Indian Mounds Park

With crummy weather behind and ahead of us, my husband and I decided to get out of the house, drive to the Indian Mounds Park and go for a walk. Why not join in the bleakness of the day by going to an Indian burial ground? Actually, it was quite pleasant.

The park is in St. Paul, Minnesota and has 6 Native American burial grounds with the oldest supposedly constructed 1500-2000 years ago.  All of the mounds are protected by a low fence. The park overlooks the Mississippi River and the St. Paul airport.

As we drove up, we saw a children’s playground and a picnic area. Once out of the car, we took a paved walking trail.

Mounds Park Children's Playground
Mounds Park Picnic Area
Mounds Park Walking Trail

Peek-a-boo views of the Mississippi River and the St. Paul airport can be seen although later in our walk we were able to get an unobstructed view of both of them.

St. Paul, MN airport
View of Mississippi River

As we continued on our walk, we saw an Indian? statue and a large covered shelter area that had a view of the street on the other side of the park. The area has a lot of older houses and is an “established” neighborhood. Friendly joggers greeted us as we walked past them.

Covered Shelter
Street view from Mounds Park shelter
Mounds Park Statue
House near Mounds Park

Currently there are six (6) mounds (literally) that have Indians buried beneath them. At one time there were a lot more but some of them were destroyed in the late 19th century by developers.

Native American burial mounds

Off in the distance the skyscrapers of St. Paul can be seen.

St. Paul, MN skyline

An old “airway” beacon that was built in 1929 still stands and was used to provide the city of St. Paul with air service between Chicago and St. Paul. One thing I learned is that “airway” beacons flash white-to-white while the normal airport beacons flash white-to-green. The beacon is original except for a refurbishing that was completed in 1995.

Airway Beacon

It was a goodly walk we had today. The constant rain/drizzle that we have been having makes everything look very very green and the tree trunks look dark. Guess beauty can be found just about anywhere, eh?

Trees in Mounds Park, St. Paul

(To read more about the history of these burial grounds, click here for the Wiki article.)

 

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