Camping in Willow River State Park

Willow River State Park, located just outside of Hudson, WI, is a convenient park for people who live in the twin cities and western Wisconsin. I first visited in the fall (and wrote a post about it then), and recently visited again. This time I went camping and enjoyed the park even more.

Naturally, I visited the waterfall and did a little exploring around there with my friends. This was the obvious first stop as they had never been to the park, and you don't see waterfalls like that too often in Wisconsin.

The next task at hand was to set up our campsite. We ended up having 3 tents for 5 people (we had 2 person tents). We easily had enough space, and we were fortunate to have a little distance between our campsite and the other campsites in the park. There were still quite a few people walking around, though, so it wasn't as peaceful as some places. Either way, it was a wooded campsite in a nice park, which was pretty good for what we were looking for.

I went on a run a little later in the day, which included a hill that was just brutal. I never stopped, but during part of it I felt like I could walk faster than I was running! It was a paved path, but most of the running I did was on the trails. I think I went about 3-4 miles total.

As the night came, we got our fire going, cooked up some dinner, and told campfire stories. A great way to spend a cool spring night.

Jerimoth hill, the highest point in Rhode Island

I recently did some traveling for work, and found time to visit another highpoint! I drove to Jerimoth Hill, the highest point in Rhode Island. Located just across the Connecticut border, this was an easy highpoint to summit.

I was on my way from Boston to Hartford, and I wanted to visit a highpoint while I was in this area, but I didn't have too much time as the rental car needed to be returned on time. The highpoints of Massachusetts and Connecticut were a bit out of reach, but Rhode Island's wasn't too far out of the way.

So I drove to Jerimoth hill. I saw a sign for it along the road, parked, and walked a few hundred feet down a wooded trail, following signs that were left by a highpointing club. It was very well marked for being a pretty short trail. One would never know you were at the highest point in the state if there weren't signs there. Definitely very different from being on top of Mauna Kea in Hawaii!

I did drive through some very quaint parts of Connecticut on my way back to Hartford, although I didn't stop due to some rain and the need to get the car back in time. I remember several hills and some towns along the way. Maybe I'll come again and explore when I'm not in a time crunch!

Ice climbing in Sandstone MN

Several weeks ago, I got the opportunity to go ice climbing in Sandstone, MN, at an old quarry that was turned into a park, not far outside of the small downtown area.

Once we arrived at the park, the first thing that needed to happen was to put anchors in place. The guide and one volunteer did this while I waited on the ground, 50 feet below. This took a little while, and I was starting to get a little cold, but I was very excited, so it didn't bother me too much.

After the anchors were set up, we were ready to do some top rope ice climbing. There was one other group climbing that day, but there were several routes available to climb along the wall of the quarry.

One side note, in order to ice climb, we had special boots, crampons, ice axes and helmets. On top of wearing snowpants and a winter jacket, this was much less comfortable than the shorts and t shirt with rock shoes outfit that I usually have underneath my harness.

I tried 3 different routes. The first one gave me some trouble, and I had a short fall. The second one was really easy for me, and the third came pretty easy as well.

It was great to finally give ice climbing a try as it was a goal of mine. It was quite different from rock climbing, but definitely provided a similar thrill.