Kelly Schneider
Eagan
A review of this place — 2 years ago
Worth visiting!
My boyfriend picked Scenic State Park out for his first camping trip (I grew up camping with my family). It is a beautiful state park (true to its name), though a bit small. Many other state parks have more hiking trails or other natural attractions, but for a short weekend camping trip or if you like fishing, this is the place to go! The non-electric loop of campsites emptied out Sunday afternoon, so it felt like we had the place to ourselves.
Many of the other state parks fill up with reservations early in the season, but there were plenty of sites available just a few weeks before our trip.
The hike up to Chase Point (1.9 miles each way) is worth the view – mildly difficult terrain, but some people in front of us managed to get their off-roading baby carrier most of the way there. We rented a canoe for an afternoon, and the lake was quite peaceful. The lake is fairly shallow (I think 36 feet at its deepest), so no water-skiing or other antics that might disturb the calm. There is a small swimming spot on the shore, as well as several spots to dock your own boat if you bring it.
The park rangers who work there are very friendly. They were more than willing to help us out when we arrived late to buy more ice, and patrolled the park after hours to keep the volume down, which we appreciated.
There isn’t a playground, so other than swimming, kids might get bored if you go for a long time. There’s really only two hiking trails (including the one to Chase Point), which is why I say Scenic is the perfect place for a weekend camping trip. If the naturalist program hadn’t been cancelled due to budget cuts, I’m sure there would be more to do. The Bog Walk (a little detour off the longer hiking trail) was closed unfortunately, and I think that would have been an interesting guided tour.
Make sure you bring some serious bug spray with DEET (the Cutter Skintastic we brought didn’t work, but Deep Woods OFF did), otherwise you’ll get eaten up. But it’s not unbearable, as long as you have something with DEET in it.
I don’t know if we’ll go back, but that’s just because there are so many state parks in Minnesota and I’ve only been to a handful of them. So much more to discover in my new home state!
