In June 2018 I rented a car, loaded it up with all of my car camping and backpacking gear and drove from Austin to Ely MN to spend a week at an artist residency on Tofte Lake. I decided to car camp my way up there to save money.
And it gave me a chance to road-test my backpacking gear (tent – Lanshan 3F UL 2-person, sleep pad, sleeping bag, stove, etc.). There’s a complete list of my backpacking gear here.
The first night I stayed at El Dorado Lake State Park, which is massive, and pretty trashy – literally. My brief report on that park is here.
My second night I stayed at Nerstrand Big Woods State Park, and I loved it. I can’t stress enough how entirely opposite this park was from the Kansas park. It was pretty far away from I-35 – off in farm country. But once you enter in the park, you are in the woods, the Big Woods.
GEAR
I did get to water test my tent that night. An ENORMOUS thunderstorm rolled through. It started raining almost exactly when I finished eating dinner and didn’t stop until about 5 that morning. My tent pad was a little slopey and already water-logged so a lake formed around my tent pretty quickly. The good news is the bathtub was high enough. The weird news – and it must have been my pitch – was that water splattered onto the floor of the tent. Not tons. Anyway – I didn’t sleep that night either. I pretty much spent the night with my headlamp on trying to decide if I should just bail out and sleep in the car or stay put. I stayed put in the interest of staying dry. It worked.
CAMPGROUNDS
The park is just beautiful. The tent with water/electric are surrounded by trees. The bathrooms are immaculate and well lit, with locks, even. The park staff were friendly, knowledgeable, interested.
They are really serious about protecting the plant and wildlife in the park and have a lot of great information everywhere about what lives there and how to not fuck it up.
My campsite (Drive-In #32 NR) was right across from the restroom, and nicely hidden by trees. I didn’t have any neighbors in any direction. There were some other families in that loop, but I really felt like I had that park to myself.
I hadn’t asked the office for trail maps because I had no intention of hiking, but I saw a trailhead right next to my tent pad, so I immediately pitched my tent and started walking… in my xero’s, hilariously.
HIKING
I had no idea there was 11 miles of trail and that it would be so beautiful. I took the trail to this waterfall, and it was a really short walk, so I just started wandering down another tail from there. I think I ended up doing at least 3 miles of trail before it got too dark to be out there. I also got so caught up in wandering those trails, and trying not to get lost that I didn’t take any pictures. I regret that.