The wife and I plan on coming up to the arrowhead region after Christmas. We are looking for a high end hotel with pool, hot tub, nice bar area, fireplace, on the trail. Will the Grand Ely Lodge meet our needs? Any other reccomendations?

Thank you.

Wow... ! Sure hope you make it out to the trails!!!! [jk Jeff!]

Yep. Good rooms, good food, pool, etc. Right on Shagawa with easy access to lake trails out to Vermilion, the Taconite, and the Tomahawk.

A cool route you might not think of is to go from Shagawa to Little Long and then continue North up to where Chainsaw Sisters used to be. You can can then loop around across some smaller lakes, the Burntside River, Burntside Lake, and then back to Little Long and Shagawa.

Map attached:

Click to view attachment

Trails? He does not need trails!! Hell thier sleds might not even leave the trailer, or the shed back home for that matter!! hahaha

Com'on guys...........we plan on putting on at least 10 miles!

No I know you are being way modest. If anybody ever does have a chance to ride with driveumhard, please do he and lisa are great riders put on good miles and have a blast doing it. Have fun that week, and I hope I can meet up with you, we will see how it goes.

I would have to put a vote in for the Fortune Bay casino. It has it all... gas, trails going every direction, gambling with liquor, restuarants, huge hotel with hot tub rooms, swimming pool. Plenty of parking for snowmobile trailers... park your sled right out your room if your on first floor. Plus its close to VC and bayview.

and if the trails are bad around the Bay if its a busy weekend they are REALLY bad because so many people ride them!! Hopefully lakes are staked by christmas. tower/coook club does vermillion. i can keep posted when Ely and Babbitt does this area. Some spots on lakes are still iffy for stopping and cutting a hole. Hope you find somewhere to stay! Ely/Babbitt/Tower area is great to ride! And agreed with the old way to Chainsaw Sisters. is a great little couple hour ride with many great sights. Also Grand Ely Lodge is located seconds from downtown Ely. Torture Bay is a little ways from Tower/Cook. Hope this helped!

Map Of Ely/Crane Lake/North Shore/Virginia/Babbitt/Tower Area Request

Don't forget to eat at Stony Ridge on Shagawa. Best burgers you'll ever eat. I promise. They have meat toppings on already awesome and huge burgers. They're works of art.

Area lakes do not have a lot of ice yet. Reports from Vemillion are a few inches of ice, some water, ice slush & snow. This is a result of the heavy snow a couple of weeks ago after just freezing up. Warning signes posted on hwy 77 on way to Fortune Bay warning of poor ice conditions.

Thank you for all this info! Keep it coming please.

Thanks

let us know, how the conditions are, thinking of heading up that way soon after x-mas too..

skidder

i vote grand ely great place, awesome teriakyi chicken wings, right on shagawa lake, 9 inches of ice as i drilled a new hole at the fish house last night out on shagawa, but some spots have less, just keep on the throttle on the lake

Ya all this fresh snow did some damage to the ice on most of the lakes and rivers, but still doable.. I was on the St. Louis river last night and it was kind of iffy as to what was froze and what was open water, been riding it for 38 years but nothing i haven't seen before unless you don't like thin ice and open water.. I may run towards Meadowlands Saturday and check out that end of it. about 40 miles one way downstream, I'll report what it looks like next week

Does fortune bay have gas for sleds down by the marina???? I never bothered to go look.

Its in a wierd spot away from the casino, you usually have to drive threw some bare parking lots to get there. Pay at the Pump.

holy shzznit, when did they put that there? I cant believe I never knew about it. Damn this preoccupation with alcohol!