North Shore Hiking, Camping & Waterfalls

Jeff, Ruby, Baxter & I just completed our annual "fall colors" camping trip up to the North Shore between Duluth and Grand Portage, Minnesota. We had a fantastic time enjoying the perfect weather, new hiking trails, and camping at two separate locations over the weekend. The theme of this year's trip were the waterfalls of the North Shore. While we took over 400 pictures and visited more places than I can count, included below are just the highlights. Enjoy!

Congdon Park, Duluth: Tischer Creek
This 1.5 mile trail was an easy hike right up the creek in the heart of Duluth. The dogs enjoyed a dip in the creek while we enjoyed the very old stone bridges that cross the waterway.

Beaver Bay: Beaver River
This was a quick stop on our trip that required no hiking. Jeff pulled the car down a small, dirt path off the side of Lax Lake Road and we hopped out for a quick pic.

Caribou River/Waterfall

With only a half mile hike upstream, Caribou Falls is easily accessible for those not afraid of heights or climbing down a ton of stairs. While not the highest falls we visited, this is probably my favorite waterfall of the trip. The hike in was beautiful and traquil. The stairs allowed us to get very close the bottom of the falls.

Campsite on Night #1: Devil Track River on Pincushion Mountain

This was one of our most ambitious hikes at 2.3 miles (with all of our camping gear on our backs), but it was well worth it. The camping site on Devil Track River is probably the best site I have ever stayed at. On top of a small plateau on the side of Pincushion mountain, we were situated between two separate falls in the Devil Track River. The sound of rushing, crashing water set the scene on our first night of camping. The only downfall: the 150 rough-cut stairs we had to climb back up the next day to get back on top of the mountain. It was an exhausting hike, but well worth it!

Grand Marais: Kadunce River

This hike up the Kadunce River was supposed to be 1.5 miles round trip, but unfortunatley the bridge that crosses the river about 1 mile in was destroyed in mid-September. We still hiked up as far as we could and took some time to let the dogs play in the water.

Grand Portage State Park: High Falls

As you can see from the first pic below, this park is right on the border between Canada and MN. I am less than 200 yards from the border crossing, but unfortunatley do not have my passport with on this trip. I guess my first trip out of the country will just have to wait. High Falls pools into the Pigeon River and is probably the largest waterfall in MN at 130 feet tall.

Campsite on Night #2: South Bally Creek Pond

After two full days of hiking, we had a variety of sites planned out on where we could camp for night number two. Thankfully, we picked a close, 1/10 of a mile hike-in site located right next to South Bally Creek pond. The site was large, a fire started up quick, and we had a perfect view of stars and satellites in the night skies.

Oberg Loop

Definitely one of the most spectacular views of our trip. This two mile hike took us to the top of Oberg mountain and allowed us to walk in a circle around the top of the mountain and take in the 360-degree views. From this perspective, we saw tons of leaves changing colors, a tranquil pond, views of the surrounding moutains, and gorgeous birds swooping through the wilderness.