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Yeah stay out of Minneapolis. Uptown is as bad as downtown and now this weeks murder is a dismembered 36 year old man in NE. No details available yet. Never know what is happening next here. The weather is not normal this year either. Looks like a lot of high 90s for the summer. Hope it’s a bit cooler up north.
MOA is in Bloomington next to the airport, not Minneapolis. People love to bash the mall, but I always enjoyed going there in the past, until a certain faction began stabbing people and throwing little kids over balconies. Only been once since the latter incident and you better believe I held onto my kids tight with a watchful eye. MOA is what it's advertised as - a mall on steroids, with a ton of neat food choices....I even used to stop off at Cowboy Jacks for a beer at the bar on my way home when I worked in Edina occasionally. The amusement park is cool and there's an excellent aquarium on the bottom level. It's a place I would still definitely recommend for a first time tourist, but with the way things have been in the TC metro the past year I would make it a point to be diligent about my surroundings at all times. Because it's such a major attraction with the associated huge crowds there's always the potential for trouble.
I took the fam to Fargo so we too could "claim" North Dakota last year. There's just not much up there and there are so many better drives/destinations you could do. Southeastern Minnesota, for instance, is one of the best kept secrets anywhere in the country. The bluff country along the Mississippi is incredibly beautiful and so I highly recommend the drive on 61 from Red Wing down to La Crosse, WI if it's scenery you seek. That's river country, mind you.....there aren't many actual lakes down that way at all, which surprises people unfamiliar with the area in correlation with Minnesota's "10,000 Lakes" moniker. SE Minnesota and a large portion of western Wisconsin actually resemble the Ozarks of Arkansas and Missouri if you're familiar with that part of the country. The best (most numerous and biggest) inland lake experiences will primarily be north and west of the MSP metro. My personal favorite inland lake regions are the Alexandria vicinity, the Brainerd Lakes area and the Boundary waters up by Canada. Even so, there are a lot of beautiful lake chains within the TC metro, too....such as the Lindstrom vicinity in Chisago County and the Minnetonka area just west of Minneapolis. That said, I haven't even scratched the surface as far as seeing the rest of this states inland lake offerings. I've seen a good bit for only being here 4 years, though.
Duluth is one of the nations great harbor towns and not to be missed. I have never worried about crime there for even an instant. I was just there to take my son aboard the William A Irvin, which is a retired freighter converted into a museum. I've always found the shipping industry to be fascinating and we love to watch the boats go in and out of harbor down at Canal Park. Duluth is just a gorgeous city and the Lake Superior water views are breathtaking. Beyond that the North Shore is more of the same all the way to the Canadian border. We actually went up to Grand Marais and back to the south side of the TC metro (Lakeville) in one day a few years back.
Btw, I spent much of my childhood in the Houston metro. You will love the natural beauty of Minnesota coming from a spot like that. Unfortunately, we've been mired in a Texas-like heat wave the past couple weeks, but it looks like it's finally starting to break. This is usually a very comfortable place in the summer, aside from the legions of bugs that will decorate your windshield almost instantly when you drive. Gotta watch out for the wildlife, too.....there's just so much of it they can't help but make there way onto the roads eventually.
Wherever you wind up going, enjoy Minnesota! We've had a rough past year as everyone knows by now, but no matter how crazy things get politically, this will always be one of the most beautiful states in the US and that will never change, thank the Lord.
We visited MOA a few years ago and even my husband who isn't a mall going guy enjoyed it. My daughter had a blast at the amusement park. The night before we went to a Twins game and they handed out coupons which you scratched off then checked the bar code at MOA. Our daughter got $95 worth of rides or something like that . My favorite is that Log Flume. We ate at several places the best was Twin City Café. I visited the twin cities a year later in the winter to go see the Gophers play hockey and my hotel was close to MOA. I absolutely fell in love with the twin cities. The University of Mn campus was beautiful.
Let me just say this about my recent travels to Minnesota along I-694 and I-94.
I COULD NOT BELIEVE the level of road construction going on in the Twin Cities all the way through St. Cloud. It was like nothing I've seen anywhere else. It appears that the metro area is playing infrastructure catch up too late, otherwise I can't really comprehend the insanity of it all and the completely hazardous and dangerous merges (due to the construction), and the well known lack of people not being able to merge in the Cities.
thanks for the heads up although I doubt we will be taking any big road trips this summer.
We visited MOA a few years ago and even my husband who isn't a mall going guy enjoyed it. My daughter had a blast at the amusement park. The night before we went to a Twins game and they handed out coupons which you scratched off then checked the bar code at MOA. Our daughter got $95 worth of rides or something like that . My favorite is that Log Flume. We ate at several places the best was Twin City Café. I visited the twin cities a year later in the winter to go see the Gophers play hockey and my hotel was close to MOA. I absolutely fell in love with the twin cities. The University of Mn campus was beautiful.
Thanks for sharing. The log chute is one of the few rides that was part of the original Camp Snoopy when the MOA debuted in 1992. I was a kid then and it was my favorite ride and I will say that it’s still my favorite today (The Fairly Odd coaster is a great as well.) It’s unfortunate that they drained the water from it during the COVID shutdown and they haven’t gotten it up and running. I’m hoping that changes very soon.
Locals tend to scoff at MOA. A very popular response if you bring it up to someone is “oh I won’t go near that place.” It is the complete opposite for us. With our children we usually have 1-2 annual memberships active at any given time between Nickelodeon, Crayola Experience and Sea Life and I’m not embarrassed at all to say that we make it down to the mall at least once and sometimes multiple times a week and especially during the colder months. We enjoy walking the mall, shopping, dining, going to movies. Our family and friends got their COVID vaccine there so the mall has touched our lives in many ways.
The Mall of America was impressive when I was there the Tuesday after Memorial Day. Didn't walk thru the entire mall lol but I enjoyed my visit. Better than King of Prussia.
Don't worry about crime here - if you don't leave stuff in view in your car, make sure to lock your doors, and don't go looking for trouble you will be okay. I am all over Minneapolis proper every day and I am fine. Downtown and Uptown are pretty safe, just keep you wits about you. I recommend checking out the lakes in Minneapolis proper while you are here. You can rent one of the shared bikes and ride miles and miles of trails along the lakes. You can rent kayaks and paddle boards to bring on the water too, which I highly recommend. If you rent them at Bde Maka Ska, you can paddle on Bde, Lake of the Isles, and Cedar Lake, as they are connected by channels. If you go downtown, check out the Stone Arch Bridge for a good view of downtown and the falls.
Don't buy into the scared mentality some people echo. This is a safe place, just be smart. People love to cite things like the dismembered guy found in NE. That kind of thing happens to people involved in criminal activity who associate with mobster types, and do something wrong. Unless that describes you, that won't happen to you.
Like many others have said, definitely go to Duluth and then drive along Lake Superior. There are tons of beautiful State Parks to stop at along the drive - my personal favorite is Temperance River. And yes, the drive along the Mississippi in the SE part of the state would be well worth it too. I think you could skip ND altogether and be fine. It's boring out that way and there are places around MN that would be more worth the time in my opinion. Towards the boundary waters area is another cool spot. MOA is okay if you really wanna see it, but don't spend too much time there. It's just a really big mall (I do really like the log ride at the amusement park there though).
Crime is a concern, I just don't let it rule my life. I'm in South Minneapolis and I still go out each day to one of the local parks, I still drive where I need to go. When approaching the problematic areas I'm inclined to think about my surroundings at a higher level but I still do what I want/need.
Exercise common sense, that's all that's needed. It's beautiful here, come visit and enjoy the stay.
Thinking of visiting Minnesota this summer. Not planning to spend much time in Minneapolis other than Mall of America. Mostly wanted to do an outdoor trip, visit Fargo to claim "North Dakota" and maybe spend some time on Lake Superior.
Some of my travel party are very concerned about crime in Minnesota and think anything in Minneapolis or Duluth is unsafe. I'm from Houston, TX so I don't think it's worse than that but I'm not familiar with Minnesota at all. Wanted a break from the heat and see some good scenery, as well as popping into North Dakota.
Duluth has a super small pocket of homeless people. Crime-wise, it's smack-dab in the middle as compared to the rest of the USA (C-D Crime Index of 300ish). Duluth has a very homogenous population (white central). If you are remotely concerned, I suppose you could dodge downtown Duluth. Personally, I would have absolutely NO concern. I'd send my wife solo there any time of the day... Including DT Duluth. You will be hanging out in the tourist areas anyways. it is NOT a problem!
Re: MPLS. I wouldn't be sending my wife DT MPLS by herself unless it is during business working hours. Even then with all that has been going on, I'd punt. There are some incredibly safe areas in MPLS. But MPLS as a whole has a higher than average crime index. More specifically, 96% higher than the average American town. Don't shoot the messenger (pun not intended). Read all about it here https://www.city-data.com/crime/crim...Minnesota.html
re: Fargo. I understand why you want to check that box. Because you want to say you have been in ND. I get it. But as others have mentioned, you will be UNDERWHELMED. Maybe visit a lake nearby. Crossover and check out Fargo. But get ready to say "boy were they right"! Yawn. If you want to watch a dog run away for two days straight, you picked the right town! If you decide to spend a night in Fargo, you will conclude you blew a day.
If you wanna go all the way up to Fargo to "claim North Dakota", does that mean to mark off another state as having been visited? Wisconsin, Iowa, and SD are closer, and more interesting. WI's only a half hour from St Paul, and right next to Duluth. SD is a few hours away, but still closer than ND, and the closest city in SD is Sioux Falls, which is actually pretty cool. I haven't been to Fargo since I was a kid, but I remember it being pretty boring. The good scenery in the Dakotas is on the west side of the states. (Except for the cool waterfall park in Sioux Falls.)
As far as going to MN for scenery, we have a wide variety of scenery in different parts of the state. The scenery in Duluth is completely different from the scenery in Red Wing or Pipestone. Maybe you can get some ideas from a website like this one: https://www.minnesota-visitor.com/mi...a-regions.html .
I don't see anything wrong with visiting the Mall of America. I've taken visitors from overseas there, and they always enjoyed it. It's just a shopping mall, but tourists like it. I think visiting some place that's completely different from anything in TX would be more interesting, but it's a famous place you can check off your "I have been to" list.
I really would not worry about crime, especially in the daytime. The crime rate is probably much higher in large cities in TX than the Twin Cities or Duluth.
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Yawn. If you want to watch a dog run away for two days straight, you picked the right town! 
If you decide to spend a night in Fargo, you will conclude you blew a day.
