Unless you are family (and have it written down on your calendar), you probably didn’t think much of July 15th (last Tuesday) as it came and went. To be honest, I didn’t think to hard about it either, despite it being our second anniversary. Before you get excited, let me explain. Kirsten and I aren’t too big on actual dates of annual events (e.g. birthdays, etc.). While we did go out on a BWCA on our actual anniversary after work, we celebrated our anniversary the week early….in DULUTH! We weren’t planning it that way, we just were going to get rained on so we decided a crappy weather weekend would be better in town then on the trail.
So we hoped into the car after work on the 9th, and drove for 2.5 hours to our nearest, big, American city/town. Since we made plans last minute, we had to scramble for a hotel. Canal park, which is the tourist joint, had one good find: the Suites. It wasn’t to spendy either, perhaps having no windows in our room helped drive down that figure. The Suites is a converted warehouse on the water, which has condos on the top, and lots of high ceilings, and odd shaped rooms. But it was a fit. And the windows thing helped as we slept a lot later than was planned (definitely needed though).
When we showed up the tourists were walking around in beach attire. Not strange for a town on the water, but Duluth is still cold in the summer so it was a bit of a surprise. After a shower, and a shave! (finally...6 weeks later) we hit up a Midwestern fave in Famous Dave’s. The ribs must have been laced with tryptophan because we passed out (or maybe it’s just the work load here). The next morning we hit up Little Annie’s Cantina for lunch, great Mexican. Then we preceded to one of our favorite summer activities…a street fair. I’d never been to the downtown part of Duluth, so it was a pleasant surprise. My personal favorite was lanky high schooler on stage performing kids songs about sharks in a N. Dynamite-esque shark polo with an electrical tape shark mural on his acoustic guitar. After the fair, we hit the water front where the Duluth dog show was just warming up. I’m not sure who was more excited, Kirsten or the dogs that she was petting. As mentioned in the rambling post below, we hit up the Great Colorado Adventure about the Colorado River. It was a lot of fun, especially since I didn’t need any Dramamine to avoid motion sickness. Finally to top off our day of craziness…we went to TARGET!!! It’s been awhile since we’ve enjoyed the big box, anti-wal-mart. Unfortunately they were (badminton) birdie-less. When we got back to the hotel we waited over an hour for Green Mill delivery, which has always disappointed, and again were let down.
On Friday we milked the noon check out time, since it has been awhile since we’ve had a room bigger than a double-wide. But when we finally got moving, we headed to Amazing Grace bakery, a bustling but quaint little coffee house/bakery in the basement of the canal park shopping center. Mom, who had tracked ‘em down via Google (impressed), had put together a nice little surprise of anniversary themed cupcakes. Huge and tasty, great place to visit on the trek up the northshore. Then we set off on our second most important mission of the weekend: new birdies. But on the way we made a pit stop in honor of Donny, our fast food loving co-worker, at Mickey D’s. After we found some excellent birdies, we stumbled upon Plato’s Closet, and Kirsten came out the big winner of the weekend with a new wardrobe for the fall. Unfortuantely the loser in the situation was the fitting room hanger, which came out of the plaster due to our haul. Find a stud people! Before we headed back we had to stop at Best Buy, another MN corp. gem, for some movies. The two TV show seasons (see below) were clutch.
As we headed home, the storms were ragin’ and we knew that we had made the right decision. An ancillary benefit to the trip was that we finally got to see the rare Northshore surfer. The waves were decent and the dry suits were out in force. But that wasn’t the only rarity we saw on the way home…another moose sighting on Clearwater road. And with that another anniversary weekend concluded on a high note.
So we hoped into the car after work on the 9th, and drove for 2.5 hours to our nearest, big, American city/town. Since we made plans last minute, we had to scramble for a hotel. Canal park, which is the tourist joint, had one good find: the Suites. It wasn’t to spendy either, perhaps having no windows in our room helped drive down that figure. The Suites is a converted warehouse on the water, which has condos on the top, and lots of high ceilings, and odd shaped rooms. But it was a fit. And the windows thing helped as we slept a lot later than was planned (definitely needed though).
When we showed up the tourists were walking around in beach attire. Not strange for a town on the water, but Duluth is still cold in the summer so it was a bit of a surprise. After a shower, and a shave! (finally...6 weeks later) we hit up a Midwestern fave in Famous Dave’s. The ribs must have been laced with tryptophan because we passed out (or maybe it’s just the work load here). The next morning we hit up Little Annie’s Cantina for lunch, great Mexican. Then we preceded to one of our favorite summer activities…a street fair. I’d never been to the downtown part of Duluth, so it was a pleasant surprise. My personal favorite was lanky high schooler on stage performing kids songs about sharks in a N. Dynamite-esque shark polo with an electrical tape shark mural on his acoustic guitar. After the fair, we hit the water front where the Duluth dog show was just warming up. I’m not sure who was more excited, Kirsten or the dogs that she was petting. As mentioned in the rambling post below, we hit up the Great Colorado Adventure about the Colorado River. It was a lot of fun, especially since I didn’t need any Dramamine to avoid motion sickness. Finally to top off our day of craziness…we went to TARGET!!! It’s been awhile since we’ve enjoyed the big box, anti-wal-mart. Unfortunately they were (badminton) birdie-less. When we got back to the hotel we waited over an hour for Green Mill delivery, which has always disappointed, and again were let down.
On Friday we milked the noon check out time, since it has been awhile since we’ve had a room bigger than a double-wide. But when we finally got moving, we headed to Amazing Grace bakery, a bustling but quaint little coffee house/bakery in the basement of the canal park shopping center. Mom, who had tracked ‘em down via Google (impressed), had put together a nice little surprise of anniversary themed cupcakes. Huge and tasty, great place to visit on the trek up the northshore. Then we set off on our second most important mission of the weekend: new birdies. But on the way we made a pit stop in honor of Donny, our fast food loving co-worker, at Mickey D’s. After we found some excellent birdies, we stumbled upon Plato’s Closet, and Kirsten came out the big winner of the weekend with a new wardrobe for the fall. Unfortuantely the loser in the situation was the fitting room hanger, which came out of the plaster due to our haul. Find a stud people! Before we headed back we had to stop at Best Buy, another MN corp. gem, for some movies. The two TV show seasons (see below) were clutch.
As we headed home, the storms were ragin’ and we knew that we had made the right decision. An ancillary benefit to the trip was that we finally got to see the rare Northshore surfer. The waves were decent and the dry suits were out in force. But that wasn’t the only rarity we saw on the way home…another moose sighting on Clearwater road. And with that another anniversary weekend concluded on a high note.
(more pix (including beard disappearance) here: http://picasaweb.google.com/willo11/2YearsInDuluth )
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