ahoyne9Continuing on my waterfall chase throughout my home state I decided today would be a good day to tour the city of Minneapolis. The trip would also include going to the Minnehaha Regional park to see Minnehaha Falls. A perfect day, I met up downtown at my mateโs apartment so we could plan out a long bike route to see what Minneapolis has to offer.
Day 1 โ Bike the City of Minneapolis 07.28.2020
The first stop was a short bike ride to the Foshay Tower. This is not the tallest building in Minneapolis but it is the tallest building you can go to the top of and walk outside to take photos of the skyline. The cost to do this is USD 10.
Next, we biked over to the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden which has the famous Spoonbridge & Cherry Water fountain. In my 30+ years of living here, I have never gone to see this so I was excited and then disappointed because I thought it was a lot larger than it was. This is a free park to go to and worth a half hour to walk through and see all the sculptures.
We then headed over to Theodore Wirth Regional Park, I didnโt stop to take any photos here but there is a good mountain bike trail and a golf course here for those that are interested. Someday Iโll update this post with the mountain bike photos when I go.
The next stop was the Stone Arch Bridge on the way to the bridge we passed a small waterfall that I didnโt even know existed, Shingle Creek Falls, I wouldnโt go out of my way for this but it was a nice place for a break and added to waterfall list. Stone Arch Bridge crosses the Mississippi River and has some great views of the Minneapolis Skyline.
Time to make our way to the main even, Minnehaha Regional Park. There are some nice bike trails in this park but we didnโt go through any of them. To get there from Minneapolis you cross another bridge that has great views of the city skyline as well, from Washington Ave.
Although we didn’t do much biking throughout the regional park, we did stop to see Minnehaha Falls. If you’re visiting you can take the light rail from the Airport or downtown directly to the falls. I also posted some pictures below of what the falls look like in Winter so you can see the difference. Which one do you like best, winter or summer?
The last stop after this long bike ride of 40km (25mi) was outside US bank stadium, I came back later at night before heading home to get some good pictures of the skyline lights. Iโm not sure I would travel specifically to Minneapolis as a tourist, but if youโre here for a layover or to visit the Mall of America, check out Minneapolis. Hire a bike for the day and take one of the 133km (83mi) of off-street trails or 70km (44mi) of bike-specific lanes, making Minneapolis home to the โbest bicycling city in America.โ
Seven waterfalls down, a lot more to go! Minnesota Waterfall Counter:
- Wolf Creek Falls โ Banning State Park
- Big Spring Falls โ Banning State Park
- Swinging Bride Falls โ Jay Cooke State Park
- Vermillion Falls โ Vermillion Falls Park
- Willow Falls โ Willow River State Park
- Minnehaha Falls โ Minnehaha Regional Park
- Shingle Creek Falls โ Webber Park
Thanks for reading and liking my post, cheers!