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Published: August 10th 2013
Horrifying
Marriage is about 2 people becoming 1... right?!!??!What a beautiful morning again! We have been so lucky with the weather - 70s and sunny here in Minneapolis. We haven't been so lucky with Jon's bug bites. He's really had a bad reaction from the mosquitos and we suspect people are starting to avoid us on the street because of his aggravated festering scabby spots. Well, its not actually that bad but the first stop today was the pharmacy for some more ointment.
Before heading out of town, we stopped by the Sculpture Gardens for a wander around. It's a bit of a strange place being surrounded by highways into the city. Our two favourite sculptures were the spoon and the mirrors. We actually managed to become one person in those mirrors with Jon's head on my body. A truly horrifying look. We zipped around town then on our way out to try to see the Stone Bridge - got bored looking for it and failed to read a map properly so crossed the Mississippi a few times on other bridges and then bailed out to head north. This was going to be a long drive day with this little detour so we were anxious to just get
"My dirty husband" or "Playing with Perspective"
He isn't really... I had to explain that one to him. going and Minneapolis just wasn't doing it for us as a city.
In our mission to avoid McDonalds whenever possible, we stumbled across a cute little sandwich shop called Erbert & Gerberts. We ordered a Narmer (turkey, of course) and a Halley’s Comet (obviously that's gonna be roast beef) and headed out to sit on the curb in the parking lot to eat. Why does the air conditioning have to be on arctic blast everywhere in the mid west. Seriously?!?!?! This is something I DO NOT miss living in the UK. Nothing kicks off a headache like the drastic temperature change from being outside in the 90 degree sun to going inside to a sub zero freezer. I’d rather sweat in the heat and humidity thanks. I could rant for ages on this point...
The drive through Minnesota on a sunny summer day is potentially one of the best drives out there. It is only day three but these roads will definitely be ranking on our top drives list. Be sure to hit up MN 39 and head towards Bena to drive around. You can fill up your tank at the Big Winnie General Store. Very cute. Slightly
Lunch. Yum.
Food = fantastic. Air Conditioning = FFS. inflated fuel prices but still under our budgeted $4 / gallon so we decided why not! Plus, it made a great thank you post card to our dear friends and family who have helped make this trip happen with their generous contributions to our petrol fund (nb I really mean gas fund but Jon got confused when I started talking about this and why we would need money for gas when he produces plenty on his own).
Jon made friends with the locals whilst taking pictures and learned that the place formerly housed German prisoners and had been built by Frank Lloyd Wright “or Frank Lloyd Wrong as I like to call him”. They suggested we read up on it in the book “Behind Barbed Wire”. Maybe there’s a Cliff Notes for this one?
One other top sight along this journey is the Big Fish Supper Club. For all of you 1980s cult comedy devotees, you should recognise this place from the opening credits to National Lampoons Vacation - our source of inspiration for this entire trip. The place was actually closed but we met the nicest lady there. She had a flat tire and was waiting
Driving along
Seriously, does it get any better than this?!?!?! What a nice drive. for her husband to come and rescue her and their dog. He’s not a techy kind of guy - as you can probably imagine the type in Northern Minnesota and she figured it could be at least another couple hours before he even picked up her message. She was happy to bide her time taking pictures of us though which was very handy!
Everything was taking just a little longer than expected and we had set off just a little later than planned so we skipped the Paul Bunyan statues and we finally arrived at the Mississippi Head Waters. This was a highlight for me. Towards the end of our trip we’ll be looking at this river’s end and that just amazed me. The sky was super blue, everything looked very lush and green and kids were playing in the water. Amazing.
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