What to do when it’s 72 degrees in Feburary? Canoeing on the Cahaba River Sunday afternoon/evening! It took a little longer than we anticipated.
Here are a couple pictures from the trip, follow the link for a few more:
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| From Cahaba River Canoe Trip – Feb. ‘09 |
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| From Cahaba River Canoe Trip – Feb. ‘09 |
An aide to Oberstar said he had no hand in the mayors’ wish list, which includes a number of road and highway projects in his district, including $5 million to paint Duluth’s iconic Aerial Lift Bridge. Also tucked in are $2 million for a lake-walk extension at Beacon Point and $6 million for snowmaking and maintenance facilities at Spirit Mountain.
Turn your snow shovels into a lawn chair – that’s just one benefit of global warming for Minnesotans.
Minnesotans for Global Warming has to be the hottest political groups in the Twin Cities. They jokingly ask people to stop breathing since we contribute to CO2 the global emissions.
I had the good fortune of meeting the brains behind M4GW this past weekend. Check out their blog.
You can ride an ostrich?
For the second annual “Extreme Race Day,” the Shakopee horse track pulled in an estimated 15,000 curious onlookers. While horses raced all day, the crowd came to see a different kind of thoroughbred. And they’d only get one chance — yep, one race to decide the faster ostrich in Minnesota (by way of Kansas).
Camels racing too.
I just got back from an awesome camping trip to AirVenture 2008 in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. In case you are not familiar, Oshkosh is the largest aviation fly-in in the world. The estimated attendance is 750,000 for the week. I drove over from Minneapolis to meet some friends who flew in from Birmingham on Wednesday. Fortunately, we had great weather and no rain during the events.
Although I’m not directly involved in aviation myself, I still enjoyed seeing everything from the latest experimental homebuilt planes to the historic military aircraft. Highlights of the show include dozens of beautiful WWII era warbirds, airshows featuring the F-22 Raptor, ultralights taking off across the road from our campsite, incredible new planes like ICON Aircraft’s incredible new plane.
Check out my pictures here:
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| Oshkosh AirVenture Wis. 2008-07-31_08-02 |
I found out Friday night at the fly-in movie that John Travolta is an aviation freak to the extent that he designed his house like an airport and owns a Boeing 707, which he flew to Oshkosh (Quantas – Australian airliner). He introduced the movie Broken Arrow at the fly-in theater. BTW, he parked his Quantas jet right in the middle of the exhibition area – it was pretty lame compared to the rest of the planes surrounding it. There’s a description of his airport-house here.
Watch some videos from the fly-in from EAA:
If you’re into live folk/americana/bluegrass music, check out the 2008 Birmingham Folk Festival being held August 2nd at Avondale Park.
Minneapolis, St. Paul parks shine in national report
The nonprofit Trust for Public Land on Tuesday reported the following for the state’s two largest cities:
RECREATION CENTERS per 20,000 residents: St. Paul, first nationally at 3.0; Minneapolis, second, 2.6.
TENNIS COURTS per 10,000 residents: Minneapolis, first, 4.9; St. Paul, tied for third, 3.7.
BALL DIAMONDS per 10,000 residents: St. Paul, first, 5.6; Minneapolis, second, 5.3.
SKATEBOARD PARKS per 100,000 residents: Minneapolis, third, 1.6; St. Paul, 16th, 0.7.
PARK-RELATED SPENDING per resident: St. Paul, third, $224; Minneapolis, eighth, $151.
NON-SEASONAL MUNICIPAL PARK EMPLOYEES per 1,000 residents: Minneapolis, fifth, 1.56; St. Paul, 14th, 1.08.
The Twin Cities also landed one of its park destinations among the most-visited in the nation. The Lake Harriet/Lyndale Park area in Minneapolis receives about 2.25 million visitors a year, placing it 30th.
FYI… I may not be posting much this summer as I enjoy the great outdoors and the warm weather.
Some pictures of Minnehaha Falls Saturday and a few others from my 21 mile bike ride to the falls. Minnehaha means “curling or falling water” in Dakota.
Minnehaha Creek is a small tributary of the Mississippi River that runs from Lake Minnetonka, about 10 miles west of downtown, through the southwest suburbs of Minneapolis and ends just after the falls at the Mississippi River. Minnehaha Creek is a popular canoe route in the summer months.
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| Minnehaha Falls |
There is also a Minnehaha Falls in Georgia.
Some pictures of Baxter, my dog (almost). I’m actually keeping him for a former house-mate.
I’m glad to see he’s still alive and well and chewing up the sticks laying around the back yard.
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