The Ducks of The Dam in Orr, MN

Or, A Minnesota Mallard Mystery

Orr, Minnesota has 211 residents, according to the sign on U.S. Route 53. It’s the closest populated area to the Ash River Visitor Center at Voyageurs National Park, where we had reservations on the boat shuttle to Kettle Falls in the park.

And it’s still a 40-minute drive to the visitor center from so-called downtown Orr, so it was our destination for one night before catching the boat in the morning.

Since we had a few hours to kill before trying to view the Northern Lights, we went to get dinner at one of the two establishments open and serving on a Sunday night: The Dam Supper Club.

I’m always drawn to a place with character, and The Dam’s bar fit the bill with vintage signs, maps, and ephemera all over the walls and ceiling.

We settled at a high-top table and contentedly gazed at the old maps hanging near us while we sipped our Castle Danger cream ales and waited for our caesar salads (walleye for me, chicken for Dan).

While we dined, I think half of the town’s residents passed in and out of the bar on their way to or from a party someone was having that night, based on all the conversations I overheard. Everyone knew everyone else, it seemed.

One resident, Brenda, was whooping it up in the corner as she fed dollars into a toy prize machine, the kind with the claw that you can navigate to scoop up the toys. You know, THE CLAW.

This machine was filled exclusively with rubber duckies and duckie-adjacent creatures like turtles in a cornucopia of styles. Glitter ducks in every color of the rainbow. Ducks that looked like golf and soccer balls. Ducks that looked like little Godzillas. Or giraffes.

Every time she grabbed a duck, Brenda would yell, “ooh, I don’t have this one yet!” and go in for another round. It was amusing and diverting like a background TV show, waiting and wondering which duck Brenda would acquire next.

And then.

Like an eye chart coming into sharp focus as the lenses click into place, everything shifted in the room.

There was a duck nestled in a Vikings helmet on a shelf behind the bar.

There was a duck balancing on the tip of a ski hanging from the ceiling.

And a duck on the old tricycle hanging next to the skis.

Ducks! Ducks everywhere, perched and hidden in and on all the tchotchkes we’d been idly viewing this entire time.

OK, scroll back and look at the photos at the top of the post. Can you find the ducks?

When you’re ready, scroll down and I’ll show you.

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Are you ready?

Ducks! You can’t unsee them!

We didn’t ask the (very friendly) bartender about the hidden ducks because, honestly, I’d rather it remain a fun little mystery for my memory files. The hilarity was in the discovery, and I’m fine with leaving it as a story to tell here.

I guess I shouldn’t tell Brenda that she can get her very own Lucky Duck arcade machine at home — or a 100-piece assortment of ducks and toys to fill it. Because where’s the fun in that?