Stillwater Minnesota World Snow Sculpture Festival

Winter can be long, boring, and very painful in Wisconsin if you shut yourself indoors and wait for spring to arrive.  Many years ago, a wise friend told me that the key to not getting depressed in the winter was to "get out and play in it" and he is so right.  The problem is, most winter play is quite expensive or too adventurous for me.  I do not own any snowmobiles and skiing scares me to death.  But the past few years, we discovered a love of hiking in the winter (check out some fun winter hikes we've done in the past at the end of this post).  The forest in winter brings a new depth of beauty that is so different than during the warmer months.  But I also started keeping my eyes out for winter festivals, so when I saw a town only about two hours from my house had a "Snow Sculpture Festival" I decided that would be a fun, new winter experience for us.  We had never been to a snow sculpture festival before. 

Even though the town was only two hours away, we did book a hotel for a romantic weekend and also because a lot of the festival activities were at night and we didn't want to miss them.

The snow sculptors  came from all over the world.  A flag representing their country was positioned at each snow sculpture.  They all started with the same size block of snow and they had four days to complete their sculpture.  When we arrived Saturday morning. many were putting the finishing touches on their snow sculptures.

We went to view the sculptures twice:  once during daylight hours to watch the sculptors do their artistry, and then again after dark to view them all complete and lit up.

My husband and I know absolutely nothing about snow sculpting but would you believe we picked the top two winners right away?  That's right, we picked Canada's "The Inosculation of Souls" sculpture and Mongolia's "Legend" sculpture as the best of them all, and we were right! They won #1 and #2 respectively.  I'm standing in front of Canada's snow sculpture in the photo below.  What blew me away about this sculpture was the holes in the birds head and beak.  How did the snow not cave in during that process?

Taiwan's sweet sculpture "Lover's Tear".

After viewing the sculptures we decided to go grab some lunch and do some shopping. Stillwater is famous for its gorgeous historic downtown with fabulous shops and restaurants.

While shopping, we received a message that our room was ready and since we were nearby we decided to check in.  We picked a posh, trendy hotel right downtown so we could walk to all the festivities at night.  It was pricey, but it was an unusual experience.  I don't think I got my money's worth as it was twice the amount I'd normally pay for a hotel and our room wasn't that great plus we had to pay $30 for parking.

The Lora Hotel used to be a steam-powered brewery in 1868.  It was refurbished into a hotel in 2018.  It is built right into a hill and it preserves the original limestone walls and caves from the original brewery.  You can see the caves right behind the reception desk when you walk into the lobby of the hotel, but they are not open to the public.

The room was nice, but unfortunately we didn't get a room with limestone walls as advertised on their website.  Our favorite part of the room was the rain shower!  The price for the room was probably so high because of the snow sculpture festival that weekend.  

Our room seemed kinda small, but it was nicely decorated.  However, for the price I paid, I've stayed in nicer hotels with more amenities.  

The lobby's Christmas Tree was decorated with all the flags of the nations participating in the snow sculpture festival.  We were told at check-in that they had several teams staying at the hotel;  that was a fun fact.

Stillwater has so many amazing, gorgeous historic buildings, like this old mill now turned antique shop.

For lunch we went to "Nacho Mamas" and we both ordered a stuffed burrito.  I just about died when I saw the amount of food on our plates and I instantly regretted that we didn't just order one and split it.  I've never seen such a big burrito in my life.  I ended up making three meals out of mine it was so huge.

I love the black and red design of this old building.

We went back to our hotel for a two hour nap before heading back out after dark for the night time snow sculpture festivities.  It was so much colder at night, but the festivals had fire pits everywhere plus an indoor warming tent.  We were also very appropriately dressed for the occasion.

The town of Stillwater looked so pretty all lit up at night.

Stillwater still had all their Christmas decorations up, so I took advantage of them!

We walked across their famous lift bridge in spite of the cold to get some views of the city lit up at night.

The colorful snow sculptures really stood out in the darkness.

And here is the beautiful lift bridge all lit up at night.

And finally, here are some of the completed snow sculptures.  First up is USA's "Call to Arms".  My first thought when seeing this sculpture was "Well of course the USA would be the one country to do something woke". 😆They didn't win anything. 

Edited to Add on 1/30/26

The USA sculpture was recently removed from where it was displayed over a rules violation that was noticed after judging was completed in the World Snow Celebration. The hands spelled out a political message in sign language.  Political messages are not allowed in the Snow Sculpture Festival.  Read more about it HERE!

There were several modern art sculptures.  None of them won any awards.  I think people like to see more realistic sculptures representing something tangible and not just artistic.  However, I really liked Switzerland's modern art sculpture because I was so impressed with the interlocking rings.  How in the world did they do that?

Lithuania's "Let's Play".

Another one of my favs:  India's "Nature Cradle".

I'm sure the children enjoyed viewing Britain's "For Fast Acting Relief, Slow Down",

My husband's favorite modern art one was Peru's "Tupana" which was also a "People's Choice" winner.

Some people thought Mexico's "Tripping" should have placed but I don't see it.

Canada's "The Inosculation of Souls" won both First Place and "Artists Choice".  I don't usually have a lot of good things to say about Canada, but go Canada!  This was very well deserved.  And did you know, they had an all woman team?  Wow! 

2nd Place went to Mongolia's "Legend".  We loved this sculpture,  And frankly, this is what the USA team should have sculpted imo.  Something, that represents our great country and not just a woke statement.

And the award to the worst sculpture in the festival imo goes to Turkey's "Dialogue",  I mean, what in the world is this?  😆  It looks like they hardly sculpted anything from their box of snow.  

It's really cool to walk through the aisle of flags representing all the countries participating in the snow sculpture festival.

Here is Canada's amazing all women team:

Most all the other teams were all men, so to see women do so well at the festival was awesome.

Here is the 2nd place Mongolian team.

And third place went to Thailand for "Life in Frame".

After viewing the sculptures we went inside the warming tent where they had a super fun and exciting closing ceremony, then we decided to go grab some dinner.  Most of the restaurants were pretty crowded at this time, but we managed to find a vintage burger shop that squeezed us in after a short wait.

I liked the decor and ambiance of this place, but the burgers were just ok.  I think most people go here for ice cream.  I did appreciate that the burgers were small, which I know sounds funny to say, as most people want a big, juicy burger.  I just grow tired of the huge portions at most restaurants.  I usually have to cut my burger in half and take the other half home.  The burgers at Leo's Grill and Malt Shop were the perfect size for me.  However, they used canned mushrooms instead of fresh mushrooms on their Swiss and Mushroom Burger which was a big no-no to me.

The next morning we went out for breakfast at The Main Cafe.  I ordered a four berry French toast and then we split two eggs and hash browns.  This was a very good breakfast.  I loved the French toast!  I couldn't finish it, as once again it was too large, so hubby ate my other half.

I hope you enjoyed my winter weekend getaway.  And would you believe I am officially out of travel posts?  Well, I am.  So unless I take another winter trip, I won't have anymore travel posts to share for a while. 😢

Have a Great Day!  Amy

Linking Up with these Fabulous Blogs HERE!

For more ideas on how to have fun this winter, check out these posts!

 A Candlelight Walk in Interstate Park

Visiting Como Park Zoo in Winter

The Snow Shoe Trail in the Black River Forest

Hiking Parfrey's Glen in Winter

Great River Bluff State Park

This week's travel post will be the last of my fall hiking adventures, then I won't have anything to share with you for a while until we do our Valentine's Day weekend getaway. 😞 We won't be going on any more trips until spring.  But my fall travel post is a good one, for we went to a beautiful park in Minnesota that we had never been to before:  Great River Bluff State Park.

Great River Bluffs State Park has six and one half miles of easy trails with scenic overlooks of the Mississippi River Valley.  Unfortunately, we were a little short on time so we weren't able to do all the trails, but we did see the highlights.  Now we just have a great excuse to go back!

King's Bluff

The first trail we took was King's Bluff.  This is a 2.5 mile out and back trail that takes you through a forest to an overlook.  Because this is a park where you drive to the top, then get out and hike, all the trails are very level.  No mountain climbing involved!

When you get to the end of the trail, you have two views:  this one of the Mississippi River, then just turn around and you will see the next view of the valley in the second photo.

You can just park your car and hike all the trails at once, but because we were short on time, we kept getting back in the car and driving to the next overlook.  Our next stop was just a pull over along the road. The Mississippi River looked so breath taking through the dark canopy of the forest trees.

                               

                              (Hill of Many Timbers Overlook)

I had read that the Hill of Many Timbers was the best view in the park, so I did not want to miss it.  It is a very short trail from the campground, but you can't park there if you're not camping.  There is a small parking lot near the East Overlook, but during busy times you may not be able to find a spot.  It is only 0.6 miles out-and-back, and the forest views are worth the little hike!

But the view is what really makes the short hike worth it!  Wow! Yes, I agreed with the reviews I had read, this was definitely the best view in the park!

It was super windy from the top of the overlook, even though it was not a windy day.  My husband took this funny video for the grandchildren.

South Overlook

We only had time for one more little hike, so we jumped back into the car and drove to the South Overlook.  The foliage was amazing on this trail.

This trail is the easiest trail in the park.  It's just a short 0.7 miles from the parking lot to see both the North and South Overlooks.  The trail actually forms a Y.  You hike to an intersection, and then you can turn right to see the South Overlook or left to see the North Overlook.  We only had time for one, and for whatever reason, we turned right.

At the end of the trail is a deck with an overlook.

Each overlook always has information on the view before you.

Once again, the trail was nice and level, I didn't even need my walking sticks!

You can even enjoy some views of the Mississippi on your return trip!

 We really enjoyed hiking this little park in Minnesota.  It's the perfect park for fall hiking, and I think it would make a great park for snowshoeing in winter since all the trails are so level.  Maybe I will suggest that to the hubby, and we can go back this winter to hit the overlooks we missed the first visit.

I hope you enjoyed my fall travel series!

Have A Great Day!  Amy

Linking Up with these Fabulous Blogs HERE!