How Minnesota Are You?

Nuzzle Up to Paul Bunyan and Babe
Minnesota has scads of gargantuan roadside sculptures, but the most notable is Paul and the Babe, built in 1937, standing by the shore of Lake Bemidji. (Don’t miss the Fireplace of States next door.) 300 Bemidji Ave.,    Bemidji, 800-458-2223

Paddle Old Man River
Put your canoe in just above the Mississippi’s mile 860 in Brooklyn Center and paddle (or float) the fifteen or so miles to Hidden Falls–Crosby Farm Regional Park. Along the way, you’ll navigate three locks and pass through what seems like centuries of history, from heavily wooded sections suggestive of the time before Father Hennepin to the Mill District of the early twentieth century to the industry and high-rises of today. Rent equipment at Midwest Mountaineering, 309 Cedar Ave., Mpls., 612-339-3433; 651-296-6157

Watch College Football’s Winningest Coach Notch Another “W”
In fifty-four seasons at tiny Benedictine St. John’s University, John Gagliardi has amassed four national championships, twenty-five MIAC titles, and 419 victories. At age eighty, “John,” as the players call him (one of his many unorthodoxies, including no tackling in practice, is to have the players refer to him by his first name), can still be found on the sidelines, as much a fixture as the “Johnny Bread” the monks sell to make rent. Saint John’s University, Collegeville

Visit Gehry’s First
Fifteen years ago, every fuddy-duddy in town was bent out of shape by Frank Gehry’s glistening “tin-can pile” rising on the U of M’s East Bank. Now, compared with the Walker and Guthrie extravaganzas, the Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum seems tastefully modest—and almost forgotten amid the latters’ hype—though it offers one of the most satisfying art experiences in the metro and is a globally recognized Gehry landmark—four years, we might add, before his Guggeheim Balbao. 333 East River Pkwy., Mpls.

Eat Local Food—Buy It at a Co-op
The Twin Cities is home to America’s most vibrant community of co-op grocery stores. From Seward to The Wedge to Lakewinds and Mississippi Market, they are the ultimate sources for locally grown and raised natural foods. Member-owned and community- and customer-focused, co-ops function as an important counterweight to the cruelties and chemicals of industrial foods and farming in the battle to reclaim the purity of what we eat.

Shop Stillwater, the Antique Antiques Capital
Stillwater, the idyllic birthplace of Minnesota nestled along the banks of the St. Croix River, is the essential Minnesota antiquing experience. Stroll the sidewalks of a town first settled in 1848 and discover many original buildings. A dozen-plus well-edited shops—many housing scores of dealers—offer a buyer’s delight. But what makes this antiquing town truly great is that you’ll find even more nonantiques stores, plus restaurants, wine bars, and coffee shops, which makes for the perfect package. 651-439-4001

Dance among the Amber Waves
As much as we are a state of pine trees, lakes, and a big river, we are also a prairie state. Most of western Minnesota was prairie once—native grasses in golds and greens, punctuated by pink and gray boulders. Then, as now, you’ll find small farm towns struggling to hang on, abandoned churches and homesteads, the odd bison. Renowned Minnesota nature photographer Jim Brandenburg has chronicled the area and created a gorgeous gallery of his work in his hometown of Luverne. His Prairie Foundation works to restore the native prairie, once the continent’s largest ecosystem. It’s a great place to start your exploration. 211 E. Main St., Luverne, 507-283-1884

Bite into a U of M– Bred Honeycrisp Apple at an Orchard
The U did good, no?

Get Away to a Lodge on a Lake, Jake
The quintessential summer lake experience (for those of us who don’t own a cabin on one) is sitting porchside at a lodge, walleye frying in the pan, mosquitoes hovering, the setting too beautiful to flee. There are many such experiences up north, but perhaps the ultimate is at the 1913 Burntside Lodge near Ely. Log cabins dot the shore. There’s canoeing or kayaking—with portages to Native pictographs—the obligatory sauna, playground, and a sand beach. Blue water and pine trees are a given. There’s no TV, and the only blackberries allowed are the ones that grow on bushes. Ely, 218-365-3894