Kids were away at Grandma's this weekend, so we dropped the dog at the neighbor's and set off to parts unknown. We seriously had no plan until Jim suggested the Jeffers Petroglyphs. Then at least we had a direction. No hotel yet, but at least a direction. It was ridiculous, not at all fancy, but great, really great. We remembered that we like to be together, we like the same stuff, we have fun, we can't wait for retirement ;)
The route:
These petroglyphs were the main destination. Everything else, we figured out as we drove by looking at roadsigns and websites. Yay for 4G!
9000 year old art! Very cool. Most of them were very very hard to see, but these are pictures of the clearest. We took our shoes off and walked around on the rock, which made the experience that much better. It felt very different to walk on the rock barefooted than it did with shoes - grounding or connection to the past or something.
Also, the visitors center was very well done. We got to throw an atlatl at a fake bison (like a spear, but with an extra piece to give it more force) and they had a fire and were making bison stew and roasting corn and popping corn using ancient Native techniques and tools. The whole park was very impressive.
We stopped at Minnesota's largest candy store for goodies and a selfie with the Hulk.
We made it to St. Peter's Pearly Gates, thank goodness!
We visited the Blue Earth County History Center.
This is falling water #1 of our trip - the Rapidan Dam
Just downstream a bit is a campground I am determined to come back to someday.
And we had dam pie at The Dam Store ;)
We asked the guides at the petroglyphs for ideas of what to do next and they suggested this fantastic little waterfall - Redwood Falls. (falling water #2)
I took my shoes off and waded upstream for a bit.
I desperately want to live here. Gorgeous.
Fun
There's a giant crow that we worked really really really hard to see. Highway 71 was closed, but not on our phone map. We kept serpentining around it till we found a way to get back on 71 to see the crow. This is one of many things the kids would not have had the patience to enjoy. Good thing we're dorks together. Why go see a giant crow? Why not?
We searched and searched for a hotel (online) and couldn't agree on anything, mostly because we didn't have any plans for the next day, so we didn't even have a destination city. So I decided on a section of Minnesota (west-central) that I hadn't explored before and picked a town not too far away. The first hotel to come up on the phone was The Palmer House. I saw it was built in 1901 and said "that's the one!" It sounded like it fit in the adventure well. We got there and realized its been featured on different paranormal and ghost-y shows for being super haunted. Ha! Adventure! Our night was super comfortable and safely passed without the ghost cat walking over our bed or ghost boy throwing his ball in the hallway. These are our scared faces.
Its been visited by lots of old famous people.
We walked down to the local band shell in Sinclair Lewis Park.
cute fountain.
And falling water #3
Then on to Alexandria and Big Ole - a giant Viking statue.
We also sat by a lake for a while here, waiting for a museum to open. Fish jumping, a weird dragonfly like bug, general peacefulness.
And then the Runestone museum with a Viking runestone from 1342 supporting the theory that Vikings came over before Columbus - all the way to Minnesota via the great lakes. It was also just a general history museum and had a great little model village from 1860.
I liked that they used Ivory soap in the old schoolhouse.
We ate at the the best Chinese restaurant ever - The Great Hunan in Alexandria, based on a recommendation from the lady at the museum.
Then we went to Beaver Island Brewery in St. Cloud to sample their wares. Then home in the busy Sunday afternoon traffic.
And a picture with a giant fish.
