Itasca State Park...

We spent the last four days camping at Itasca State Park, neither Lukie or Lex had any memory of being there (though they were at the park when they were very little), so we had to fix that...we got to the park on Saturday and explored the less popular areas of the park avoiding the crowd...

We visited the several thousand year old Indian Mounds (they are there, it's a bit grown in)...

And read about their history...

They learned how felled trees were moved during the winter in the logging days...

Saw a replica of the Wegmann Cabin (a pioneer era cabin that served as a store, post office and other things)...

And then saw the ruins or remains of the cabin...all that is left is the foundation...

Then it was time for dinner...Lukie is pretty happy cooking hot dogs as long as he can be done when the first dog is done...

It was such a busy day that Lukie fell asleep in the hammock (something he repeated every night)...

Before breakfast the next morning, we went to the headwaters area to avoid crowds (we were there for about 20 minutes before anyone else showed up)...Lex jumped at the chance to walk through the Mississippi River...

And then went to the headwaters...

Lukie was the first to walk across...

Lex went second and I followed...

This is Lukie checking out a crayfish he found...you might be able to see it...

I suggested that they walk down the river to the bridge on our way out...as they left I said "see you in New Orleans" and got a chuckle out of them and the older couple that had shown up...

Lukie might be showing a little too much leg...

After we ate breakfast, we left the park to explore a couple of areas nearby (future posts) and took our usual pictures at state parks new to us...

At night, it was time for marshmallow roasting...Lukie can't have any (because of his braces), but he enjoys making them...

Lex likes eating them...

And making them, but I'm pretty sure that more were lost to the fire than those that made it to her stomach...

Our camp at night, notice that someone is in the hammock...

The next day we took the 10 mile Wilderness Drive to see some former record trees...

This white pine truck was huge...

Learned about an ancient bison kill site, which Lukie thought was pretty cool...

Then it was time to take the 3.5 mile hiking club trail (we added another two miles when we took a loop trail through a bog along the way)...

I'm always a ways behind them...they haven't figured out to pace themselves yet...

It was a nice hike, great temperatures and we saw may eight other people...

We got the password and am now approaching 100 miles hiked throughout the state park system and another patch...

Before we left the final morning, we went back to the headwaters...this time there was no way Lukie was going to let Lex be the only one who crossed the river here...

Took our selfie...

And walked across the river again...

Lex had a rough time of it though...she fell three times (not getting very wet) and got frustrated...she told Lukie she was never going to do that again...

So she took a break...

I had a little talk with her to calm her down and told her that we weren't going to leave the park until she made it across the river again...so she tried again...

And made it this time...the DNR worker congratulated her (he had seen her fall a couple of times).  Funny story about the workers, they go to the headwaters every morning to clear out the reeds, sticks, etc. against the rocks.  Turns out there is a beaver who is trying to stop the river, the workers said that if they didn't clear the reeds, the river would be a trickle within a week...

Lex was barely wet...but happen she made it across...

This was our last view of Lake Itasca...

Not a bad way to spend a few days...making memories...