Holy Waterfalls Batman! - Part 1

As you may have guessed by the title, this day was all about waterfalls, and lots of them! We found 2 of these state parks in our "Off the Beaten Path" book, and the third was suggested to us by the park ranger at Amnicon when we checked in the night before. This book has proved

to be a real gem and has yet to lead us astray. On the contrary, everything we have done that we found in the book has proved to be above and beyond what we had envisioned from the descriptions. Sorry for the plug, but we have to keep the sponsors happy ;) The 3 state parks we visited this day were Amnicon, Pattison, and Jay Cooke. The first 2 are in Wisconsin and the last is in Minnesota a half hour south of Duluth. Amnicon had only a small path to offer (a 1/2 mile round trip) but provided the most diverse grouping of

waterfalls we would see today. Even though there was not a lot of ground to cover, we spent at least an hour walking around and taking photos of this great display of waterfalls. The last set of falls we came across was set away from the main river and a

little excluded. Seeing the opportunity, I suggested that we bathed in the waterfall, fulfilling my earlier dreams that were not realized at Tequamenon Falls. To my delight, though clearly not hers, Katie agreed and we took our shower for the day underneath a waterfall. It was amazing to say the least. Once cleansed and refreshed, we drove to our

next stop, Pattison State park which boasts the tallest waterfall in Wisconsin - Manitou Falls. After visiting the big falls, we decided to take the 3 mile round trip hike to the little falls and get our hike in for the day. It was a nice hike which walked around the lake that feeds the big falls then follows alongside the

river until reaching the little falls. About half way down the trail Katie spotted what she thought might be raspberries. Since neither of us had ever seen them in the wild before, we were unsure and hesitant to taste. After a few seconds of mental debate however, I took a chance and popped on in my mouth. Immediately I knew they were indeed raspberries and damn good ones! Not that I am a raspberry conasuir, but I have never tasted sweeter raspberries in my life. Unfortunately, along with the raspberries came the mosquitos and guess who forgot bug spray... we did :( Katie got it worse than I did for a change, but we were both scratching by the time we got back to the van.