Where:  St. Cloud Campground & RV Park
When:  August 1 to September 6, 2022 (~ five weeks)
Cost: $851.5 for full hook-ups (site 27; back-in)
Bucket List:  Munsinger Gardens

We spent around five weeks in Central Minnesota near St. Cloud in the summer of 2022.  Here some tips on what to do when in the area:

Buy Bug Spray

Minnesota is known as the Land of 10,000 Lakes.  It’s also home to a 10,000,0000,000,000 mosquitos, gnats, and other pesky bugs.  Like a gazillion of them – ALL of them wherever WE happened to be.   Our solution? When we ventured outdoors, we found that DEET-free Kids Off worked reasonably well.  We used it because we figured it would be dog-licking-friendly as well.  The product is made with Rosemary Oil, Citronella Oil, Geranium Oil, Cedarwood Oil, Peppermint Oil, Lemongrass Oil, and Soybean Oil so we smelled nice too.

Stroll Through Munsinger & Clemens Gardens

If there was ever a doubt that I am becoming my mother, that doubt was erased after visiting Munsinger-Clemens Gardens.   I spent multiple hours there on multiple days, admiring the gardens.  The best part:  these gardens are open to the public and are ABSOLUTELY free.

Munsinger Gardens lies directly along the Mississippi River bank.   The land was formerly a sawmill, but then St. Cloud acquired the land around 1915.  When Joseph Munsinger (1876-1946) became the Superintendent of Parks for the City of St. Cloud in 1930, he had the idea of creating the garden as part of a WPA project.   The city named the park after him in 1938.   Today, the winding flower-filled paths meander through hovering pine and other trees.  There’s even a “timekeeper’s cabin,” wishing well, and some resident peacocks!

A city street aptly named Riverside Drive separates Munsinger Gardens (14 acres) from Clemens Gardens (7 acres), which is accessible with a short climb.   This garden is named in honor of Bill and Virginia Clemens, who lived just across the street.  The couple donated the land to the city and then funded the construction of a rose garden there in 1990.   Although Ms. Clemens suffered from multiple sclerosis, she was able to visit the gardens and could see it from her window.   Today, there is a beautiful memorial statue of the couple.  While Munsinger Gardens is considered an “informal” garden, Clemens Gardens includes six formal gardens – a rose garden, rest area garden, formal garden, white garden, perennial garden, and treillage garden.   All of the gardens but the white garden contain a fountain.  

Munsinger-Clemens gardens is a true central Minnesota treasure!

Explore Quarry Park

Located in Waite Park (on the western edge of St. Cloud), Quarry Park is a 684-acre nature preserve that was once home to over a dozen granite quarries.  A $5/vehicle permit is required to enter the park.  We opted for the $25/year annual pass, which is free for veterans. 

The labyrinth of trails within the park is quite extensive.   Luckily, online and paper maps are available at the park.  In addition, there are several maps on signs located throughout the park.   There’s both a summer map and a winter map so make sure you get the correct one!

A historical section (#18 on the map), featuring several old quarry tools, is located near the western edge of the parking lot.  Here, we learned that granite is heavy – like REALLY heavy. Granite weighs about 180 lbs/cubic foot (about the size of a small microwave oven) – so the equipment to move the granite around is massive.  The equipment on display includes:

• A quarry derrick

  The 85-foot tall derrick can lift up to 20,000 pounds of payload! The derrick is fastened to a concrete slab poured in 1946, and the the timbers were made of single-piece 100-year-old Douglas Fir harvested from the Oregon coastal range. The trees were then planed into 15-inch square beams 85-feet long.  The derrick could rotate 360° if it were set up for that range of motion.  The round wheel at the bottom of the mast is called the “bull wheel” and allowed the derrick operator to turn the mast and boom arm.  The mast has a steel pin on the top which is in the middle of a circular “spider,” which is a lubricated spindle that pivots within the halo ring while held erect by the seven steel cables called “guy lines.”  The base of the mast has another pin which is lubricated within a socket to allow the mast to rotate freely when the bull wheel is engaged and pivoting.  The guy lines are anchored into 1.8 billion year-old bedrock by staples. These steel u-shaped pins are drilled into the bedrock at an angle so that when there is a load on the boom arm the cable loop slides down the shank and pinches against the bedrock   The derrick on display is called the Liberty Derrick, which was used by the Liberty Granite Company. The company founded in 1924 and closed sometime in the 1950s.  The Stearnes County Park puts the old derrick to use twice a year in a public celebration.

• A saw blade

  The saw blade measures 11.5 feet in diameter with 144 teeth from a processing plant that cut granite.  Each tooth has a silver-soldered segment made with synthetic diamonds embedded in them.  These diamonds are harder than granite and could slowly cut the granite blocks into slabs.

There’s also a few derrick anchors, a metal skip that the rocks were dumped into (the skips were converted from old boilers), and a tip cart that took the rock up to the grout pile.   A derrick house (more of a wooden shack) housed the drum hoists and brakes that control the derrick’s mast, boom arm and hook.  An operator would sit in the shack controlling the derrick based on signals provided by a second operator standing outside.

In this section of the park, we learned about the LARGE grout piles scattered throughout the park.   The stones on these grout piles were deemed flawed by the quarry company.  Granite might be discarded because of irregular colors, varying crystal sizes, or tiny fractures within the rock.   The stone products made from granite at this site were for dimensional stones so that if there were any blemishes, the rock was discarded.  For example, if an architect ordering that type of granite said that no crystal size should be larger than a dime and the stone did not meet that specification, the stone was discarded onto the grout pile.  As much as 80% of the stone quarried went into these grout piles!  Some of them are 40-60 feet high.

After the quarries closed in the 1950s, the park was a well-known but unregulated party spot called Hundred Acres Quarry.   In 1992, Stearns County purchased this site from Cold Spring Granite Company, and the park opened in 1998.  The park is the largest in the Stearns County Parks system.

The quarries themselves are worth exploring.   For example, Quarry 13 features interesting basalt dikes that interact with St. Cloud Red Granite .  

In addition to learning about the granite quarrying process, the park contains opportunities for a number of outdoor activities.  

• Hiking.  We came primarily to hike, and there are many walking trails to chose from.   There are some interesting features on some of the trails as well.  For example, to get to Quarry 2 from the parking lot, we walked across a creaking and floating boardwalk.   A prairie section contains both native and non-native species of grasses and wildflowers including asters and coneflowers.   The prairie undergoes a planned burning every 2-4 years.  Near Quarry 8 (“Treboske”), stairs to an overlook provides great views of the surrounding grassland and wetland areas.

• Swimming.  The most popular activity in Quarry Park by far, swimming is permitted in quarries 2 (“Melrose Deep 7”) and 11.  Dozens of kids (and some adults) dive from the cliff-like rock piles into the large swimming holes.  Many people are just on the water in tubes and other floatation devices.  There’s also a small beach, picnic shelter, and restrooms located near the swimming areas.  There are no lifeguards present so visitors must swim at their own risk.

• Fishing. Fishing (mostly trout) is permitted at quarries 1 (“Red 6”), 4 (“Oberg”), 7 (“Thielman”), 9 , 13, 14, and 18.  We only saw a few fishers during our visits to the park though.   A Minnesota fishing license is required to fish at the park.

• Biking. While biking is allowed on most trails in the park, we only saw a couple of bikers.  Most of the trails are dotted with teenagers in swimming clothes who aren’t paying much attention so bikers beware!  There are three designated mountain biking trails that include riding on sloped, rugged, and rocky terrain.

• Rock Climbing.  Rock climbing is available near the Liberty Derrick and Quarry 20. A special permit is required. 

• Scuba Diving.  Scuba diving is allowed in quarries 1, 13, and 18 (“Benzi 14”).  Diving is only allowed by certified divers, and a special permit is also required.

Quarry Park is a favorite of the locals, and it is easy to see why.   It’s a unique area that will appeal to both the history buffs and adventure seekers.

Bike the Lake Wobegon Trail

When deciding where we wanted to stay in central Minnesota for a month, we were on the look-out for long bike trails.  The Lake Wobegon Trail is a 62-mile paved trail with trailheads at Waite Park, St. Joseph, Avon, Albany, Freeport, Melrose, Sauk Centre, West Union, and Osakis.  At Albany, there’s a spur that leads to the longest covered bridge in Minnesota in Holdingford, and the trail continues to the county line, where it connects to the Soo Line Trail just before Bowlus.   The Lake Wobegon Trail was formerly a rail line operated by the Burlington Northern Railroad Company, and is now largely maintained by Stearns County, where 57 miles of the trail resides. 

When we got ready to actually ride the trail, I went looking for Lake Wobegon as a “destination” for our trip.  I found lots of lakes on Google Maps – Lake Anna, Middle Spunk Lake, Englemeier Lake, Melrose Lake, McCormick Lake…to name a few…but no Lake Wobegon.   Another Google search quickly told me that there I’m probably the only person in their 50s who didn’t know that Lake Wobegon is a fictional lake located in central Minnesota created by long-time author-singer-humorist-radio talent Garrison Keillor.  This made-up lake is famous…like really famous.

Lake Wobegon is the subject of multiple books by Keillor and Minnesota Public Radio’s A Prairie Home Companion (“APHC”).  Keillor would begin nearly every episode of APHC with, "Well, it's been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon, Minnesota, my hometown, out there on the edge of the prairie." 

Because I was born and raised in a small town in Kansas about the size of many of the towns on the Lake Wobegon Trail, I decided to read a Lake Wobegon Days, the first of Keillor’s books published in 1985.  His commentary on small-town Midwestern life hits home on many levels.   Keillor writes that Lake Wobegon is known as the place where “where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average."   He calls Lake Wobegon "the little town that time forgot and the decades cannot improve."  His nostalgic church-going characters reminded me of folks I knew growing up.  Perhaps my favorite line from that book is about how a young boy’s desire for air conditioning was received by his family:  “You get A/C and the next day Mom leaves the house in a skin tight dress, holding a cigarette and a glass of gin, walking an ocelot on a leash.”

I can see why many people like his musings. 

Turns out, aside from Lake Wobegon, Keillor makes reference to a number of actual real-life towns and other non-fictional landmarks in central Minnesota.   The folks of central Minnesota decided to pay homage to Lake Wobegon in naming the trail, and in the fall of 1998, Keillor participated in its grand opening celebration.

Keillor’s image has struggled in recent years, and he was fired by Minnesota Public Radio in 2017.  Regardless of whether the allegations of inappropriate conduct are true, my opinion is that Lake Wobegon and all that it represents shouldn’t necessarily be discounted because of that. 

We rode the St. Joseph to Albany section and the Albany to Holdingford section on two different days.   The trail is a well-maintained paved trail and VERY easy, relatively flat ride. We even saw a couple of roller-bladders on the trail.  The route takes us through mostly farmland, but trees and shrubs line the edges of most of the trail.  By St. Joseph, there are 10 numbered signs with simple instructions like “Be Honest” and “Be a Good Sport.” I imagined Keillor’s fictional characters espousing such wisdom during my ride. Other than those signs and perhaps the covered bridge near Holdingford, there wasn’t anything specific to write home about.  Perhaps a that is part of the Lake Wobegon Trail’s charm though.  I couldn’t help but just feel connected to the trail, the simplicity of it, and what it represents.       

Grab a Beer at a Local Brewery

Biking, bucket lists, and beer.

Back Shed Brewing was my second favorite brewery in the area. Food trucks, big patio, live music, fun events (e.g., bean bag tourneys, painting parties), and great beer.   There’s a good selection of stouts, IPAs, blondes, sours, and even some seltzers so it’s a great spot for big groups with varied tastes. We ventured there on a couple of occasions, including the brewery’s one-year anniversary celebration.  Located in Waite Park just west of St. Cloud, this young brewery is doing it right.   The owners literally started brewing in their back shed, but they have come a long way. 

Bad Habit Brewing is located in St. Joseph, Minnesota, which is less than 20 minutes west of St. Cloud.  The Lake Wobegon trailhead is not too far from the brewery, which explains why we went there twice.  The brewery has some of the most colorful can art and beer names around (e.g., Born & Razz'd, Bros Gotta Hug, Lookie-Loo).  The prices are not listed on the beer board so we were a little shocked to find out our four-beer flight was $14. The high prices didn’t stop the place from being popular though.   On the weekends, the place was so packed and we felt lucky to find a table to share with some locals outside. 

Beaver Island Brewing is located just a few blocks from the Beaver Island Trail.  I opted for the Sweet Miss Chocolate Oatmeal Milk Stout and purchased several six packs of that beer while we stayed in the area.   The taps were housed on an old repurposed Graco Lubrication mechanics garage from the 1940s.  The brewery hosts a $10 biking, brats, and beer event each Thursday.

St. Cloud is home to the first Granite City Food and Brewery, which opened in June 1999.   The company now has 30 restaurants in 13 states, mostly in the Midwest.  We were familiar with the brewery because there are locations in the Kansas City and St. Louis areas.   They have a staple of good house beers, but the place doesn’t seem to experiment with weird concoctions like the little breweries.  Nonetheless, the food is outstanding and we wanted to visit the place because it was doing craft beer way before the craze hit.

Pantown Brewing was probably my favorite in the area:  great beer, good food trucks, a nice space, and an interesting history.   The brewery is named after the Pan Motor Company and the company town now located in St. Cloud that included 58 homes, a fire department, and a hotel.  The company, which produced about 750 cars between 1917 and 1923, was the brainchild of showman Samuel Pandolfo.   To prove their road-worthiness, three Pan Cars were driven up to Pikes Peak in Colorado.   The cars had modern innovations like a gas gauge, built-in clock, built-in ice box, electric starter (no more hand cranks!), a retractable canvas roof, and front and back seats that each folded down into a bed.  However, in 1919, a Chicago federal grand jury indicted Sam on seven counts of mail fraud and one count of attempted mail fraud. Interestingly, the judge in the case was Kenesaw Mountain Landis, who was the 1920 baseball commissioner during the Black Sox baseball scandal.   Pandolfo was convicted and served three years in Leavenworth Prison. During our time in St. Cloud, three original Pan cars were on display at the local fairgrounds.  The brewery is decorated with historical photos and information about the Pan Motor Company, and I spent quite a bit of time staring at the wall while Kasie talked to the locals. As for the beer, I loved the flagship 1917 American IPA, while Kasie kept going back to the Pollinator wheat beer.  ODB's Meat-N-Greet, a BBQ food truck owned and operated by a former pro wrestler, was camped out there on one occasion.  We knew the food was good because she was also staying at the St. Cloud RV Park and we could smell her cookin’!

We traveled to Third Street Brewhouse in Cold Spring, Minnesota on one cloudy Saturday afternoon. This brewery is the craft beer division of Cold Spring Brewing Company, which started in 1874 near the cold spring from which it and the surrounding town gets its name.  That’s not a typo – the brewery is nearly 150 years old!  The long-time family owners tried to take the brewery public in the 1990s, but failed.  They had an image problem, among other things “We were an old brewery known to make kind of crappy beer,” Doug DeGeest, vice president and general manager of Cold Spring Brewing Company recalled in 2013.  After a buy-out by Carolina Beverage Group, the company shifted its focus to contract manufacturing for non-alcoholic beverages including soft drinks, teas, sparkling waters and energy drinks.  The company also makes beers for other manufacturers, as well as a few craft beers released under their own Third Street brand.  The taproom only had about a half-dozen beers on tap, with the Minnesota Gold lager as the flagship beer line, but the Hoplift IPA was decent, and there was live music playing.    

Kayak the Mississippi River

The Mississippi River flows through central Minnesota so one of my “bucket list” items was to explore the river — both by hiking and boating.  Well sorta.  Instead of a river boat cruise, we opted to rent a tandem kayak at CW Outfitting located in Clearwater, MN (about 20 minutes from St. Cloud).  We could choose from a 5-mile, 8-mile, and 13-mile trip.   We opted for the shorter route and booked it online the day before at a cost of about $78 with taxes and fees.   Adventure, here we come!

I was a little nervous when we arrived and learned that the trip would be self-guided.  I had only kayaked a couple of times before, so the idea of floating down this massive river without assistance was unexpected.  “It’s a beginner’s level trip,” Kasie assured me.  I was skeptical.  

After a very nice woman working at CW Outfitting explained the route and we watched short 2-minute safety video (That was it? Just two minutes?), I asked her if she had any advice for the trip.  “Maybe wear some sunscreen,” was all she said.

After lathering ourselves in 50 spf, we hopped in a van with a skinny college kid in flip-flops and an affinity for 90s rock radio stations.   We drove about five miles upstream on some dirt roads near corn fields to begin our adventure.  Kasie had packed snacks (“survival nuts”) in a dry bag, and had her phone with her just in case something went wrong. 

Our river ride was completely…uneventful.  The river was remarkably calm during our outing; this part of the Mississippi was nothing like the float trips we had taken on some rivers back in Missouri.  At times, I felt like we were floating on a lake, the reflections in the water were so clear.   During several parts of the trip, we could see the colorful rocky bottom of the river.  We paddled every now and then, but also just let the water take us.  We saw geese, a turtle, one eagle, and a few blue herons during our journey.  Better yet, we saw no other people on the river.   There were no rapids, fallen trees, or leaks in the kayak.  Just a nice peaceful couple of hours. 

Our time with CW Outfitting wasn’t exactly what I expected…but in a good way.

I didn’t get sunburned either.  

Where to Stay: St. Cloud Campground & RV Park

We decided to book our stay in central Minnesota about a month before our arrival date. Unfortunately, there were not a lot of RV parks in the area that could accomodate our big rig for five weeks on relatively short notice. Many of the RV parks are seasonal too. We felt lucky to find St. Cloud RV Campground & Park.

The RV park located in a country setting on plenty of acreage about five minutes from town with easy access to Highway 10.   Some of the adjacent properties are farmland and grassland, but the RV park has some nice pine and shade trees around much of its perimeter and throughout the park itself.   Some overhanging trees at our site kept us nice and cool, but also prevented us from putting our awning out during rainstorms so we got used to muddy dog feet during our stay there.   Aside from a little tree trimming needed at our site, the RV is probably one of the most well-maintained and amenity-centric RV parks we’ve ever stayed at.

The owners of the park maintain a sticks-and-bricks residence on RV park property, and there were 3-4 workcamper couples taking care of the property during our time there.  Mowing occurred every Tuesday like clockwork (although the property is so big that some mowing/trimming often bled into Wednesday).  St. Cloud RV park is tastefully decorated with lots of hanging flower baskets, flower pots, and other outdoor décor (bird feeders, a windmill, etc) – some from the owners and others from the seasonal residents at the park.  The park has one of the homiest feels we’ve encountered.

At St. Cloud RV Park, there’s a 6-ft deep heated swimming pool that is promptly covered evering evening or in case of inclement weather.   One play area contains a volleyball net, playground equipment, horseshoe pits, ladder toss stands, and a GAGA ball octagonal pit.   Another area contains a covered pavilion near a basketball court (there are two hoops) painted with pickleball lines with a movable pickleball net.   The south side of the RV park is mowed in the shape of a baseball field and contains a baseball backstop and home plate.   We never saw anyone playing ball there, but it was a good grassy area close to our site where we could walk the dogs on rainy/muddy days.    An official dog walking area is located on an elevated section in the northwest part of the park.   The park does not provide poop bags, but we rarely saw any dog droppings on the ground.  Again, the park is very well maintained thanks to the workcampers. 

St. Cloud RV Park contains around 100 sites, including 45 pull-throughs and 80 full hook-up sites.   There are at least two propane tanks located at the campground serviced by Dooley’s Petroleum.   Many of the sites have an in-ground firepit and a picnic table.  The sites are mostly gravel (with some granite mixed in given that St. Cloud is known as “Granite City”).   Many of the sites have concrete pads next to the RV parking area as well.  

The park boasts a centrally located shower-house and laundry facilities.  The tile and paint in the shower-house is a little dated, but it was functional and cleaned regularly.  Laundry was cheap at $1.50/load (for both the washer and dryer).

At the main office, residents can check out some well-used various sports equipment, video games, and board games.  We used their pickle ball equipment one time, and then decided to purchase our own.  I then proceeded to win EVERY game I played against Kasie!  Hear me?  EVERY GAME!  Oh yeah, baby!

The office also contains a book/magazine exchange area, some DVDs and VHS tapes for use and board games.  The office contains a designated mail receipt shelf that was usually stacked with lots of Amazon boxes.   A cooler houses a few cold non-alcoholic drinks near a pool table and Super Chexx table hockey game.

St. Cloud RV Park also is home to a large 2800 square-foot “Rally Center” for meet-ups and other gatherings, although we did not observe any rallies using the building during our stay at St. Cloud RV Park.  Two shower stalls / bathrooms located in the Rally Center are open, even when the rest of the gathering space is closed.

Bird-watching is a popular activity in the area.  During our stay, one of the residents would place some loose corn on a stump located about 20 yards from his site.  A pair of red-headed sandhill cranes would stop at the stump for breakfast and then stay a while.   That was a treat!  There’s also an abundance of bushy-tailed squirrels and chipmunks at the campground.

One area where the St. Cloud RV Park could improve is the internet.  The website says there is “ Free In Your Rig Wireless Internet.”  We assumed that meant some sort of wifi access at each site.  Instead, that meant that each rig needs to provide its own internet access.  The wireless internet at the RV park is non-existent. 

Another thing that bothered me (at least at first) about the park was this large electrical grid tower located in the RV park. Having said that, after a couple of days, I barely noticed it.

St. Cloud RV Park did prorate our five-week stay using their monthly rate.   The RV park is on the pricey side (even with the $730/month rate) compared to what we are accustomed to, but is competitive to other RV park prices we found in the area.  

The bottom line is that we would stay here again.