The Cut Foot Sioux Trail is a 22-mile (35 km) loop trail in the Chippewa National Forest of Minnesota, USA. It follows gravel and sand forestry roads that are now used for hiking, biking, cross-country skiing and horse back riding. The trail passes by several lakes.
The trail starts at the Cut Foot Sioux Visitor Information Center on Minnesota State Highway 46 in west-central Itasca County. The Center, on the Leech Lake Indian Reservation, offers interpretive programs and a fishing pier. From the Center the trail runs west through wooded country past several lakes, including Cut Foot Sioux Lake, then turns north and slopes gradually up to Farley Tower, an old lookout. Turning east, the trail runs along the Northern Divide, then drops down to the Bowstring river before heading south back to the Visitor center.
The trail connects with Simpson Creek Trail, a 13-mile (21 km) trail system through large red pines on a peninsula that extends into Lake Winnibigoshish, and passes through the Cut Foot Experimental Forest, used for studying pine forest management. Walkers may see eagles, osprey and loons on the lakes.
The Cut Foot Sioux Ranger Station, near Lake Winnibigoshish, is the oldest remaining ranger station building in the Forest Service's Eastern Region. A log cabin, it was built in 1904 and abandoned in 1918, but has been restored and is in good condition as of 2008.
US Forest Service Map
Famous quotes containing the words cut, foot and/or trail:
“And if the stage-dark head rehearse
The fifth act of the closing night,
Why, cut it off, piece after piece,
And throw the tough cortex away....”
—Allen Tate (1899–1979)
“That’s life. Whichever way you turn, fate sticks out a foot to trip you.”
—Martin Goldsmith, and Edgar G. Ulmer. Al Roberts (Tom Neal)
“Most of us don’t have mothers who blazed a trail for us—at least, not all the way. Coming of age before or during the inception of the women’s movement, whether as working parents or homemakers, whether married or divorced, our mothers faced conundrums—what should they be? how should they act?—that became our uncertainties.”
—Anne Roiphe (20th century)