One thing I really like about Saint Paul is enjoying sunsets over the Mississippi River. Having grown up in Minneapolis, which is to the west, I seldom saw this. Since the Highland Park area is hilly, people who are up for climbing and biking (and timing) can extend the sunset and essentially see it four times in one evening.
Start this climb half an hour to an hour before sunset, depending on how much you like to dawdle:
1) Start at the limestone bluffs near Woodlawn Avenue and Mississippi River Boulevard. Lock up your bike and climb down to the water’s edge. Look at the swallows, silver maples and wild irises growing there. I once even found a mudpuppy foraging near the edge of the water.
2) Climb up and out of the valley just as the sun sinks below the canopy of the opposite shore. Bike south on Mississippi River Boulevard to the Ford Dam Overlook. Enjoy seeing the cormorants and crows that dwell in that area. If it’s early summer, observe the mayflies and cottonwood clumps floating through that lend epic scale and depth to the valley.
3) Head south again and cross the street just before the sharp left curve in Mississippi River Boulevard. Enter the southwest corner of the Ford site and check out the pond there, where nature is taking over what was once an industrial dump. Heave your bike over the unused railroad tracks that are becoming overgrown with quaking aspen saplings. Head directly toward the Cleveland Hi-Rise and then take the gravel utility trail out of there. Cut through the Little League fields, through the strangely quiet apartment complex, and get to the southwest corner of the Lunds and Byerly’s building. Look at the awesome expanse of the Ford site and contemplate its many possibilities for people and nature.
4) Finally, bike east on Ford Parkway, take a right on Kenneth Street, a left on Bohland Avenue, and a left up the stairs to the grassy hill overlooking absolutely everything. This is where you want to be when the sun fully winks out. Check out the Minneapolis skyline and visually retrace the route you took to get there.
pseudoisaac 