Rice Lake: Parks, Lake and Cultural History

Rice Lake offers several points of interest for a trip: a lakeside corridor with historical significance, a park between the lake and river, a bird sanctuary, and a route heading east to Park Falls. These features offer different focal points. If you first decide which places or route you’re interested in, you can use the information more purposefully when planning your trip.

Lakeshore and Cultural History

Indian Mounds Park and the adjacent lakeside corridor lie between Lakeshore Drive and the lake. The corridor extends from Bundy Street to the former site of Lakeview Medical Center. These locations place the area along the shore and also identify its endpoints—helpful when familiarizing yourself with the park’s location in Rice Lake.

Indian Mounds Park also has cultural and historical significance: it contains approximately twelve groups of Indian Mounds and the last burial grounds of the Mound Builders on the west side of the lake. The approximate number describes the mound groups in the park; the burial grounds’ location on the lake’s west side also places them in the landscape. If you’d like to consider history as well as the lakeshore when choosing a destination, this park offers a specific point of interest.

Between Lake, River and Bird Sanctuary

Hiawatha Park offers a different perspective on the area. It lies on a peninsula between Rice Lake and the Red Cedar River. Its location is therefore shaped by two named bodies of water. Rice Lake covers more than 900 acres; this figure gives a sense of the lake’s larger scale, while the peninsula location identifies a particular park. The size of the lake and the park’s location thus answer different questions about the landscape.

Wolfinger Bird Sanctuary is a bird sanctuary. It adds a distinct focus to the area’s parks and waterways. When planning your trip, you can distinguish it from the cultural and historical significance of Indian Mounds Park and Hiawatha Park’s location between the lake and river.

A Route with a Direction and Destination

The Tuscobia State Trail is a 76-mile route that runs east from Rice Lake to Park Falls. Its starting point, direction and destination make clear that the trail extends beyond Rice Lake. If you’re including a longer route in your trip plans, you can think of Rice Lake as the starting point and Park Falls as the destination of the route described.

The figures associated with Rice Lake also represent different scales: more than 900 acres refers to the lake’s area, 76 miles to the length of the Tuscobia State Trail, and approximately twelve to the number of mound groups in Indian Mounds Park. They help answer different questions about lake size, route length and cultural history. When planning, it’s therefore helpful to associate each figure with its respective place or route.

Search for Hotels in Rice Lake

Then compare hotels based on the requirements that matter for your stay.

Discover more destinations: Turtle Lake, Chetek.

Back to the regional travel overview: Barron County.