Brookings County Highpoint Trip Report

Date: December 28, 2001 ; October 21, 2017
Author: David Olson

A good highpointer always brings a map. For those who left their DeLorme atlas at home, here are some directions put together from the 1:250K maps. Go to a point on US 75 due east of the HP area. This is located 8+ miles south of the town of Ivanhoe MN, or 5.5 miles north of the town of Lake Benton MN. Go 8.3 miles dues west on county road to the state line. Go a short distance north on unimproved road to where it turns west onto a farmer's homestead.

(Fred Lobdell visited the area since 2001 and reports that the unimproved road no longer exists. Which means that the farmstead no longer exists either. Who would have thought?! This means walking across fields to get to this highpoint area.)

I went up on the crest of the Coteau des Prairies. First, I went to the east Brookings SD CoHP area. There is a farmstead on top of it. It appears highest about half-way between the house and the MN/SD state line, on the left (south) side of their road. N 44 20.720' W 96 27.203'

After I visited it, I went to the 7 county HP areas of Lincoln county MN, extending from one-half to three miles east of the state line and the east Brookings SD county HP area.

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On Saturday October 21, 2017, I visited the other two highpoint areas of Brookings county SD. I drove north on I-29 to SD-28 and east to Toronto SD. Turn south on Dakota St./Deuel co. road 317/ 478 Ave. Go south two miles, then east 1+ miles. Park at two power poles east of north 479 Ave. The second one is labeled A135. Go a little south of the road and walk east 4 power poles to just south of power pole A139. This terrain is so flat that I doubt this HP area gets as high as 1991'.

For the remaining HP area, go west a little bit to south 479 Ave., go south 1 mile and east 0.6 miles. With crops harvested the high point should be evident to the south and a straightforward hike, N 44 31.546' W 96 36.746'