Tettegouche State Park

Silver Bay, Minnesota • August 12-18, 2022 • 6 nights on site #22E

Tettegouche is a really nice park with very spacious sites. Our site did have a trail right behind that we could see and hear hikers passing by, which was fine. The park had three waterfalls with numerous trails. Be ready to climb and descend many, many steps on the trails here!

Of course, Dave hiked ALL the trails even on overcast rainy days. I’m more of a fair weather hiker but managed to get in four of them. Even though we had six days here the weather was not very cooperative with thick fog and rain on most days.

In the Park

Two Step, Cascade, and High Falls can be hiked in the Tettegouche State Park.

Two Step Falls

Look out from Shovel Point Hiking Trail. Wonderful views along the way!

Baptism River Mouth Beach Hike. We could see people swimming down here when we’d ride over the wooden bridge to our campsite. This day families were skimming rocks.

High Falls Hike • Tettegouche

Cascade Falls Hike • Tettegouche

Day Trips Outside the Park

Lake Superior Beach

We were told at the Tettegouche Park visitor center that kayaks could be launched at the end of fire road 5596 and we went to check it out. It was a longer path getting to the water than we like to haul our kayaks. I’m not sure that I EVER want to paddle in Lake Superior with my non-sea kayak! I’m a fair weather kayaker and it was rough out there. It was a nice pebble and stone beach which was fun for rock hounding. A big bonus here was that there were a couple of local geologists on the beach who were very chatty with us. One was a little concerned about how we found this little remote beach of theirs. After, we drove to Beaver Bay and spent some time in Beaver Bay Agate Shop & Museum. This was probably the best rock shop we’ve been in through out all our travels. We then brunched at Lemon Wolf Cafe which was just ok.

Gooseberry State Park, MN

We loaded the bikes in the back seat of the truck and had planned to ride from Beaver Bay to Gooseberry Falls State Park. We sat in the truck and waited an hour for it to quit drizzling, but it never did so we just went ahead and drove. Gooseberry Falls has five beautiful waterfalls. The hiking route from the truck to view them took about 5 miles. Waterfall #5 was the only one that was really hiking. Gooseberry is a very nice park but, all campsites are non-electric.

Split Rock Lighthouse & State Park

Between Tettegouche and Gooseberry State Parks is Split Rock State Park. They all have camping. We stopped here on the way back from Gooseberry. Dave decided that since it wasn’t raining now he’d ride his bike back to Gooseberry while I beach combed on Pebble Beach. They were not pebbles but big oval rocks that were very difficult to walk on. The Lighthouse could be seen from Pebble Beach.

We ate dinner on the way back from this day trip at Northwoods Family Grill. They were having Taco Tuesday, but were out of tacos. Which was upsetting to Dave. He LOVES Taco Tuesdays. They also had a sign coming in featuring pizzas, but, they were out of those too. Fortunately, I got the best Rueben sandwich I’ve had in a very long time. Dave got pulled pork BBQ sandwich which was also excellent.

So far we are impressed with Minnesota State Parks and what they have to offer.

Our next stop is Pokegama Dam Core of Engineers campground near Grand Rapids, MN for three nights.