We had a hospital visit for Nigel today - and he has been signed off. In the summer he suddenly had huge floaters in one eye and it was a torn retina. They lasered it which they said was like welding and it was fine but the consultant wanted a belt and braces approach so did the second round of welding and today was just the final check on how that went and all was good.
I have another new scrap page to share today - made at the weekend. We were not huge fans of Montreal, but the Notre Dame Basilica was absolutely stunning. So stunning I was even prepared to use some of my precious Blue Awning papers which I treasure. It was my favourite ever range of papers.
Today I am thankful for
- my new i phone - more on that once I suss it all out but Barb, I blame you in part!
- Nigel's all clear from the eye hospital.
Day 8 Minneapolis
22nd October 2019
Start miles 2940
Start time 7.30
End miles 3021
End time 5.15
The one with the birthday
Nigel was again going to be celebrating his birthday whilst we were away on holiday. His actual birthday would be tomorrow, but that was going to be a heavy travel day and so we had decided, that as we had two days in one place and a very easy day today we would celebrate his birthday a day early. Our morning began with flat presents. Taking items on holiday that we don’t really need is always problematic and so Nigel gets flat presents. Some of these are vouchers for things that he can have whilst on the trip and as luck would have it he had vouchers for gifts from Hard Rock Cafe is, a voucher for gifts from Angel Stadium, a voucher for frozen custard, a delicacy we had never tried, and a voucher for a meal at the Hard Rock Cafe in Minneapolis. Wasn’t that lucky!! He also had photographs of presents that were at home waiting for him.
We had decided that we would go to the golden corral for breakfast again this morning, And so we headed off into maple grove and found the golden corral, which didn’t serve breakfast and didn’t open until midday! Oh dear… Egg McMuffin again then. We decided that today would be a shopping day as well as sightseeing and so we drove to the hobby lobby As I had seen that they had 50% off or paper studio products. The one thing I really wanted to look for whilst I was in America was D ring albums and so I hoped that they would be included in the 50% off. We arrived at Hobby lobby at 8:30 and sat in the car in the pouring rain until they opened at nine. It proved to be well worth the wait as they had gorgeous albums at 50% off which made them less than £8 an album. I bought four and loads of packs of refills.
Our next stop was something a little more unusual and something we haven’t expected to see in America. Nigel had read about a man who had built a cycle speedway track in Minneapolis and was keen to check it out. It was a little tricky to find thanks to roadworks diverting us in all directions, but eventually, we pulled up next to a perfect cycle speedway track. Nigel went to take photographs and was so pleased that he had a chance to meet the man who built it and to see inside the facility as well. It was really beautiful and I’m so glad he got to see it all.
One of the things I had always wanted to see, and I have no idea why, was the mall of America. I think it was the name as much of it as anything that stood out and once I had looked it up on the Internet I was fascinated to see it had a theme park in the centre, countless attractions and the odd shop or two. The shopping wasn’t what appealed as they were largely the sort of stores that we don’t go to but saying the other stuff sounded fun. we parked easily and headed off into the mall which if I’m honest was a fairly major disappointment. It was much smaller than it had been in my imagination, and yes there was a theme park and that was impressive but the rides were small and aimed at a younger audience… And were expensive. We did enjoy watching some of the rides and we had fun looking at the huge models in the Lego store.
The tiny people show the scale
I also really enjoyed seeing the Crayola area, although we didn’t do the Crayola experience as that was definitely aimed at a younger audience. I was in heaven, though, looking at all the colours of the crayons and it brought back memories of how happy I would be when I would get a new pack of wax crayons when I was a child. I would glory in their wondrous names, smell them as there was nothing quite like the smell of wax crayons, and I would colour so carefully so that I didn’t break them. I was always a little bit sad when their points had gone and when you had to gradually tear little strips of the paper wrapping off as the crayons wore down. Nigel insisted on buying me a pack of crayons, so goodness knows what I will do with them.
We made our way down to the Hard Rock Cafe for Nigel‘s birthday lunch, and we even had a voucher for a free entree as he is a hard-rock member and they send you a gift for your birthday. It was a nice café, but the experience was not a positive one. When they bought our meal the fries were cold and I don’t mean they were just not very hot, they were cold. We called the server over and explained and she took them away and said she would get fresh fries. We waited and waited and waited and then we ate our meal and as we got to the last couple of mouthfuls the fries appeared. We expressed our disappointment that the fries had taken so long and we said it would’ve been better if she had taken the whole meal away to keep it warm so that we could’ve eaten it all together. We thought no more of it other than what a disappointing birthday meal it had been, when the manager came over and expressed his apologies and told us that lunch was on him. Normally we are the sort of people who would not accept and would say it didn’t really matter, but in this instance it had mattered and had spoilt his birthday celebration and so we were happy to accept the free meal.
We wandered around the mall a little and Nigel saw a 3-D virtual ride experience which sounded fun. It was reasonably expensive and they said it was quite intense and so I opted not to do it, but just to sit whilst Nigel experienced it. He was actually very disappointed that it was really just a 3-D simulator and not a virtual experience but heck it was a fun thing to do.
When we exited the mall back into the real world the rain had stopped and what we didn’t realise was that was to be the last rain we saw all trip. It was still grey, but we were undeterred and headed off to see other things we had highlighted for our Minnesota day. We went to see the Minnehaha Falls, which were surprisingly fast running, Possibly due to the amount of rain that had fallen. The fall colours in the park were lovely and I enjoyed seeing the statue as it brought back so many memories of when I was a little girl and mummy used to recite Longfellow’s Hiawatha poem as a bedtime reading.
We also checked out the sculpture gardens seeing the spoon bridge in particular.
By our standards it has been a very quiet day but much needed in amongst all of the things we were doing and it was good to get back early relaxed and ready ourselves for the next stage of our trip.
There used to be the most amazing scrapbook store at the MoA called Archivers. It had EV.ER.Y.THING!!! EVERYTHING! Everything you would ever need or want for a scrapper. Every brand, every color, every theme, every type, every style, every designer was sold there. Steve and I would go up to the Mall once a year just so we could eat in one of the restaurants and then I could shop my heart out at Archivers.
Then suddenly, in 2014, they closed all their doors across the country. :'-( Thus, I have only been to the Mall three times since then-- once to see the Princess Diana exhibition, once to show our son and his wife the Mall, and once for a "girls' weekend" with my mom and two sisters to see the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition. My younger sister was intent on finding the home plate plaque and the red stadium seat on the wall to indicate Harmon Killebrew's longest home run in the Metropolitan Stadium which once stood where the MoA is today.
I don't believe the Mall has the draw it did years ago.
I remember one of the orchestra teachers up in Fairbanks told me all about her adventure seeing the Mall of American in 2002 when she attended a National Honors Youth Orchestra festival with her daughter. I think the Mall was in its height of popularity at that time and quite a tourists' attraction.
Have fun with those crayons! Did Nigel buy enough Legos so he could build a motorcycle?? ;-)
Posted by: Barb in AK | December 04, 2019 at 12:49 PM