|
Wednesday/Thursday, June 23&24: A Prairie Home Companion
| |
White Pelicans taking off early in the morning as we leave South Dakota, heading for Melrose, Minnesota. | |
|
Wednesday, 6/23/21: Prairie Home Companion
Lake Wobegon,
Where all the women are strong
All the men are good looking
And all the children are above average
—Garrison Keillor
Several Minnesota towns vie for the title of Lake Wobegon. The town of Marine, on the St. Croix River, presents a strong case. Butch Thompson, the jazz pianist and band leader that led Garrison’s band on the Prairie Home Companion radio show, came from there. A bar with a creek running under it is said to be the model for the SideTrack Tap, the bar featured on the show.
But Marine is not in the Prairie. That is where places like Freeport, Huntingford, Avon, etc. move in for the kill. These tiny prairie towns, just west of St. Cloud, have a nice little competition claiming to be Lake Wobegon. They are knitted together by the Lake Wobegon Rails-to-Trail Bike Trail. Garrison Keillor himself called Huntingford as the town that is, “most Lake Wobegonic.”
We arrived in Melrose around 11 am. Melrose is right in the middle of the Lake Wobegon Bike Trail system. It has a city campground that runs along the edge of the city’s ball field and fair grounds. We came to see if we could grab a campsite for a couple of days while we scoped out the bike trail and find the true Lake Wobegon.
Unfortunately, all the RV sites with electricity were taken. Two gregarious sisters in a pop-up camper explained that Melrose was setting up for big doings this weekend and that is why the campsites are all taken. First of all, a citywide class reunion was going to take place this weekend. Citywide meant citywide. Anyone that graduated from the Melrose high school, no matter the year, was invited. A big regional baseball tournament was also scheduled for Saturday. A carnival will be setting up, fireworks will be lit, and the regionally admired band, the Armadillos, will be playing.
Basically, Melrose will be celebrating the 4th of July a week early. How Lake Wobegonic of Melrose to get such a jump on the 4th of July weekend.
Fortunately, the Melrose campground has a separate and remote tent area with lots of openings. We boondocked in one of them.
| |
This was our welcoming party at the Melrose City Campground. | |
We enjoyed German Night at Cafe Charlie’s. We split a giant order of the Bavarian pot roast with spatzle, a delicious kind of pasta-like little dumplings. The roast was so tender that it just melted in your mouth. | |
|
After setting up, we cruised around the back roads to a couple of QTs outside of the Lake Wobegon area. We are keeping the Lake Wobegon wannabe QTs for our bike ride. The little backroad towns were nice, but not the uniquely picturesque towns I was hoping for. One community, Spicer, surrounded a large round lake with very big expensive homes crammed onto lots that were way too small. You could practically walk around the lake jumping from roof-top to roof-top on these monster homes.
If I had that kind of money, I would put the bulk of my cash into purchasing two or three lots and build a nice small, but comfortable cabin.
Hey, that’s what we did. We have nearly 30 acres on a river, and our house is a modest cabin in the woods. Fortunately, we invested in our estate back in 1977 when prices were affordable. I am still working on a name for our place. Homes with names, we have heard, are magically worth more. Let’s see, Zuege’s River Pines Estate. It is still a work in progress.
| |
The potential QTs we visited didn’t really pan out to be much, however in Spicer, Minnesota, we ran across this kind of cool sculpture. | |
|
Thursday, 6/24/21: eBiking
Well, I don’t know about Holdingford being all that Lake Wobegonic; and we found the towns associated with the Root River trail system in southern Minnesota to be significantly quainter. Still, we found some very nice mom’n’pop cafes which counts for quite a bit.
We peddled 25.5 miles from Holdingford up to Bowlus, then down to the twin lakes, and back to Holdingford. (OK, we sort of peddled - the eBikes did the bulk of the work.) This stretch was nicely canopied with trees, allowing the muggy 87º to feel comfortable.
Besides the trail, the highlight of the day was hitting several cafes. First up was Cafe Charlie’s. This cafe was owned by a surprisingly young couple. Actually, we ate there twice. Yesterday was German night and we had Bavarian pot roast with spatzle. This morning we split a veggie omelet. Both meals were terrific.
| |
Back to Cafe Charlie’s in Freeport for breakfast. We split a veggie omelet. | |
Freeport’s bar trying to cash in on the Lake Wobegon’s Side Track Tap. | |
Most every prairie town has a grain elevator. This is Freeport’s. | |
I figured that this Q’Annon, anti-Vaxer, Trumpian, conspiracy-nut is Holdingford’s “odd duck” or “colorful character” or “zany maverick”……… Anyway, to answer his question, no, I haven’t seen cows or rocks wear a mask. I’m not sure what that has to do with anything. He seems to have missed the “Bill Gates microchip in the vaccine” theory, although he did come up with the “spike protein” conspiracy. | |
Each town along the Bike Trail has their own unique trailhead. Holdingford’s trailhead featured an old Soo Line box car. | |
Holdingford’s covered bridge - the longest in Minnesota. | |
Some interesting metal art scenes in Holdingford. In the first panel, I believe that is an illegal corn-liquor still or showing corn being made into ethanol for fuel. My vote is for the still. | |
In the winter, the trail is used for snowmobiling. The snowmobile in the middle depicts the Snow Flyers, the snowmobiling club that grooms this part of the trail. | |
The trail was shaded by a canopy of trees. | |
On the trail, we stumbled upon Jordie’s Trailside Cafe in Bowlus, and had a scrumptious piece of Turtle pie. The decor was a splendid clutter of dolls, jars, linens, pictures, junk art, flowers, and anything else that sort of fits in any tiny empty spot. The whole ensemble just worked. | |
Jordie’s Trail Side Cafe. | |
The owner said that she has been open for 13 years. | |
Duane Bobick is the most famous person from Bowlus. He was a successful boxer and he was Mohamed Ali’s sparring partner (check out the bottom left photo). | |
|
Then, out in nowhere, between the tiny towns of Holdingford and Bowlus, with a combined population of about 3 people, stood this cavernous, brand new, art cafe called Boho Cafe. So, what is an art cafe? As best as I could understand it, there is a large room where you can play around with paints, chalks, or whatever medium you want, and doodle up a masterpiece, I guess while you eat, or while you are waiting for your food, or while you are digesting your food, or whatever….
I had a local amber beer, brewed in one of the little towns in the area, and Wanda had strawberry rhubarb ice cream. How did they come up with the name Boho? It’s a combination of BOwlus and HOldingford. I really liked the place and hope they can make it, but it looked like it would take a lot of overhead to keep a big joint like that going.
| |
The stage under the giant mural is for entertainment, both scheduled and impromptu. On their scheduling board they had an upcoming 3-day “music festival”. It did not explain what that meant, who was playing, what kind of music, etc. | |
Even Boho Cafe’s birdhouse is a masterpiece. | |
|
Finally, we had supper at the True North Marketplace and Restaurant in Melrose. The two gregarious sisters at the campground recommended it because a nephew’s sister-in-law’s, uncle’s, second cousin’s brother just opened it up. Or some such connection.
All-in-all, we had a great day of biking and eating. As we wind down our 3 month journey, we know that we will have to shed a couple of pounds. But, that will have to wait until after the 4th of July.
| |
Miscellaneous scenes from towns on the trail. | |
Schmidt Beer is one of those regional beers, like Hamms, Lone Star, and Grain Belt, that was prevalent decades ago. | |
Avon’s trailhead features this observation tower. Now that’s taking the Lake Wobegon trail seriously. | |
Glossary of terms used for newcomers: 1) V-Jer. The name of our camper. 2) Saturn. The name of our Van. 3) Duende. Our mischievous gremlin that breaks things. 4) Tata. The good gremlin that helps us fix Duende’s dirty work. 5) The Black Hole. This is what we call Walmart because every time we go in for just a couple of items, we come out spending way more than we figured. 6) QT. Quaint Town. 7) Little Buddy. This is what we call our Dyson cordless stick vacuum. | | | | |
