Animal lovers, get excited, there's an animal sanctuary here in southeast Minnesota that our animal-obsessed selves can go visit. It's in Castle Rock, Minnesota, which is between Cannon Falls and Elko New Market, a little under an hour from Rochester, MN.

I want to get to an animal sanctuary someday. As an animal lover myself, I would be in paradise getting to hang out with saved farm animals who are now living their best lives.

Brown and white cow on farmland.
LIN CHUN-TSO
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What's an Animal Sanctuary?

If you're not familiar with animal sanctuaries, they're places where farm animals go to live life as normal animals. They come from different situations but many come from places where they had a poor quality of life in tight quarters, not much sunlight (if any), etc. Their only purpose was to make food.

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I'm not here to harp on anyone for eating animal products. I eat animal products and while I lean vegetarian, I still eat meat sometimes too. But what matters is where it comes from. If the cheese comes from a farm where the animals are treated properly, fantastic. That's how they should be treated.

SE MN Animal Sanctuary

So, back to the animal sanctuary! This one in southeast Minnesota is called Little Acorn Sanctuary and they have goats and chickens who have been saved from whatever situation they were in and are now living out their lives in a happier place.

You can visit Little Acorn Sanctuary, meet the animals, get a tour, and learn about the situations that these animals came from before.

Other Animal Sanctuaries

I found a few other animal sanctuaries. The two that stood out to me are about an hour and 45 minutes from Rochester. They're both in New Richmond, WI. One is Pleasant Pastures and the other is SoulSpace Sanctuary.

Ben Mater, Unsplash
Ben Mater, Unsplash
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Pleasant Pastures has adorable cows, pigs, and farm cats.

SoulSpace Sanctuary has even more animals. They have chickens, pigs, farm cats, a farm dog, ducks, sheep, and even peacocks!

No matter which animal sanctuary you visit, it's a fun afternoon with the family plus you'll learn something along the way too. And also, you can sponsor an animal at any of these animal sanctuaries if you're interested. It could be a fun gift idea for an animal-loving kid.

LOOK: 30 fascinating facts about sleep in the animal kingdom

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