I don’t do all the mileage gaming nonsense. I’m not saying you shouldn’t but I’m a) credit card suspicious and b) lazy. Terribly, terribly lazy. So it was with some surprise I found I had enough miles for a domestic flight. When it turned out a friend was having a reading in St. Paul, I booked a ticket.
Here are the things I liked best from my long weekend in the Twin Cities.
But first, a message from our sponsor, sort of. As always, some links are Amazon links, you click and buy, I get a little something. Please, and thank you.
Travelpro sent me their Crew roller bag, standard carry on size. This particular bag has a pocket expressly designed to hold a charger pack — there’s a USB port on the back of the bag you can plug your gadget into. I thought this a gimmicky little extra until I was in a crowded terminal — then I thought, well, that’s kind of nifty.
None of my other bags are four wheel spinners so I appreciated how much easier it is to maneuver this configuration in a plane aisle. The bag has an insert for carrying your wrinkleables, which I did not use (as if), but everything else is fairly standard. The materials are tough, though, the zippers are not junky, and nice touch, there’s a plastic pocket inside which is large enough to hold a wet swimsuit. I’ve tested a bunch of these while I had a regular review gig — this is a well made bag.
Heads up, readers. This brand is expensive and appears to be on sale right now. If you need a new bag or were planning to buy one as a gift, now’s the time.
Okay, advertise-y bits over. Now, on to other things…
Sealife Aquarium at the Mall of America: I really, really, really love looking at fish. But wandering an aquarium almost immediately after you get off an airplane brings the experience to a whole new level. Watching jellyfish swim after being acutely aware of every damn bone in your body because you’re in coach next to a large man is very relaxing. For the record, I think the very best US aquarium is Monterrey Bay in California, but I liked the extensive walk-through tanks at Sealife, they’re super cool, and jellies, I never tire of watching jellies. Bonus points for the sawtooth shark. Man, that’s a weird critter. (~ 25. for adults, I had a free pass.)
A Baker’s Wife: This neighborhood bake shop looks like the kind of place where you’re going to get an adequate puff pastry cheese or cherry Danish. And sure, you can get those things and they are better than adequate. But skip all that and have the American Teacake. It’s like a freshly baked challah met a Koign Iman and they fell wildly in love, but someone had a recessive gene for gigantism so no, I could not eat the whole thing. I tried. I did.
Red Wing Shoes: Most fashion I can take or leave, but I’m a sucker for shoes. And roadside attractions. When my friend Doug suggested we go to Red Wing to see the giant boot, I was all in. There’s a store here, and a tiny museum displays the history of Red Wing Shoes. I did not buy anything, the wine colored laceups were not available as markdowns in my size, but they were gorgeous. Oh, and the giant boot. It’s hilarious.
Stockholm Pie and General Store: Doug is one of the few people I know who’s as devoted to dessert like carbohydrates as I am. I trusted him completely when he routed us through Stockholm, Wisconsin for pie. The drive was a lovely meandering road past mowed cornfields and bluffs and the last of the fall color. The Mississippi River was on our right, mirroring the flat gray of the sky, Stockholm was a little crossroads of a town on our left with brightly painted 1800s buildings and, hello, pie. I tried three kinds — mixed berry, pecan, and apple crisp — and they were all excellent.
Bogart’s Donuts: My friend Leif lives a Minneapolis sky-way connected life. He guided us through the human Habitrail to Bogart’s where we narrowed our choices to three kinds of giant donuts: a standard glazed with home made candy corn on top, a maple bar sort of thing stuffed with Twix, and some third thing I have too much of a sugar hangover to remember. The Twix thing, well, we could have stopped there, but the standard glazed had an insanely fluffy texture and was made with a yeast raised dough and oh, boy. Oh boy. Donuts aren’t even my first choice when it comes to pastry, but oh boy. (~2-3 bucks for a donut. Worth it.)
The Somali shopping mall: Minneapolis has a sizable Somali community and for reasons I failed to research, my friend Frank seems to know his way around it. We went to the Somali mall for lunch where we had a tomato based chicken curry mixed in with thick, chewy, house made noodles and a pile of goat that was more aromatic in its seasoning. I don’t typically eat four legged critters, but I tried the goat and I have to concede it was quite good. The mall smells like coffee and spice and the languages in your ear are not English and the place is all slapdash construction… it was far away from Scandinavian influenced Minnesota. I intend to go back for samosas and coffee when I’m hungry again; likely sometime in 2018 given all I’ve been eating.
Hi-Lo Diner: This gorgeously restored late 50s diner was moved from Pennsylvania to an arterial in south-ish Minneapolis and is now a hipster magnet. Because I hadn’t had enough carbs, I had their Hi-Top, which is basically a pile of stuff — savory or sweet — on top of a giant glazed donut. If this sounds weird, you’re right, it is, and also, it’s delicious. I didn’t eat again until about 4pm because I was full of spicy shrimp and slaw and donut. Say what you will about hipsters; they know where to pile on the carbs at brunch. (~15 for too much food plus coffee and tip.)
Minneapolis writers: Early in my career I was so lucky to come into contact with a travel writing site called World Hum. I become embarrassingly saccharine when I think about the people I met through that venue. It’s how I know Doug and Frank; Leif and I met because we were both very early adopters of blogging in travel, we both wrote for Lonely Planet.
My time in Minneapolis was spent in the company of these excellent writers. They’re all different, but they all have interesting perspectives on the world and believe in the importance of research.
Buy their damn books, we need writers like this in travel, in our world.
- Backpacking with Dracula: Leif literally wrote the (guide)book on Romania, and while there, he became very familiar with that country’s notorious ruler.
- Europe on Five Wrong Turns a Day: Doug traveled around Europe using his mom’s 1963 Frommer’s as her guidebook. What could go wrong? Doug has a new book coming out early next year, The Not Quite States of America, about the US territories. You can pre-order here.
- The Geography of Madness: Crazy has regional flavors? Frank digs into how we lose our minds depending on where were are.
I hope you spent time this week in the company of people you enjoy and whose work you genuinely admire. Now, excuse me, I need to go stock up on salad and get some exercise.