Lake Show

Minneapolis is one of those cities that gradually moved up on my radar the last few years. Before I moved to New York, I could only hazard a meek guess at where Minneapolis even was (I used to mix up Minnesota with Montana, strictly because both were vaguely "north" and started with M's). I can't believe it to be a quirk unique to the west, but it does seem most Californians are afflicted with an especially myopic handle on geography. And who can blame us? The Pacific is a powerful, dominant force, and for much of my life, I only knew the coast. I knew San Diego and San Francisco, and could proudly point out Oregon and Washington. Las Vegas was the easternmost city I could definitively locate. Everything beyond fell within the vast, shifting borders of the "East," "South," or "Midwest."

I don't know if it was a result of simple maturity, or whether it had more to do with the fact that I had physically seen and familiarized myself with more places in the U.S., but my time in New York saw a pretty impressive sharpening of my geographical literacy (I'd venture as far as to even say that I was reading U.S. maps at the fourth, maybe even fifth, grade level). On top of such rapid development, I also began to meet a lot more people who were not from the places I was from. And that was when Minneapolis stepped out of the shadows of abstraction. Several of the friends I met in New York were from Minneapolis, the majority of them inclined toward the arts. And it was through knowing them and hearing their stories that slowly, I began to understand Minneapolis as more than just an inchoate place. It formed, in bits and pieces, into somewhere that was richly metropolitan yet textured with natural splendor, creatively vibrant but also touched by an almost bucolic, uniquely-Minnesotan charm.

It wasn't a difficult decision to make sure I stopped by on the way back to California. And it won't be a difficult decision to go back again in the future. Minneapolis was bewitching in all the ways I hoped it would be.

The Minneapolis Institute of the Arts

Multi-sided solid from Dürer's Melencolia I.

We had to hit up the Mall of America, just to see it.

Four stories, over 400 stores...

...with a branded amusement park in the middle of it? Yeah, that's pretty American.

I much preferred the parks.

Minnehaha Falls in Minnehaha Park is usually a bit more spectacular. But even in the dry season, it makes for a good destination.

Look! All of that is in the middle of a park! There are over 180 parks in the city, and each one puts your city's park to shame.

We had a few good meals and caught a small show at 7th Street Entry (the historic First Avenue was dark for the night, unfortunately). It was an easy visit, an easy place to leave a little piece of my heart. And after, onwards.

Roadside stop.

Remember what I said about pictures of corn?

 I'm not sure if Roy's taking a leak or a picture in this shot.

There are many oddities by the road on these drives.

 But also a lot of beauties.

 Keep truckin'.