Welcome to the inaugural trip of 2026! The first stop of the season is Maplewood State Park! I’m excited to share this beautiful place with you.
Maplewood State Park Information
Maplewood State Park is located in Pelican Rapids, MN in a transition area between prairies and forests, which gives it a unique blend of plants and animals belonging to both terrains. It also has eight lakes and several ponds! So many options if you want to swim, fish, boat, and/or relax.
Activities
If you’re looking to hike, there are 25 miles to explore with 2.2 miles being self-guided. There is a 5.5 mile portion of the North Country National Scenic Trail, which is a footpath that stretches over 4,800 miles from North Dakota to Vermont. This part of the trail is marked, so if you’re interested follow the markers! News to you? Me too! I never would have thought you could walk from North Dakota to Vermont…
Biking more your speed? 3.8 miles of the paved Heart of the Lakes Trail comes through. This is super cool! Another thing I learned while researching this park. There’s also 9 miles of unpaved trails, so bring your mountain bike and see the sites.
Equestrians! There’s 20 miles of horse trails and horse camp sites, so bring the beautiful beasties and ride on!
It also has eight lakes and several ponds! So many options if you want to swim, fish, boat, and/or relax.
During the winter months, there are 5 miles of groomed (ski pass required) and 5 miles of ungroomed cross-country skiing trails, 21 miles of groomed snowmobile trails, and snowshoeing throughout the park as long as you stay off the groomed trails.
If you’re looking for wildlife, there’s 150 bird species, including colonial nesting birds, kingbirds, swallows, cuckoos, cerulean warblers, and blue-grey gnatcatchers. I also encountered swans and loons! There’s 50 species of mammals, including deer, beavers, racoons, squirrels, rabbits, and chipmunks. As well as, 25 kinds of reptiles and amphibians. Want to check off some wildflowers off the list? The park is home to trillium, hepatica, bloodroot, yellow lady’s slipper, wild onion, prairie rose, and showy milkweed. I was a little early for most of these, so I missed them. It would have been cool to see them.
Camping here? Well, you’re in luck. There are 71 drive-in sites, 32 electric sites, 3 backpack sites, 24 horse camp sites, 1 group camp site, and 5 camper cabins.
Other offerings
The park also offers a ranger station, interpretive exhibit, picnic area, picnic shelter, warming house, fishing pier, swimming beach, and two different boat access points. There’s also a gift shop, equipment rentals, firewood and ice sales, color vision glasses, and an All-Terrain Track Chair.
All of this info came from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources website, so credit where credit is due. Clickย hereย to view the original source.
Accessibility of Maplewood State Park
Parking
The areas I was in had plenty of parking. The trail head had a small parking lot, as well as at the cabins. In the main campground, there was parking near the bathroom/shower building.
Bathrooms
Vault toilets are available year round at the trail center, picnic area, the main campground, cabins on Beers Lake, the parking lot of the Beers Lake boat access, horse campground, day use area, and the picnic/beach area.
Plenty of places to potty if you need it!
Getting to the trail
The trail I did was right off the road that leads to the cabins/ campground. It’s clearly marked, but could be missed if you aren’t paying attention.
Maplewood State Park Trail Information
The Woodland Nature Loop Trail is about 0.9 miles and has 85 feet of elevation, which differs slightly from the AllTrails information. I decided to do this trail right after I unpacked the car. It was 3.5 hour drive and I needed to move around. The hike took me 29 minutes to complete and ended up being more difficult than I anticipated. Made it though! The trail was a narrow nature path, with a steep hill and roots, a lot of fallen leaves, and down trees to navigate.
I didn’t bring my sticks, but could have totally used them. Not going to lie, this one inspired my new should have brought my sticks song…Thankfully, I could shuffle down the hill and be okay, but if you have mobility issues it’ll be tricky. Note to self: Bring the sticks anyways…
I had to take a few breaks due to shortness of breath and pain. The pain was happening before the trail, but this exacerbated things some. Since it was a short trail, there wasn’t anywhere to sit a spell, so I just stopped on the trail and caught my breath. I did see some swans, which was cool, but couldn’t get any good pictures.
My rating
This trail would fall into the moderate to hard category of my rating scale. The change in elevation was a big factor, along with the uneven, trip hazard filled trail. Now if you don’t have any mobility issues, this may not be a factor for you at all. Like I said, I had to take several breaks and the trail was less than a mile. It was hard for me.
My Camping Experience at Maplewood State Park
I stayed here for the entirety of my trip. Since it’s May in Minnesota and the weather can be unpredictable, I elected to stay in one of the cabins. Maplewood State Park has five cabins–one in the campground and three down a bit, so they are on their own. I chose one of the further ones because my goal was relaxation. Thankfully, my neighbors were the quiet type.
The Crappie Cabin
The Crappie (named for the fish) Cabin is in the middle of the three cabins. It is similar to the one at Glacial Lakes. It has four beds, table, room to move, electricity, and heat. There’s also a picnic table and fire ring available for use.
It was a nice place to stay for the three days I was out here. There was a robin’s nest in the tree on my site, so there was tons of bird activity. I also saw a beaver and got some decent photos from the window, but only got a butt when I tried to sneakily take photos out the door. It got startled and ran under my cabin. The loons on the lake went nuts one night. It was cool to listen to them.
A gravel lot is available for parking near the vault toilets, which is down the path that leads to the cabins. While the lot is smaller, there’s enough room for each cabin to have two vehicles, which is nice. The lot and the path to the cabins are well-maintained gravel, which makes getting around nicer.
Now, the crappie cabin is considered the ADA accessible one. The cabin itself is since it has a ramp, extra room for mobility devices, lever doorknob that will unlock by pushing down on the handle, and a bed that is decent for transfers, however, I don’t know that I would consider it completely accessible though. You can’t drive up to the cabin and need to cart in your belongings. Carts are provided, however, needing to navigate that down the path will be challenging and a strain on energy reserves.
Once I got the hang of the cart, I did okay, but having to make multiple trips each on both check in and out to get my gear where it needed to go was frustrating and a drain on resources. I was already having shortness of breath and pain problems and this added to it.
Facilities at the Campground
In the main campground, there is both vault toilets, modern flush toilets and showers, and sinks for dishes. The toilets and showers have accessible options. The shower I saw wasn’t something I would consider accessible. There’s also a fish cleaning building here, right off the modern restroom building.
Have you been to Maplewood State Park? Want to go? Comment below. I’d love to hear from you.
Did you find Currently Unnamed Cardybear? Put found in the comments!
Be safe out there! REMEMBER YOUR MAPS AND PASSPORT STAMPS!! Seeyalaterbye <3
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