Effigy Mounds National Monument

Trip Date: October 14, 2011

My time in Minneapolis came to a close early this morning. It was a Friday and my friends Jojo and Abe and I finished our breakfast at Mickey's Diner in St. Paul. My things were all packed in my car and as soon as we got back into Minneapolis, I dropped them off and got right back on the highway heading back to west Michigan. Already on my trip I checked off two more of the official 395 National Park units in the system (the Mississippi and St. Croix National Rivers), and I decided that on the way home I would take a different route, through Iowa, and check off one more park: Effigy Mounds National Monument.

Effigy Mounds NM is located on the bluffs of the Mississippi River in northeast Iowa. The park protects earthen mounds erected by the local native people between the years 700-1300 (roughly). These people were spread across the Mississippi River region of eastern Iowa, northern Illinois, southern Wisconsin, and southeastern Minnesota. The video at the National Park's visitor center suggested that before white settlers moved westward, there were more than 10,000 of these mounds in northeast Iowa alone; however, since these mounds were often in the middle of pristine farming and range land, most of these mound structures were destroyed. Those that remain are of a variety of types. Some of the mounds are simple round dome-structures, while others are more conical, or elongated, yet geometrically simple. The mounds that I was most interested to see, however, were in the shapes of bears and eagles. Archaeologists have discovered that in the center of these mounds are the remains of coals from fires and human remains, suggesting that these mounds were sacred burial sites. And what makes the animal mounds more impressive is that these burial sites lie beneath the brains and the hearts of the animals, suggesting a spiritual connection to these vital organs. The Park preserves 81 mounds total; the northern unit has more conical and elongated lobe mounds while the southern unit has the majority of the animal mounds.

The park is not a huge park, but there is a lot of ground to cover if you want to see everything, and it's all done on foot! The visitor center is the obvious place to stop and they have a nice video (though dated) and a great museum which illustrates a glimpse into the lives of the mound builders. While it was a beautiful day on my visit (low 50s, though windy with gusts up to 40 mph!), I was told that the best time of year to see the mounds was in the winter or the spring. The reason for this is that in the summer and the fall, the undergrowth of blackberry brambles, grasses, and weeds grows on the mounds and makes it difficult to see how tall are the mounds. In the winter and spring, none of the growth has started yet, so you can get a better idea of the height of the mounds. The grass is cut around each mound, but out of respect for the mound builders plants are allowed to grow. Back in the 70s and 80s, each mound was outlined and you could clearly see the shape of each, though they were much easier to see from aerial photography. Nowadays, the only outline of the mounds is where the grass is or is not cut.

I didn't have that much time to spend at the park, but I was coerced by the friendly staff and the nice weather to make the 7-mile hike from the visitor center to the Hanging Rock overlook at the very northern edge of the park. It was a good two hour hike there and back and well worth it. The weather was just stunning and it was fun seeing families with their kids or dogs (or both) enjoying the outdoors. Once at the Hanging Rock overlook, I stayed there for a few minutes and savored the isolation and scenery of boats and barges chugging up and down the Mississippi while a vulture made lazy circles below me. The trek was great, but I didn't see the majority of the animal mounds I wanted to see, so I said, to heck with it, and parked my car at the southern unit and spent the next hour hiking up to the Marching Bear Group of mounds - a stunning collection of 10 bear and 3 eagle mounds.

Boats on the Mississippi River seen from Hanging Rock Point

Mounds out near Hanging Rock

A line of smaller circular mounds seen through the trees

I had to stand on a fence in an attempt to get the full shape of this Bear mound on camera. You can see where the grass is mowed and where it is not. This is the Bear. It's head is facing to the left and the two "lobes" you can see in the photo are the Bear's front legs (left) and back legs (right).

Aerial photo of the Marching Bear Group of mounds in the park's southern unit, seen outlined in chalk (which I'm not sure if they still do), but it makes them easier to see. (Photo: National Park Service)

Beautiful fall day

Mounds out near Hanging Rock

Just a vulture doing his thing

It was cool to see, every now and then, the gusty wind hurl a pile of leaves into the air and carry them out, across the Mississippi River

Within each the northern and southern units of the park are two large swaths of Tallgrass Prairie, a landscape that once covered the entire region from the Great Lakes to the Rocky Mountains

Clouds marching over the fall colors in the southern unit

I tried getting another overhead shot of one of the Eagle Mounds, but it wasn't the greatest

Wildlife in the park was small, butterflies, chipmunks, squirrels, songbirds, etc., but there. I was hoping to see some whitetail deer, but I was out of luck.

 

All in all, I was at the park for no more than three and a half hours, yet managed to log 11 miles of hiking. I knew it meant I would have a very late night of driving ahead of me, but I think this excursion illustrates exactly what is my travel philosophy: You never know when you will be back to a place, so you might as well enjoy it for what it's worth while you're there. I usually also leave something out on purpose so that I have incentive to return, and while I saw everything this particular park has to offer, it seems like such a spiritual, peaceful place, that I would love to return and just lay out in the tallgrass, watching the clouds march across the sky and let the wind blow all my worries away.