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Normally, we try NOT to let ice accumulate on our roads and highways, but this Minnesota road is made of nothing BUT ice.

This might be one of those Only In Minnesota-type things: An entire road, made completely of ice, is now open here in the Land of 10,000 (Frozen) Lakes. Granted, it's WAAAY up north, near Minnesota's Northwest Angle (about 500 miles, or 8 and a half hours, northwest of Rochester) but it's still here in the Bold North.

If you want to get technical, the Northwest Angle ice road connects that weird piece of Minnesota (known as 'the Angle' to locals and which happens to be the northernmost part of the U.S.) to the rest of the state. But, to do that, this highway has to run for 37 miles across the frozen surface of Lake of the Woods.

Minnesota's Northwest Angle (Explore Minnesota)
Minnesota's Northwest Angle (Explore Minnesota)
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The entire history of how the Northwest Angle came to be is fascinating (it was due to a mistake made on a map plotting out Minnesota way back in 1783! Check it out, courtesy of Explore Minnesota, HERE), as is the fact that residents of that tiny part of the state routinely have to cross through Canada to get to their property, which is here in Minnesota.

And, when the Canadian border remained closed in 2021 due to the pandemic, the ice road was born. According to this NPR story, the Northwest Angle ice road was created last winter to help residents there connect with Warroad by bypassing the Canadian border and instead driving over the frozen lake.

As you might guess, it's not cheap to plot out and maintain a 37-mile road on frozen Lake of the Woods. NPR says it costs about $1,500 per mile to keep the road open, which is roughly from mid-January through March. That also explains the $250 fee it costs you for a roundtrip on the ice road.

You can see more about the Northwest Angle ice road (the 2021 version) in the TPT video below. And keep scrolling to check out some other unique ice creations you can only see in Minnesota in the winter.

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