Great Lake Country Lodges

Stout's Lodge [back to top]
(Red Cedar Lake) Birchwood, WI
715-354-3646
Built:1903
Best For: Imagining you belong to the leisure class.
Backstory: With his father’s lumber fortune, Frank D. Stout built a 31-room summer home on a 26-acre island in Red Cedar Lake, dubbed Island of Happy Days. The buildings, modeled after the popular Adirondack camps back east, included cabins for the children and special quarters for servants and guests. Stout also built a recreation hall and classic over-the-water boathouse. When he realized he erred in leaving the bark on the logs (causing moisture and insect damage), Stout imported cedar logs from Idaho and rebuilt the entire complex. The island lodge is now co-owned by John Rupp, proprietor of W.A. Frost in St. Paul.
The Vibe: Stylish quietude. Any lodge on its own island has a leg up on the competition. Besides, Stout’s has a great look and a traditional style. It feels upper crust, and hanging out here makes you feel a bit the same. Guest rooms in the lodge have been remodeled, mostly to reflect the Northwoods feel, with wood interior siding, antiques, and private baths. Many have fireplaces and screen porches. Stout’s is an idyll of quiet entertainments: Play croquet on the broad lawn; relax in an Adirondack chair. Fix meals in your quarters or eat in the main lodge. A ferry makes regular trips to the mainland
Overnight: $169–$309; season runs late May– late October

Spider Lake Lodge [back to top]
(Spider Lake) Hayward, WI, 800-653-9472
Built: 1923
Best For: Contemplation, quiet sports, and procrastination.
Backstory: During the early days of Prohibition, Ted Moody built Moody’s Camp. While some guests had Chicago mob ties, most of the early clientele were anglers aiming merely to catch big muskie, walleye, and bass from the nearby chain of lakes. The cozy lodge, built by a local Native American craftsman from tamarack logs, recalls some of the best details of the rustic Adirondack style. The resort’s cabins have been sold off, but the main lodge has become a stylish bed and breakfast.
The Vibe: Exquisite camp. You may come to Spider Lake with a list of activities and the best of intentions, but be prepared to jettison the works in favor of sitting on the porch overlooking the lake or snuggling in an armchair in front of the fire. Owners (by profession interior decorators) Jim Kerkow and Craig Mason have transformed the lodge with antiques, kitsch, serious art, and outstanding examples of their own line of lodge furniture. The log interior, rubbed down once a year with orange oil and water, is tranquilizing. Guest rooms are decorated, each according to a theme, with prints and accessories. If you pry yourself away, enjoy paddling on the sprawling chain of lakes.
Overnight: $159–$199

Grand View Lodge [back to top] (Gull Lake) Nisswa,
866-801-2951 
Built: 1919
Best For: A lake country vacation in style, with all the perks and activities.
Backstory: M.V. Baker decided to cash in on property he owned on Gull Lake by selling 50-foot lots. Prospective buyers were so eager he had to put them up. What’s more, plenty of people simply wanted to vacation. So Baker built a grand lodge, importing large cedar logs from California and hiring a crew to cut the rest of the timber from the property. The lodge, according to the state historical society, is one of the “most elaborate and well-articulated examples of rustic log architecture in northern Minnesota.”
The Vibe: Bold. The Grand View, three stories high with banks of windows and French doors, proclaims its grandeur to anyone walking to the front door. The oldest part of the lodge, with a fieldstone fireplace and glowing logs, has a suitable moose-and-snowshoe atmosphere. Because of early concerns over variable water levels, the lodge doesn’t capitalize on a view of the lake, several hundred feet away. The rooms in the main lodge are modest and spare but charming, an accurate reflection of the era in which they were built. They have recently been winterized and updated with air conditioning. (More spacious accommodations are available elsewhere on the property.) Amenities include
a pool, whirlpool, waterslide, gardens, boats for rent, and Deacon’s Lodge golf course.
Overnight: $170–$350

Canoe Bay [back to top]
(Lake Wahdoon)
Chetek, WI,
800-568-1995
Built: 1964–present
Best For: Folks for whom design never takes a back seat to privacy and luxury.
Backstory: Ezra Cornell, founder of New York’s Cornell University, first acquired the land on which Canoe Bay sits in 1867. Timber harvested off the land was sold to endow and operate his institution of higher learning. The acreage eventually fell into the hands of The Seventh Day Adventist Church of Wisconsin, which built a summer camp and retreat center. The camp operated until 1979, when the Adventists tired of the five-hour drive from their bases in the state’s southeast corner. Dan Dobrowolski had familial ties to the region and, with his wife Lisa, bought the camp in 1992. They painstakingly rebuilt and expanded it into the luxe retreat it is today.
The Vibe: Serenity amid exquisite beauty. Canoe Bay (the Midwest’s only Relais & Châteaux lodging member) is about privacy and quietude—there’s no soaring lobby or mass gathering place, because privacy and small-scale luxury is the emphasis here. The proprietors’ preoccupation with excellence in all its forms has engendered a small resort where extraordinary works of architecture, reflecting the Prairie School style, are around every bend. Fine food, much of it sourced locally, and an amazing wine collection round out the experience. There is swimming, hiking, canoeing, kayaking, fishing, massage therapy, an organic garden, a library, and a fitness center to keep you busy, but winter cocooning here is as good as it gets. (Note: no children, pets, smoking, in-room phones, or hard liquor served.)
Overnight: $350–$550

Burntside Lodge [back to top] (Burntside Lake) Ely,
218-365-3894
Built: 1913
Best For: Enjoying canoe country without a tent. Backstory: The extension of the Duluth & Iron Range Railroad and construction of a road and bridge over the Burntside River enabled tourists to venture north of the Vermilion Iron Range. A group of businessmen, including Thomas Miller and P. T. Brownell, built the first full-scale commercial resort in the area. Over the years the owners added 44 cabins, 21 of which remain. Ray and Nancy LaMontagne bought Burntside in 1941. It remains in the family, still serving tourists an unadorned dose of the Northwoods.
The Vibe: Channeling the Boundary Waters. Burntside Lodge makes a promise—a canoe country experience with perks and a roof. From your handcrafted log cabin, listen as loons call on craggy, clear Burntside Lake. Take a sauna, sip a cappuccino, and enjoy first-rate dining. Most cabins have Internet access, but TV and phone are only at the main lodge. For side trips, launch a canoe on nearby South Hegman Lake and paddle and portage to nearby pictographs. Fish for walleye, northern pike, smallmouth bass, and lake trout. Drive into Ely to watch bears at the North American Bear Center or howl at wolves at the International Wolf Center.
Overnight: $150–$454 (cabin); season runs May 8– September 20

Gateway Lodge [back to top] Land O’ Lakes, WI,
 800-848-8058
Built: 1938
Best For: Those who love a historic setting but don’t need to sit on a lake. Backstory: Detroit radio and theater magnate John King built his hotel near the Chicago & North Western’s State Line railway station in 1938. The area was a popular lake country summer getaway for Chicagoans. Men would ride the Friday overnight train, spend weekends with their families, and return to work on the Sunday overnight. The Gateway had slot machines (then legal in Wisconsin), bowling alleys, billiard tables, and trap shooting. After the grand hotel went into receivership, rooms were sold and the lodge was run through a condo association. About 50 rooms are available to rent.
The Vibe: Yearning for days of yore. The Gateway is worth a stop for the sheer spaciousness of its log lobby and the size of the split-stone fireplace (nearly tall enough to stand in). Handcrafted touches stand out—the hand-pegged floor, the massive hewn beams, and the original outdoor-themed silhouette wall lamps in the dining room. Unfortunately, many of the hotel’s original furnishing were sold in the 1970s. Gateway underwent extensive remodeling in the 1990s, but since rooms are individually owned and offered for rent, each is decorated differently. Most are small and have the original pine paneling, but the quality of the renovation varies. There’s a pool, hot tub, and sauna, plus Internet in the lobby. You can still shoot trap right outside the lodge.
Overnight: $75–$100

Douglas Lodge [back to top] (Lake Itasca) Itasca State Park, 218-266-2100
Built: 1905 Best For: A respite after biking, hiking, paddling, fishing, picnicking, and camping.
Backstory: Itasca, on the headwaters of the Mississippi, was designated Minnesota’s first state park in 1891. But the rough work of logging continued, and when the two-story lodge was built on Lake Itasca’s East Arm in 1905, the impressive structure was dubbed a “jewel standing in mud.” Named for the state attorney general who helped end logging in the park, Douglas Lodge is the oldest surviving building in the state park system.
The Vibe: Classy and classic. The whole pine logs, fieldstone fireplace, exposed whole-log interior beams, and French doors epitomize the rustic style. Guest rooms have been refurbished with air-conditioning and wireless, but true to the original plan, they remain spartan and, by today’s standards, small. Only the suites have their own bathrooms; guests in single rooms have to march down the hall. The restaurant serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner, including wine and beer. The real amenity is the park itself. Hop rocks across the Mississippi, drive or bike 11-mile-long Wilderness Drive, board the Chester Charles for a tour of Lake Itasca, hike 33 miles of trails, rent a kayak, or fish for panfish, pike, and bass.
Overnight: $69–$115

Ludlow’s Island Resort 
[back to top] (Lake Vermilion) Cook,
877-583-5697
Built: 1939-present
Best For: Imagining you’re farther away than you really are.
Backstory: Hod and Lil Ludlow built the first cabin on their Lake Vermilion island in 1933, when Hod was organizing and leading Boy Scout trips near Ely. In 1936 an acquaintance asked if he could rent the cabin for employees and customers. The Ludlow family moved to a tent at the other end of the island and Ludlow’s Island Resort was born. Of the resort’s many cabins, the most breathtaking is a four-story one with ample windows, designed by an architecture class from the University of Minnesota.
The Vibe: Water world. Only four of the 21 cabins are accessible by car. The rest lie on Ludlow’s Island or the unroaded north shore. Built over seven decades, they have a range of period ambiance. As you arrive, pick up the receiver of an antique phone, ring the lodge, and wait for the lapstrake-hulled motorboat to haul you to your lodgings. The cabins have fireplaces, a view of the lake, and access to Internet. Mainland cabins have TVs, but only two island cabins do. The lake, with numerous bays and 365 islands, is ripe to explore. Rent a boat to fish for some of the biggest muskellunge in the state. Take a turn at the oars of a 1890s rowboat or paddle a wood-and-canvas canoe.
Overnight: $225–$700 (cabin); season runs May 8–October 11

The Naniboujou Lodge and Restaurant [back to top]
(Lake Superior)
Grand Marais,
218-387-2688
Built: 1929
Best For: Daydreams by the big lake with Jazz-era flashbacks.
Backstory: It’s the story of what might have been. In 1927, a Duluth merchant laid plans for an exclusive private club on the shore of Lake Superior. The Naniboujou Holding Company sold 99-year memberships to the toast of jazz-era society, including boxer Jack Dempsey, slugger Babe Ruth, and writer Ring Lardner. The main lodge opened in 1929. The stock market crash put an end to plans for cottages, riding stables, tennis courts, and a golf course.
The Vibe: Psychedelic yet soothing. A 200-ton fieldstone fireplace anchors the Great Hall. Thirteen sets of original French doors are still intact. Color sets the place apart—French artist Antoine Goufee painted bold Cree Indian designs over the walls and ceiling. Yet for the riot of colors, the atmosphere is surprisingly sedate. Rooms are small with little historic feel. Half face the lake; five have wood-burning fireplaces. Superior usually keeps the lodge cool, but summer nights can get stuffy. There’s no TV, phone, or Internet in the rooms, and no alcohol in the restaurant. Walk the cobble beach or the banks of the Brule River to the landmark Devil’s Kettle. Across Highway 61 hike the trails in Judge C.R. Magney State Park and the Superior Hiking Trail.
Overnight: $84–$109; season runs May 15–October 18, plus select winter weekends

Lutsen Lodge [back to top]
(Lake Superior)
 Lutsen,
800-258-8736
Built: 1952
Best For: The view, as you linger long after breakfast. Backstory: In 1885 Swedish immigrant C. A. A. Nelson claimed a homestead on Lake Superior, nestled in a perfect cove at the mouth of the Poplar River. Back then no road ran along the lake. Any travelers arrived by boat, and Nelson put them up. The North Shore highway was built during the late 1920s and paved in 1940. A tide of automobile tourists followed it northward. In 1952 the Nelson family built this Swedish–style hewn pine–timber lodge, designed by Edwin Lunde.
The Vibe: Stylish with a view. The site at the mouth of the river is one of the most pleasant along the lake. Heavy interior beams and lakeside windows frame the pretty view as well as you can imagine. The rooms in the main lodge are modest by current standards and lack air-conditioning (which isn’t usually necessary), though they do have Internet. Unfortunately, the view of the little cove has been compromised over the years by construction of condos. Lutsen Lodge has a pool, whirlpool, and sauna. A three-hour introduction to kayaking is free. Nearby are the Superior Hiking Trail and Gitchi-Gami Bike Trail.
Overnight: $79–$149