Adventures in Minnesota, Angel Hinkley

Adventures In Minnesota

When you plan out an off-road adventure, the Midwest often gets overlooked. While Minnesota may not have high evaluation mountains or vast desert, it does offer you the opportunity of off-roading through beautiful farm side valleys, thick wooded forests and breathtaking overviews of our 10,000 plus lakes.

The Minnesota 4 Wheel Drive Association (MN4WDA) in a non-profit organization of volunteers that was established in 1987 to serve and represent the off-road community in Minnesota. The organization works tirelessly to create new trails and park opportunities in the state, along with advocating for the continued public use of our trails and touring routes. The organization is made up of a little over a thousand club members, individual members and business associates and is led by a small group of officers, board members and committees along with a legislative lobbyist.

Over the past 30 years, the MN4WDA has created several unique places to wheel. Our most popular offroad parks can be found in northeast Minnesota on the Mesabi Iron Rage where you can find 36 miles of OHV trails through shale rock and pine trees in the Iron Range Off-Highway Vehicle State Recreation Area. Amongst the blood red dirt terrain, rock cliffs and scenic overlooks you will experience trails for all levels of experience and

vehicle types ranging in core roads all the way up to extreme obstacles. Local lodging, camping and restaurants conveniently located in the town of Gilbert, just a mile or two from the off-road park.

One of our most exciting upcoming opportunities is for our overlanding and soft roading enthusiasts. We are in the final stages of creating our Border to Border Touring Route. This new travel route takes you across northern Minnesota from North Dakota to Lake Superior on street legal roads, made up of state and national forest, township, county and state roads. Most of the roads are rugged dirt or gravel with natural attractions, historical stops, and plenty of lodging and camping along the way.

This is just the beginning of off-road adventures in Minnesota. We are currently working on creating and Off-Road Vehicle (OHV) Master Plan that will identify opportunities to enhance and improve our current trails and off-road parks, along with creating new opportunities, while ensuring that we are being environmentally sustainable. This is a community-influenced effort, led by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR), Minnesota 4 Wheel Drive Association and contracted consulting firm SE Group.

We are excited to see a formal plan created and cannot wait to start on the trail improvement and projects bringing more opportunities to enjoy our beautiful state with our family, friends and off-road community!

Angela Hinkley

MN4WDA Public Relations Director

For more information, check out

www.mn4wda.org dnr.state.mn.us and MnORVmasterplan.org.