Big Mall in a Mini Soda
Trip Start
May 31, 2010
1
19
38
Trip End
Jul 11, 2010
Maple Grove, Minnesota
Thursday, June 17, 2010
We woke up in Sioux Falls after a somewhat restless night sleep. After a gorgeous evening last night, we were aware that there was a slight 10% chance of thunderstorms during the night. We didn’t think they would come, but prepared just in case. Good thing we did, because around 4:30 in the morning we were awoken by strong winds, loud thunder and lightning. At first, there was no rain, but about 5 minutes later, that started in as well. The storm lasted about 20 minutes, but the wind lasted the rest of the night. Good news: the warm wind dried out our tent so we did not have to roll up a wet tent in the morning. Bad news: it is hard to sleep in a tent when it is blowing around in the wind. It wasn’t our worst night by far, but we woke up at about 7 a little ragged nonetheless. We had some breakfast, packed up and figured out where we were going to stay that night. Our destination was the Twin Cities in Minnesota, so camping was out, but we found a nice little Marriot in the suburbs of Minneapolis that had some vacancy. We plugged that address into Garmin and were on our way. First however, we had to stop and see the actual Sioux Falls. The falls cascade down flat red rocks through a grassy park in the middle of the city. It was definitely worth the stop to see the city's namesake.
Our drive was relatively uneventful. Nate napped and I drove, then Nate drove and I napped. We arrived in Maple Grove, Minnesota with very little trouble. Also, exciting news. The Midwest is big on E-85 gas, which my dad’s FlexFuel Tahoe takes. E-85 is American friendly, environmentally friendly and wallet friendly at 50 cents less a gallon than normal gas. Anywho, we arrived at our Courtyard Marriot, checked in and got changed into our fancy clothes (aka a new t-shirt and jeans) for an evening out on the town. While we were doing so, we heard on the news that western Minnesota was under storm and tornado watch. Being from California my whole life, I had never experienced tornado warnings before and it was clear to me that the storm that hit us the night before was following us. The weather woman assured us it wouldn’t hit the Twin Cities though, so we went along our day with the confirmation that we would be safe.
We went to the Mall of America first. The Mall of America is the biggest mall in America, hence the name. It was amazing how humongous it is. We walked around for a little bit and bought a fancy tripod so we can do self-timer pictures easier and a few gifts for people. We got tired after completing only one floor of the mall, so decided to go into the middle and check out the amusement park they have. Yes, there is an amusement park IN the mall. You have to pay an absurd amount of money to ride the rides, but being the tourists we are we bought the cheapest ticket at $18.90. This got us 20 points, which is good for about 2 rides each. We went on the Spongebob SquarePants _________. It actually was a pretty good little rollercoaster for being in a mall. We tried to find a ride that was 4 points or less after, but decided against the Balloon Race and ended up just donating our points to the Boys and Girls Club instead. Definitely worth the $18.90. I think.
As many know, this was also the night of Game 7 of the Lakers/Celtics series. Since we’ve hit up a lot of breweries on our trip, we decided to find a local brewery where we could watch the game. We ended up at Townhall Brewery in downtown Minneapolis as it had gotten rave reviews in our tour books and on Yelp. However, the one thing that both forgot to mention is that the brewery only had 2 TVs – one in the bar and one in the restaurant. Unfortunately, we were seated in the restaurant area where we could barely see the TV from a distance. To soften the blow however, was the amazing food and beer served at Townhall. As always, Nate got the sampler and I got the lightest beer on the menu. We were both happy with our choices. We ordered sweet potato fries as an appetizer as it had been suggested, and we were not disappointed. For dinner, Nate got a Black and Bleu burger and I had a chicken sandwich. We were both stuffed by the end, but it was fantastic food. Once our yummy distractions were gone, we decided to head back to our hotel to watch the Lakers finish of the Celtics in a stressful, but exciting Game 7. (Note: neither of us are huge NBA fans, and it was stressful and exciting for us. So I can only imagine what it was like for those of you who ARE faithful Lakers/Celtics fans.)
After the game, the news came on and we were updated on that storm and tornado watch that had been in place earlier. We had gotten some rain in Minneapolis and the sky got pretty eerie at one point, but nothing major. However, the rest of the state was not so lucky. During the day, 16 tornadoes had touched down in Minnesota which was one of the highest number of tornadoes to touch down in one day ever in the state. Two people were killed and some were inured during the storms as they tragically tore through cities in western Minnesota. Although this didn’t end our day on the highest of notes, we were lucky to have stayed dry and safe and escape the worst of the storms.
