The last couple years it’s been pretty obvious that the number of people attending the Halloween Hike at Mirror Lake State Park has been increasing. Nature lovers, park enthusiasts, late season campers, and families from all over the area pack in around the campfires to enjoy a wonderfully relaxing and yes, warm experience. This year we talked to a family from Appleton who made the event this year. It’s always a bit of a surprise that even this time of the year folks will come from quite a distance.

This year folks gathered around 2 bonfires, munched on snacks provided by the Friends of Mirror Lake State Park, sang songs, and made a good effort to introduce themselves to everyone else around the fires.

The hiking trail was about 1.5 miles long and lit by tiki torches along the way. Again the game of the day was to guess what the mystery animal was (Last year it was an owl). Hikers were handed a small log which they used to take notes at stations set up to provide clues. At one point along the way a member of the park staff was hiding in the woods doing their impersonation of the mystery animal’s call. My son guessed it might be a frog. The rest of us were pretty sure that couldn’t be it since the last hint said it had as many stomachs and legs…. And fur.

Later we were met by a story teller who read us a book about a tadpole and a caterpillar. “Don’t ever change.”, she said.

All and all it was another great evening at Mirror Lake State Park’s Mystery hike.  We’re looking forward to the Halloween hike here at Devil’s Lake this coming Saturday as well.

So what was the secret Animal? Well, I was going to take a picture but the staffer shut the light off just as I was about to press the shutter…. So who knows? What has short brown fur, as many stomachs as legs, and sort of sounds like a frog?