Pose #3 Lake Carlos State Park

[dreamshark]

For the second part of our 2-day smoke-hazed State Park expedition we drove southwest 3 hours from McGregor to the Alexandria lakes district.  Have you ever heard of this park? I hadn't, which is a bit surprising considering that it is located in a popular resort district of the state and has been there since 1937. 

I picked it because the eponymous lake is supposedly deep and clear and "great for jumping into" according to the DNR staff picks. It's a nice park with great Camper Cabins, but as a swimming destination it was kind of a fail. Lake Carlos is  the largest and deepest lake in the Alexandria chain of lakes, as deep as 167 feet (which is a LOT). But not HERE, where the swimming beach is located. As I am finding is typically the case in Minnesota state parks, the beach is just a toddler play area close to a beautiful and well-developed picnic area, but is not intended for adults to swim in. This one is a narrow strip of sand sandwiched between two stands of cattails, 3-4 feet deep at the max, and completely hemmed in by impenetrable water weeds.  GRADE: C-. An easy sandy entry and the quality of the water earns it a passing grade, but such a disappointing beach on a beautiful lake. 

I had some fun anyway, since I had fortunately thrown a pair of swim goggles in with my swimsuit. Although they were just ordinary goggles of the type you wear to keep chlorine out of your eyes, they fit surprisingly well and I was able to use them like a snorkel mask to swim along the edge of the wall of water weeds and chase the schools of little bluegills hanging around by the weeds. The water in this lovely lake is clear as a bell, so that was actually a lot of fun. Not a great place for actually stretching out and swimming, however. 


Okay, HERE is where the swimming beach should have been located: next to the Lower Campground. Which is, incidentally, a very attractive campground for those of you with RVs. Or boats. Because that is what this beautiful strip of clear, sandy, weed-free beach is dedicated to. At this point I had an Aha! moment, realizing that when that reviewer said "a great lake to jump into" they meant FROM A BOAT. Because if you poke the average outdoorsy Minnesotan and say the word "lake" the default image that leaps into their mind is a motor boat. 


An artistically deformed tree to the side of the boat mooring area at the Lower Campground. If there hadn't been a hella wind blowing off the lake and stirring up whitecaps I might have changed into a swimsuit and jumped in right here. But it's always dangerous trying to swim around motorboats, and particularly dangerous when the water is rough, so no.


The Hidden Lake Group Camp is beautiful. It was vacant, so we drove up the hill from the picnic grounds to take a look at it. This scenic trail runs next to it, "through mature hardwood forest" in the words of the park map notes. 


A nice shot from the Hidden Lake Trail. Is that wild rice down there? Or just very spiky reeds? Well, for sure there is a good-sized painted turtle basking on a log, although you probably can't see it in this small-sized photo. Anyway, a nice little hike. It's actually a fairly long hike if you continue all the way around Hidden Lake, but after the first set of gratuitous ups and downs we gave up and headed back to the group campsite to admire the WPA buildings.


What do you think this historic building is? I guessed an old cookhouse, but I was wrong. It's a water tower, which is still in use to provide water to the group campsite and the picnic area below. Cool.