look from Caribou Lake Viewpoint on the White Sky Rock trail. It was a pretty rigorous hike for first thing in the morning. This was a phenomenal hike as it was early and the sun was just kinda warming stuff up and burning off some fog. We got to the top and just enjoyed it for a while. Then we continued our cruise through some back roads and parked at Hidden falls off Pike Lake Rd. The rest of the day we just kind of cruised through some more backroads, went down to see the Lutsen Lodge and hang out on the beach. We then decided to do the Gondola again but it was a poor call as the weather turned and it rained the rest of the day. We hung out on the covered balcony at our room and ate, played games and had some snacks and beverages.