Photo by Lee Vue
The arrival of summer in Minnesota brings dreams of watery idylls. In the Twin Cities, those dreams likely evoke a favorite river or lake in the northern part of the state. And therein lies the rub: Our favorite destinations get too damn crowded during high season. Nothing kills the mood of canoeing a tranquil lake amid loons and the gentle lapping of the water so quickly as a philistine in a $90,000 wakeboard boat, blasting tunes with a 250-watt sound system and throwing tsunami-like waves in your direction.
But friends, there is good news. If you want to get out on the water—and you want some elbow room—you don’t need to drive for six hours and then make five portages into the Boundary Waters. You don’t even have to leave the Twin Cities. You need to consider an outing on the 12-mile stretch of the Mississippi River that flows from the Coon Rapids Dam to St. Anthony Falls in downtown Minneapolis.