We're staying at the Shack Up Inn (shackupinn.com) which uses an old cotton gin for its rooms. Wr'te actually staying in an old shotgun shack. They're all named after blues legends, ours is called Pinetop. You have to check out they're website to really get their vibe. It's definitely got character. Leave it Mom to find it.., =)
Today while Chris was in training I went off to explore Wisconsin. I stopped in Hudson, WI for a walk along the St. Croix River which is at the head of the Mississippi. This shot is of Wisconsin, behind be was Minnesota.
In my wanderings I found the Bass Lake Cheese Factory. The staff wasn't overly friendly but I picked up three different types of cheese all of which won awards at last year's state fair, all of them quite yummy.
Some of Wisconsin's fine dairy cows relaxing by Bass Lake.
Since I had time to kill I went for a hike along the Willow Lake River.
Along my wanderings I saw some para-gliders and a whole group of hot air balloons. Combined with the fall colors, farms and fields it was a really pretty drive.
Wisconsin - check. Tomorrow we (hopefully) fly to Kansas!
There's a tiny town about 2 hours south of Minneapolis that is home to several homes designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. The Stockman house is even open for yours.
We toured the home, while our guide was long winded, I recently read Loving Frank do I added my own commentary for Chris and the result was a cool experience. The house was in disrepair and in the early 90s it switched hands several times finally ending up with a historical society ready to restore it. One problem, the had to relocate the house to city property a few blocks away. We saw an article showing the home on a truck, rolling down 1st street the headline read 'Averting a Wright Wrong' :)
The town also holds the only hotel still in operation that Wright designed and, lucky us, it was just renovated and reopened this past Sept, 101 years after its original opening. Out room was small but elegant and rich, a great deal for $110 for the night. The whole hotel felt like stepping back in time. Our floor contained a library and a ladies parlor.
The town had some great food! We had dinner at Chop which features locally grown ingredients. My Walleye was light and moist with a perfect crispy outside and Chris's NYStrip was one of the best of his life. I ate every last drop of my Greek salad. Desert was at the local ice cream parlor, the hotel actually called them and they stayed open just for us! We enjoyed breakfast at Ralph's, again, all local and yummy! Everything was really affordable and we walked everywhere.
It's a shame the town is so far from a major city, it really is a perfect weekend getaway destination for folks looking for a price of Americana. For me, Iowa, check.
A few days before I left for Minneapolis to start my MidWest Tour, I was listening to my favorite Podcast 'How Stuff Works' with Josh and Chuck. In particular I was listening to How SPAM Works. I'm a vegetarian, I have no memory of having effort consumed SPAM but it's such a part of our pop culture... At the end of their podcast they discussed the free SPAM museum next to the packaging plant in Austin, MN. Wouldn't you know that was only 10 min off the highway on our way back to Minneapolis from Iowa. We had to stop!
Kids can pack their own can of SPAM (using a pink bean back as meat) and see how fast they go, encouraging kids to aspire to work in a SPAM factory one day.
There was a conveyor belt running through the whole museum with the varieties of SPAM constantly going by.
SPAMMY waved goodbye as we left, the smell of the Fried SPAM samples chasing us away.
In all seriousness, it was a really well done museum and a great piece of Americana. It definitely did not make us want to go find SPAMburgers for lunch though....
With Chris living in Minneapolis for a few months for Training I took the opportunity to visit him. He's central to four new states for me!
After venturing over to Fargo to cross of North Dakota (that's a hard one!) we spent a day enjoying Minnesota.
His crash pad is within walking distance of Como Park which is like Minneapolis's version of Central Park. They have a decent sized Botanical Garden and Zoo - all free!
The baby monkey was just too cute for words!
Before I flew back home and back to work we had to make a pitt stop at the Mall of America, on a return trip I'll have to ride one of these roller coasters.
We went to the Fargo Visitor's Center where they VERY proudly display the actual prop woodchipper that was used in the movie Fargo. I asked the volunteer what else there is to do in Fargo 'I want to go home and tell my friends all the great things to do that aren't related to that movie!' I told her. She thought for a moment and then exclaimed 'Do yah want me to take yur photo with the woodchipper?' Oh boy.
We went through the Fargo Historic downtown and it's actually really cute. We enjoyed lunch at the HoDo (Howard Donald hotel) which featured only locally grown ingredients. It was AMAZING!
After lunch we went to the Fargo Air Museum. I found it an odd place for a flight museum considering the weather's only nice for flying a few months out of the year. But it was a decent little set up.
To view the planes outside we had to have a tour guide escort us, seeing as we were on airport property and all. No problem. When the time came, the ticket salesperson called over an 11 year old boy! He gave us a true tour, explaining each aircraft. At the end he stood near a jet engine and explained the mechanics to us - it was something to see this kid explaining to Chris, a pilot, how an engine worked. =)
I did some investigating, increased our budget by a bit and found us something completely different in Key West. As Fabio said, we went from the Stalls to the Stars. We spent the next two nights at the Parrot Key Resort in a two story suite. I had a King Bed, and Jacuzzi tub with a private balcony.
The PLAN was to go to Seattle with Chris and camp out at the Gorge to watch two days worth of DMB concerts. Unfortunately my body did not like that plan. I ruptured a disc in my back a couple of weeks ago and camping is not in the cards.
Luckily Adrian and Fabio are visiting from Italy and we decided to take the arrow down to the Keys for the holiday weekend.
We started with plans to stay on Marathon Key, Key Colony just relaxing on the beach all weekend. On our walk to get lunch we encountered this 3.5 foot iguana. He was not cute.
The view from our hotel balcony was really quite pretty.
John Stark looking dapper in front of the battle monument in Bennington, VT. This thing is huge, far bigger than an iPhone photo can capture. 308 ft tall in fact.Behind us was a breathtaking view of the surrounding hills. Sadly we arrived 10 min after the ticket office closed and missed our chance to take an elevator to the top.
Bennington turned out to be a great little overnight point for us, straight out of Roadside America type books. We had booked a night in a local motel but the owner was having hot water problems and made arrangements for us to stay at a place a 'spell down the road', nothing fancy but super nice people. We enjoyed dinner at a local brewery, trying local beer of course. Definitely safe to say that Vermont is checked of my list.
This morning before we took off we perused some local artists shops. Now we're making our way back to CN to cross another state off my list.
Mom and I find adventure no matter where we go. We tool a long winding route through Vermont, some of which was part of the Molly Stark Scenic Drive. This covered bridge was near the head of the drive, we nearly zipped right past.
Me at the Vermont Welcome Center. It looks like an old barn but on the inside it's clean and modern. There was an art installation of old farm equipment and a lots of cache's for my mom to search for.
We also went "geocaching", you can learn more here. It's not my thing, but it was an interesting way to spend an afternoon with the family. Overall it was a nice relaxing trip. All of the pictures are here.
We asked some jazz street performers where to go tonight to here some good jazz. We had found Snug Harbor through TripAdvisor but there's a $15 ticket cost per person. The jazz performers told us about the Spotted Cat which is just jam sessions with no cover. So after a yummy dinner of local cuisine at Coop's Place we found our way to the Spotted Cat and hung out for a bit enjoying the tunes. I got some great video that I'll post when I get home tomorrow.
After the jazz we walked back to the hotel but stopped for a few more New Orleans classics. First we got a daiquiri since Meg had never had one. Neither of us like strawberries so much so we chose Mango. Then we finally found our shot of Absinthe liquor, it tasted a bit like NyQuil.
Tonight we pack up and tomorrow it's home and back to real life.
We have a great story involving a grounds keeper. I'll update later using the computer to tell you all about it.
Update: So we had heard that Marie Laveau is buried at the cemetery so we were looking all over for her. She was a VooDoo priestess that died in the mid 1800's. We had no luck and a guy had stopped me and said "we're getting ready to lock up". I followed him and asked if he worked at the cemetery. He said he did so I asked about Laveau and he told me that no one knows where she's buried but the tomb stone is at a different cemetery, we were at Lafayette No 1 and she's supposedly at different No 1. While he was telling me this he sat down to have a cigarette and asked where I was from and we chit chatted. I asked him a question about the cemetery and some other tourists walked by and he said, "hey folks we're about to start a quick tour!" I was confused....then we got stuck following him. Now this guy looked and smelled homeless but had a badge on his neck saying he was a groundskeeper. We followed him awkwardly while he seemed to BS different tidbits about the cemetery. I finally found a lull for us to leave and he stopped us to tell us the cemetery website and tell us that they operate on donations only and try to get $10 per person. What?!?! It's a cemetery, people pay to be buried there, donations? $10? We excused ourselves but the other couple on the "tour" gave him a few bucks. The guy actually stopped us and told them to give their donation to us because we obviously need the money...I made some lame comment and we left. We spend the rest of the day coming up with great retorts for him though. We also decided that he wasn't even an employee, that it was all a racket and if he was an employee we could probably get him fired by reporting his "tour" business... it was an interesting experience though.
After dinner we saw a Sammy puppy who was adorable. While playing with CareBear (the puppy) we listened to a man playing a glass harmonica.
We decided to embarque on a quest for absinthe which is a VERY potent liquor made of anise. It's sweet and just recently made legal in the US again. We didn't succeed last night but we did have drinks in the oldest operating bar in America. It was originally a blacksmith shop and the atmosphere was very neat. The had am old grand piano that doubled as a bar with an old woman playing old blues and country songs. She wasn't so skilled but the experience was very cool. Pictures are on the camera so I can't share just yet.
Our next planned stop was Club Laffite in Exile, the oldest gay bar in America, but we were done for the might so we just walked Bourbon St. and then retired to our room for caramel cake and tea and a night of good coversation.
