At just 346 acres (140 ha), Monson Lake State Park is one of the smaller properties in Minnesota’s state park system. It was established to commemorate an incident during the U.S.-Dakota War of 1862, one of the nastiest armed conflicts in Minnesota’s history as a state.
Today, Monson basically provides access to Monson and West Sunburg Lakes, which were formed by the melting of huge chunks of glacial ice embedded in this area’s glacial till.
The Hiking Club route at Monson is about a mile (1.6 km), so we extended it a tiny bit by taking at side trail out to a peninsula jutting into in Monson Lake.
No wildflowers were seen but there were a large number of waterfowl – cormorants, pelicans, swans, egrets, and geese – clustered around an island at the north side of Monson Lake. And a chipmunk torn between asking for a treat and running away. And possibly a muskrat.
This was an invigorating walk (1.2 miles/1.9 km) to settle lunch before we started our drive back to the Cities. It was good to pay a visit here but Monson is definitely more of a water activity park since it provides easy access to two large lakes. And with a canoe portage between them.
We returned home to begin planning a visit to the 3 parks we’d missed when Plan A fell apart. Since there are 26 letters in our alphabet, we might feel emboldened to call the new plan something other than “A”. 😁
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BOOTS on the TRAIL 
Ah, the A-Team – that takes me back a ways. 😄 It’s important to have a bunch of different plans so at least one of them comes together. 😉
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At least we can see more ground instead of only white. 😊 “I love it when a plan comes together.” Hannibal from the A-Team tv show.
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