Peak (fall color) views: 7 park & trail vantage points

Hit peak leaf color just right, and you can encapsulate yourself in a tunnel of trees glowing yellow, orange and red. Miss it, and you’ll be looking down at what’s fallen — not a bad idea if you’re on a steep, acorn-strewn path.

Catch the peak from a peak, and on a clear day you might see shimmery gold treetops contrasting with teal water and deep-green conifers. Most of those views — of Lake Superior, inland lakes, the Mississippi River, rolling hills — reward the effort year-round. But nothing beats a clear fall day.

The North Shore tends to get top billing. Retta James-Gasser, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources’ interpretive naturalist for the central region, refers to the North Shore and the Forgotten Shore.

“There’s Highway 61 on the North Shore, but there’s Highway 61 on the shore of the Mississippi River,” James-Gasser said, referring to the drive from Red Wing south.

Following are a few spots worth summiting, including a couple of sites near St. Cloud worth checking out if you don’t have time to travel. (In some cases, the hike is short or the view is accessible by vehicle.)

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Oberg Mountain

Location: North of Tofte, off the Superior Hiking Trail; from Highway 61 milepost 87.5, the parking lot is about 2 miles north off Forest Road 336/Onion River Road.

Description: Gauging how long it takes to hike this 1.8-mile hilltop loop trail (accessed by a 0.2-mile spur) is difficult. With eight overlooks — including Lake Superior, Oberg Lake and backcountry views — plus a tunnel of maples, all kinds of mosses, mushrooms and rock formations on the way up and around, it’s easy to get distracted.

Gayle Coyer, executive director of the Superior Hiking Trail Association, recommends the area for early color. The first wave runs through the maples, usually peaking in late September. The second wave turns the birch and aspens.

Less-traveled alternative: Leveaux Mountain, a 4-plus-mile round-trip hike starting from the same parking lot, has fewer overlooks but equal (some say better) views with far fewer people. “It has frontcountry, Lake Superior, backcountry, forest,” Coyer said. “When you do the Leveaux Mountain loop, you go through a deep woods.”

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Carlton Peak

Location: Temperance River State Park, north of Schroeder. Short route: A 11/2-mile hike from the Sawbill Trail lot lets you drive much of the incline you’d hike from the longer route. Long way: A 3-mile hike starting at the Temperance River wayside takes in the valley. It’s a Superior Hiking Trail spur.

Description: Another view off the Superior Hiking Trail, this one from 1,526 feet overlooking Lake Superior — one of the highest outcroppings near Lake Superior — the Temperance River gorge and valleys light up with yellows, oranges and reds stretching inland.

“It is a fairly strenuous hike to get to the top, but it is a tall, bald outcrop overlooking a valley of maple,” said Jason Peterson, acting Temperance River park manager. “The Sawbill Trail gets quite rugged. Some places you’re navigating around some rock piles.”

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Cuyuna Country SRA

Location: Just outside Ironton, this state recreation area lies about 90 minutes from St. Cloud. For a drive-up overlook, start at the Ironton water tower, take Crow Wing County Road 30, and then head left to the trailhead. The road continues to a point known as Miner’s Mountain Overlook.

Description: The rust-colored ground, leftovers from iron ore mining, gives this place a reddish glow year-round. But the trees have since grown up, a 25-mile network of nationally recognized mountain bike trails draws people from throughout the U.S., and there are drive-up fall-color views to be had.

“The trails will bring you to the top of these mine pits. With the red rock of these mine pits, the turquoise blue of the lakes that have been created there — it creates the perfect pallet for a perfect color picture,” Carlson said.

Parks worker Jennifer Lust described the view: “There’s a lot of yellows, a lot of golds, not a lot of maples. ... We have a lot of aspens, a lot of cottonwoods.”

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Mount Baldy

Location: Tettegouche State Park, north of Silver Bay.

Description: Climb Mount Baldy in the park’s off-shore segment, and you’ll be standing on a knob of anorthosite — rock that was carried up by molten basalt lava. “Mount Baldy is one of the many sort of nubbins left over from a vast mountain range,” said Kurt Mead, Tettegouche’s interpretive naturalist, explaining the volcanic activity of 1.1 billion years ago. “There’s all these knobs left over.”

Most park visitors stick to the Lake Superior shore, never exploring the park on the other side of Highway 61.

From the lot near Lax Lake, head a half-mile down the road toward Tettegouche Camp, climbing through large, old trees before heading left toward Mount Baldy for a 2-mile round-trip hike. (For a 7-8-mile option, start at the Lake Superior shore.)

“Once you get to the top of that half-mile hill, you’re in the middle of old-growth hardwoods, probably 100 years old,” Mead said. The mix of trees is unusual here: Red oaks, maples, basswoods, yellow birch and paper birch. (You’ll be close to an oak forest frequented by acorn-seeking bears; but your chance of seeing a bear here is slim.)

“It’s got an Old World feel to it. The Black Forest comes to mind,” Mead said.

The summit opens onto nearly 360-degree views of the shore, the peaks of an old mountain range, beaver ponds and Micmac Lake.

“You don’t think of having mountains in Minnesota, but when you get on top of Mount Baldy, it feels like you’re on top of a mountain,” said Kacie Carlson, the DNR’s Grand Rapids-based regional naturalist. “You’re under a tunnel of forest until you get there. Then all of a sudden you reach the top and there it is.”

Extended outing: Finish the hike and feel like canoeing, and you can continue on to Tettegouche Camp and pay for a canoe rental over the phone there.

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Charity Bluff

Location: John A. Latsch State Park, just off the Great River Road/U.S. Highway 61, north of Winona.

Description: More than 500 wooden steps will take you to the top of 1,142-foot-tall Charity Bluff, one of three within this tiny park just off the highway. (The others: Faith and Hope.) “John A. Latch State Park is not a very big state park, but it’s a great area. It’s got one heck of a view,” said Colin Wright, assistant manager at Whitewater State Park.

The leaves here may be more burnished than fiery, but the view extends up and down the Mississippi River and across to Wisconsin. Depending upon the time of year, you might see migrating birds, eagles, barge traffic and trains.

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Fire tower

Location: Mille Lacs Kathio State Park, about 90 minutes from St. Cloud.

Description: Maples surround the 800-foot gravel path to the tower, but the view will open onto oaks, which turn later in the season. (So what you see from the ground and what you see from the tower are two different things.) Peak color usually arrives in early October. “It’s a commanding view. You can see all the way across Mille Lacs, you can see the entire park from that view,” said Jim Cummings, interpretive naturalist.

Used as a fire observation tower from the 1930s to the 1970s, the structure was taken out of commission, dismantled and reassembled in the park in 1981. The 100-foot tower stands on the highest hill, which rises about 100 feet. The stairs are steep, with platforms that allow closer inspection of the canopy on the way up. The tower holds six people at a time.

Drive-through: Mille Lacs Kathio is also worth a drive. “Driving through the park is just a wonderful way to enjoy the colors. One of the reasons for that is where the trees get the most sunlight is where they tend to be brightest,” Cummings said. That’s also why you’ll see the colorful canopy from the tower, but interior hikes won’t be as brilliant.

Mount Tom

Location: Sibley State Park, about 75 minutes from St. Cloud off U.S. Highway 71 north of Willmar.

Description: The high point of this hike opens onto views of the oak savanna that’s being restored, and the oak forest. The observation deck remains closed for safety reasons, but the ground-level view is worth a look. “The Mount Tom Trail is always absolutely gorgeous,” said Jack Nelson, park manager. “You still see the rolling topography ... and on the way (up), the understory.”

Follow Ann Wessel on Twitter @AnnWessel.