Exploring the Wonders of Minnesota
In our final post about our Minnesota adventures, we look back at one of the best experiences we had in the state: canoeing the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. The Boundary Waters is a large stretch of land stretching across much of northern Minnesota and it is a complete wilderness. It is over a million …
Continue reading “Northern Beauty: Canoeing the Boundary Waters”
As we leave Minnesota, I wanted to look back on the two of the best and most quintessentially Minnesotan places we visited. The State Fair, the North Shore and The Defeat of Jesse James Days were all great in their own right, but our trip “Up North” was perhaps the best of all. It started …
Continue reading “The Gem of Minnesota: Voyageurs National Park”
Three horses carrying strangers slowly came into view. The riders eased up the reins and dismounted near the First National Bank. A passer-by paused and looked at the strangers: it was rare that three well-dressed strangers would come to remote Northfield, Minnesota in the year 1876. The men entered the bank and several more strangers …
Continue reading “Hometown Pride: The Defeat of Jesse James Days”
Our exploration of the North Shore of Lake Superior could easily be six posts, but Katie and I have a limited time left in the state, so here are our adventures in one, long blog entry. – We depart Minnesota at the end of July, so we went on a trip earlier this month to …
Continue reading “Lighthouses, Waterfalls and Fur Traders: The North Shore”
The canoe glided forward, closer to the deer standing in the river. The deer continued chewing as it looked at the approaching canoe. Then, determining the canoe posed no risk, the deer plunged its head back under the surface of the water. It rummaged around at the bottom of the river for a good part …
Continue reading “Exploring St. Croix: Canoeing the Namekagon River”
If we had a bucket list for what we wanted to do while we lived in Minnesota, it would include attending a live game for every major sports team. The Twin Cities have an MLB team, an NFL team, an NBA team and an NHL team. In fact, it appeared in early March like we …
The pop culture picture of Minnesota is probably best encapsulated in the image of someone ice fishing while wearing buffalo plaid and a trapper hat. The image is inspired by several cultural depictions. One is certainly “Fargo”, though the city of Fargo, while on the Minnesota border, is actually in North Dakota. A more Minnesotan …
Continue reading “Flannel, Hotdish and Trapper Hats: Attending Wabasha’s Grumpy Old Men Festival”
In northern Minnesota on the banks of Lake Superior lies Duluth. To get there you take I-35 north until the highway ends. In between the Iron Range of mountains and the windswept Lake Superior, it is a gateway to the wilderness that attracts adventurers in the summer and becomes a frozen shell of itself in …
Showing off your area to friends from out of town is fun, even when it involves eating pickled herring. As I mentioned last week, we had several visitors over last October to whom we showed the city. A week after my parents visited, we were joined by our good friends Jameson and Christine. We wanted …
Christmas is a wonderful time full of a flurry of activities and quite a few flurries of snow. We celebrated Christmas in Minnesota in several uniquely Minnesotan ways and those are recounted here. St. Olaf Christmas Festival: St. Olaf College, where I have taught for the past year, is a small, academically exceptional school in …
Continue reading “Wind Chill, Lutefisk and the St. Olaf Choir: A Minnesota Christmas”
Adventures in Gopherland