Entry for June 19, 2008 - Terrace Oaks Park, Burnsville, MN

OK, I know what you are thinking. Just what kind of hiking opportunities are there in the suburbs of the greater Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area?

Let's begin a day earlier. I am driving to the Twin Cities for a yo-yo contest primarily, as I do every year. For most years, I get a hotel room in either Burnsville or Eagan, MN as those areas are nice, middle-class suburbs with easy access to the Mall of America, but still far enough away from the mall to not have inflated prices on hotel rooms. I stayed at the Liv-Inn Suites just off of Burnsville Pkwy this year. Not a great hotel, but not as dumpy as the Select Inn I stayed at last year, and at a lower price through Travelocity than that other place was too. That inspired me to stay over 3 nights instead of my normal 2 nights, and get in some hiking opportunity.

I really made only 1 stop during the drive there, which is at the rest stop along I-90 right on the Mississippi River in Minnesota across from LaCrosse, Wisconsin. It is very scenic here, and I think it is more fun to take this longer drive along I-90 and drive along the river instead of the more direct I-94 route. The sun was shining so nice too.

There is some expensive real-estate up there across the road.

I drove on through Rochester (and a very quick gas stop) and took US 52 north to Burnsville. I also get to avoid most of the urban freeway system this way too.

The next morning I drove down the road to Terrace Oaks Park for a hike and some geocaching opportunity. I actually am familiar with this park as 3 years ago I logged a cache here. It is exceptionally large for being within an urban area, and features many miles of hiking and mountain biking trail.

The first geocache was not too far down the trail.

It's hiding in the end of the log. I did forget to take a photo of the actual geocache, but it was a smallish-sized tupperware box.

I walked along, bypassed one cache that looked too far off the trail, then navigated to the site of a micro-sized cache. Maybe you can see part of it sticking out in the photo?

See it now as I retrieve it?

A pose with my official geocaching watch.

A micro like that has no pen inside, and just a log sheet to sign on. Logged my visit and on to another. I brought a travel-bug with me that I rescued from Portage, Wis right before the flooding. The next geocache was located right at the other parking area on the far-side of the park. Too many people around, so I walked away from that one and wandered down the trail for another possible geocache. Still wanting to find a normal-sized one to put that travel-bug in.

This one hiding in the dead tree looks about right...

There are some travel-bugs and a geocoin already in there, so I'll trade my TB for a geocoin inside. The one I left is the race-car on the right.

Covered up better than I found.

OK, I'm getting tired, and I'm on the opposite end of the park from my transportation. Let's find a trail leading back.

A little diversion at a pond along the way.

Put over 5 miles on the odometer this morning.

And here's the route walked superimposed on a USGS aerial photo of the park.

Back to my room to shower again, and off to Wayzata for some watch shopping before finishing the day at a BBQ in Brooklyn Park. What a day, and the yo-yo contest was still a day away.