St. Cloud Times from Saint Cloud, Minnesota • Page 33

Quick trek St. Cloud (Minn.) Times Sunday, Aug. 28, 1 833 1 1 Archaeological Bv JIM ENGEL By JIM ENGEL tour brings life to past In the region 'Explorer' features fall getaway ideas After the long hot summer, travelers can find fall getaway ideas in the new 1988 fall "Minnesota Explorer" newspaper published by the Minnesota Office of Tourism. The 12-page full-color newspaper features stories about salmon fishing on the North Shore of Lake Superior, cities, villages and state parks in St. Croix River Valley; dinner theaters around the state; a new look at Red Wing; and routes for fall color drives.

The calendar of events describes more than 200 festivals and events around Minnesota, from small community celebrations to big-city theater and sports. The "Minnesota Explorer" is available free from the Minnesota Travel Information Center, 375 Jackson St. 250 Skyway Level, St. Paul 55101; at state highway travel information centers on the Minnesota borders; or by calling 7r--TW 'J 1 -T5 hsr Special to th Time One word can describe an archaeological excursion through Central Minnesota. Fascinating.

And for archaeology or history buffs, or for active imaginations or adventurous souls, it's even better. Weekend tours offered by the Institute for Minnesota Archaeology open the door to Minnesota's remarkable history and social development. In an age when history for most people dates back only as far as grandparents remember, the tours reveal a past blown away by the wind or buried under dirt, water and grass. As if by magic, a small hill becomes an ancient Indian burial mound. A pile of rocks becomes a nearly 200-year-old fireplace, remarkably undisturbed.

A hole in the ground becomes a place to store or prepare food. Uneven grass lines become the exterior walls of a French fort. It is a step back in time and a walk through the ages. Two days of digs IMA, an independent, non-profit organization sponsoring statewide programs in archaeological research, preservation and education, earlier this summer sponsored a two-day, weekend excursion through Central Minnesota. The first day included exploring 300-year-old Sioux and eastern Dakota Indian village sites and burial mounds in Mille Lacs-Kathio State Park.

Most of the second day was spent at IMA's 93-acre Little Elk Preserve near Little Falls. The preserve is the site of a 17th century French fort excavated by IMA senior research archaeologist Douglas Birk, one of the tour leaders. The tour also included stops at the Charles A. Weyerhaeuser Museum in Little Falls and the site of Zebulon Pike's 1806 fort, now covered by the Mississippi River. The common theme of the Mille Lacs-Little Elk tour was the contact period between Dakota Indians and French explorers," Birk said after the tour.

"A lot of people have no conception of who was here before us. We have a pretty tremendous history here in Minnesota." It is that history that the tours with a little imagination can bring to life. Precious preserve The IMA's Little Elk Preserve open to the public only during open houses or organized tours is an amazing site. Its 93 acres house a Photo for the Times by Jim Engel Archaeologist Douglas Birk (right), of the Institute for Minnesota Archaeology, showed tour participants remains from an original fireplace in the 1752 French fort at Little Falls. Elk Preserve near Little Valleyfair to add 'Excalibur' coaster Coaster fans will face a new challenge in 1989 when Valleyfair Family Amusement Park unveils Excalibur, one of the two steepest roller coasters in the world.

The other coasterwill be built in 1989 at Cedar Point, Valleyfair's sister park in Sandusky, Ohio. The wooden and steel coaster will be 10 stories high, nearly twice as tall as Valleyfair's largest wooden coaster, the High Roller. Riders will drop 110 feet on the first hill at an angle of 60 degrees. No other roller coaster in the world features such a severe drop, according to the amusement park. Excalibur will be Valleyfair's fifth roller coaster and add three acres to the 65-acre park.

At a cost of nearly $2.9 million, it will be the most expensive ride built at the 13-year-old amusement park. Excalibur will be a single-track, spaghetti-style coaster with multiple turns, fast drops and hairpin curves. It will feature 24-passenger trains and carry about 1,200 riders per hour. Bike trail maps offered for Dells Wisconsin Dells Visitor and Convention Bureau has free maps of more than 100 miles of scenic bicycle trails in the area. In addition to biking, the bureau can provide information on golfing, hiking, canoeing, boating and other fall activities.

Contact the Wisconsin Dells Visitor and Convention Bureau, 115 Wisconsin Avenue, P.O. Box 390, Wisconsin Dells, Wis. 53965 or call the docket Adults with an interest in archaeology, Minnesota history or a weekend away should find it interesting. Adolescents also may be interested, although children may find it tedious. Tour information: Cost The cost of the weekend tour is $149 for double occupancy.

Single occupancy is $40 extra. It includes passage on the Jefferson Lines tour bus, hotel accommodations for Sept. 10 at the Calumet Inn, Pipestone, and all meals (except Sunday breakfast). Departure Tours leave at 8:30 a.m. Sept.

1 0 from the Institute for Minnesota Archaeology, 3300 University Ave. SE, Minneapolis. More Informationreservations Contact the IMA off ice at (61 2) 623- 0299. Uttle Elk Preserve Times chart by Stephanie Johnson an 1839 Methodist mission to Ojibwe Indians, an 1840 cabin site of Qjibwe Chief Hole-In-The-Day and a saw and grist mill in operation from 1850 to 1900, according to Birk. sxjlittle Falls 'COnamia I Mille Lacs A KaWo St.

J2325aca JQT I Miles I sj- 'Mounfies' mostly memory in Canada Air fare guide Lowest round-trip fares from Minneapolis-St. Paul. Certain restrictions apply. rwrr Royal Canadian police drop horses, keep high standards Boston $158 jj Seattle $229 UA I Chicago r)NY $179 San Salt Lake City $128 mJ CH $179 CHA kmi Wash.D.CTl -mja ioq CHA Kansas City YMl twa $128NW Atlanta Atlanta, Knoenix $2U ml pi a Pi New Orleans Los Angeles Dallas AA $179 CHA Honolulu $518 NW Airline code spectrum of Minnesota history dating back several hundred years. Perhaps most impressive is the French fort site.

Built in 1752 and abandoned in 1754, it housed French explorers during rough winters. It is the oldest European fort found in the Upper Mississippi Valley above Lake Pepin and one of only two French forts found in Minnesota. The site was discovered in the 1960s by a youth who dug up animal bones and bits of pottery left behind by the French explorers. In 1972, Birk saw the site for the first time. "I had no idea what I was looking at.

In 1978, 1 finally saw the boy's artifacts. At that point, I recognized we were looking at something extremely old," Birk said. The preserve also is the site for an 1836 campsite of French explorer Joseph Nicollet, the site of $159 CHA ha Orlando $228 $1i9U-IA Miami $91 ft DL DL NW-Northwest PA- Pan American TWA-Trans World UA-United CHA- Charter airlines tl Global Express Tours, Burlington, is one of the few to include tickets with its eight-day packages. Cost: $1,800 to $2,900, including air fare from San Francisco or Los Angeles, hotels, some meals. Information: (800) 321-7798, (415) 692-7874 in California.

Tailor-made Tours, Cincinnati, has 10-night packages at the deluxe Seoul Plaza Hotel. Cost: $3,329, including air fare from San Francisco, and some meals. Events tickets not included. Information: (800) 358-6877, (800) 548-6877 in Ohio. Far East Travel Concepts, Lutz, has apartments in the Olympic Village that sleep up to seven people.

Cost: $627 per person, economy unit; $900 per person, super deluxe. Air fare is separate: $1,050 from Los Angeles; $1,250 from other major U.S. cities. Events tickets not included. Information: (800) 666-3273 in Florida.

For information on other packages, call the Korean National Tourist Corp. in New York City, (212) 688-7543; Chi-cago, (312) 346-6660; or Los Angeles, (213)623-1226. lished Radio Dial, which lists more than 3,500 commercial radio stations in 300 cities in the United States by format, dial location, call letter and operating hours. The book will fit in most any car pocket. Cost: $9.95, postpaid.

Gannett News Service AA-American BN-Braniff More rocks on Next time out: The next tour is a Sept. 1 0 to 1 1 excursion to southwestern Minnesota to explore some of the key Indian sites in the area, according to archaeologist Douglas Birk. While this is the final tour in the IMA's inaugural tour season, future outings are in the works, according to Birk. The tour will examine the Winnebago Oneota sites along the Blue Earth River south of Mankato. They date back to 1100 to 1300.

It will include stops at the Pipestone National Monument, a sacred place to Indian nations, Blue Mounds State Park and the Jeffers Petroglyph site where hundreds of American Indian rock art forms are found on the exposed surface of a Sioux quartzite ridge. Anyone interested? The tours are open to anyone. Language squabble tongue-ties Canada Gannett News Service MONTREAL Canada speaks with two voices, French and English. Right now, those voices are shouting at each other. A long-running squabble about bi-lingualism, which added fuel to a violent but futile Quebec separatist movement two decades ago, has broken out again.

The antagonists are calmer now, but the arguments are heating up and the stakes rising. A provincial cabinet minister lost his job in June in part because he appeared to side with Quebec's English-speaking minority. 0 A decision in a landmark challenge to a constitutional ban on English-language advertising has become a political hot potato, with promises broken and delayed. Western provinces are beginning to reassert English language primacy, possibly reopening forgotten wounds from years when French was the object of repression. The issue remains sensitive: how to balance the rights of English-speakers with French-speakers, who dominate Quebec but are a distinct and dwindling minority in the totality of Canada.

often taking personal time to coach the town's sports teams. A similar influence led Inkster to join the force at 18, after admiring the officers who patrolled his hometown of Broadview, Saskatchewan. But the force is fast moving into the high-tech, counter-terrorist age, with drug interdiction and diplomatic protection taking more and more personnel and attention. With an increase in British royal visits and several major international summit meetings in Canada in the past few years, Inkster said, "we're getting a hell of a lot of practice" at protecting high-profile VIPs, "and we're getting good at it." The RCMP develops a security game plan "based on threat level" of the visitors requiring protection, said Inkster, "and makes it as unobtrusive as possible." The RCMP has conceded most of its former national security responsibilities to a new Canadian Security Intelligence Service, created in 1984 after a CO- Continental ML- Midway Source: Bursch Travel of St. Cloud Times graphic by Stephanie Johnson 'm nn 'I A f7 'A Tickets, packages still available for Olympics Gannett News Service OTTAWA, Canada Except for the specially trained "musical ride" troopers who perform on horseback in shows around the world, Canada's legendary "Mounties" dismounted long ago.

The last Royal Canadian Mounted Police horse patrol saddled up about the time of World War II, and recruit training hasn't included an equestrian course since the 1960s. But Norman Inkster, commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, says he's not going to be the one to recommend eliminating "Mounted" from the famous moniker. "I'll leave that for the next man," said Inkster, 49, who took office last September. A veteran of 31 years in the force, Inkster is well aware of the almost mythical standing the Mounties enjoy as the national symbol. Most Mounties today are engaged in routine police work, so they wear blue or brown uniforms, not the red coat, riding britches and Smokey the Bear hat associated with Sgt.

Preston of the Yukon or Nelson Eddy serenading Jeanette MacDonald among the pines and redwoods. That getup, reminiscent of the Mounties' origin as a frontier police force in the rugged Canadian west in the 1870s, now only is seen at ceremonies or with the traveling "musical ride" troupe. Another change readily apparent is the growing number of female Mounties. Women first were admitted to the force in 1974. Today there are about 1,000.

There's only a theoretical possibility that, on any given day, somewhere in the wilds of the north woods, a Mountie is tracking down his or her man on a borrowed horse. But the image of the square-jawed, steel-willed Mountie who lets few suspects escape provides a tradition that "has served us well," Inkster said. "I would not want to abandon or distance myself from it. It would be difficult, he agreed, to name another institution with the symbolic status of the scarlet-coated "members" of the force, as they refer to themselves. The RCMPs 16,000 peace officers (of a total 20,000 RCMP payroll) still perform routine law enforcement duties in 291 cities and villages and serve as provincial police in eight of Canada's 10 provinces.

Ontario and Quebec provinces have their own police. Mounties continue to be a model for youth in the communities they serve, Gannett News Service It's not too late to get tickets to the Olympics, Sept. 17 through Oct. 2. Olson-Travelworld in Culver City, official U.S.

agent for events tickets, has 5,000 tickets for track and field, boxing, tennis, basketball and volleyball. To order: 1-800-992-9511. The company will have a ticket exchange office in Seoul. "We want to make sure no seat goes empty," said Herb Dockery of Travelworld. His company has sold nearly all packages, except a block available starting Sept.

28. Cost: for seven days. Most Seoul hotels are sold out. The Korean National Tourist Corp says 4,000 rooms remain in yogwans (inns). Korean Air has some seats Sept.

15-30. Cost: $1,084 from Los Angeles; $1,308 from New York City. Information: 1-800-421-8200. Package tours to the Summer Olympics still are available. However, events tickets must be bought separately.

Among other tour offerings: Driving tunes So you want to drive cross-country tuned in only to the nearest country rock station? Or classical station perhaps? AMP Publishing (456 Corona Denver, 80218) recently pub Gannett Newa Service photo Corp. Jerry McCarty is an instructor in the "musical ride" at Canada's Police College where Royal Canadian Mounted Police are trained to perform on horseback. tween 18 and 25, to stay on the force longer. The average RCMP trooper is 35.6 years old and has served almost 14 years in uniform. While keeping the force up to full strength, Inkster intends to give priority to recruiting more Asians, Hispanics and other minorities so that the force "better reflects Canada's mosaic." "We're a country of immigrants," he said, "and we ought to reflect that." government investigation criticized RCMPpractices.

But Inkster says the RCMP still attracts the type of highly motivated recruits the force always has preferred. Mounties working in the Northwest Territories, where the rigors of climate and distance are the most demanding, are volunteers, as is the custom. Throughout the force, the trend is for Mounties, who are eligible to join be.