Monthly Archives: September 2009

Off the beaten path

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Have you ever heard of the teeny, tiny Minnesota town of Vining?

I hadn’t, but my cousin Chad said it was one of those "must see," off-the-beaten-path adventures. And, since the little excursion Mom and I took to the north country was all about relaxation without deadlines, it fit right into our schedule.

Vining, located on Minnesota 210 between Clitherall and Henning, is home to about 65 residents and a rather unique sculpture park, thanks to local resident Ken Nyberg. Ken’s daughter, Karen, is an astronaut with NASA, and you can find an astronaut, made of welded steel, grasping an American flag at the front of the park.

Located adjacent to the town’s convenience store, the sculpture park is home to a life-sized elephant made entirely of lawnmower blades welded together. My favorite was the giant watermelon with the knife sticking in it, while my mom liked the little alien holding a rose. Other statues included a big buck, a pliers squishing a bug (shown here), and a potted cactus. This link will get you to another blog about the sculpture park, complete with pictures of the statues I’ve listed here, plus a few others found around town.

On the drive to Vining, Mom and I pulled off the road to take a picture of an abandoned church. It looked so pretty on our Sunday morning drive, with the beautiful blue sky above and the trees just starting to turn their varying shades of yellow and orange.

I’ve mentioned before that one of my hobbies is taking pictures of abandoned farm houses. I have pictures of a couple abandoned churches in my collection, and this one will be added to that photo album. We found the old church along Minnesota 210, not too far from Almora … another Minnesota town I’d never heard of.

I love how the sky turned out in this photo (capturing the beautiful blue sky is a trick Daily Globe photoguy Brian Korthals taught me a few years ago, and I use it whenever possible when shooting the great outdoors.)

I saw a couple of abandoned farmhouses on this trip, but wasn’t able to pull off to the side of the road because of traffic. There were also a few interesting barns, and the farm reporter in me was real curious about the potato harvest that was going on in the fields as we drove. I’d never seen potatoes harvested on a commercial scale before, so it was rather interesting to watch.

There were several spud fields in the area around Park Rapids, but we also took note of some sunflower fields in the area of Long Prairie. It was too early to see sunflower harvest, but I bet that would be interesting too!

While I was curious about the crops, much of our trip was spent admiring the changing colors of the season. We were a bit early for peak colors … northern Minnesota is actually behind southern Minnesota this year. Still, I managed to capture this image inside Itasca State Park. I apologize for the clarity … it was a windy and rainy day inside the park. I would think that in another week, the colors up there will be absolutely gorgeous.

Big chill, empty cooler

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Mom and I had great plans when we set out for our "Up Nort" vacation Friday morning.

We loaded up three fishing poles, three tackle boxes, a cooler and our luggage and headed for the north country in hopes of reeling in some pan-sized panfish. On the itinerary were Uncle Orv’s camper near Lake Minnewaska, cousin Chad’s home in Alexandria and our first visit to Itasca State Park and the headwaters of the Mississippi River.

It rained the entire time we visited the RV park near Glenwood, so there was no fishing to be had on Friday … I’m a fair weather fisherperson!

Saturday was absolutely gorgeous at Alexandria and, while I did get to go fishing (see previous blog post), there certainly weren’t any fish to fillet and store in our cooler.

By the time we made it to Park Rapids Sunday afternoon, the rain and wind were so ferocious we had to pull off at the visitor’s center and wait out the storm.

And, it was cold … VERY COLD.

We waited out the storm by checking in at a motel (we had planned to rent a cabin in the state park, but neither Mom nor I wanted to pay extra money to camp in the rain, the wind and the cold).

By Monday morning, with our car reloaded, we set out for Itasca State Park. It was still drizzling and gray, and even colder than it was the day before.

We fished in the drizzle and we fished in the cold, and then we decided to heck with it all … we can fish in southwest Minnesota and have the same kind of luck. We cut our trip short by a day and came home without any fish, but at least we are back in our warm little houses!

I took a few photos of the trip, which I will share in upcoming blog posts this week … in between cleaning, napping, stitching, reading and watching TV … you know, all those things you can do when you’re on vacation!

Skinks and skunked

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For the first time in nearly 20 years, I went fishing in a boat on Saturday.

I had my tackle box, my trusty Ugly Stik, a container of wax worms and a brand new pair of gloves filling up my hands as cousins Chad, Kelly, Sean and Jay floated to the dock to pick me up. The four guys didn’t mind having a girl in the boat … thank goodness!

After taking my seat at the back of the boat with cousin Jay (he and I share the same birthday), we headed out to Chad’s favorite spot in the middle of the lake, not too far from a collection of reeds. He always has good luck there, he said … meaning he never gets skunked.

The fish were showing up on the fish finder (actually, just little rectangles showed up on the fish finder to show activity) … but apparently fish finders are not a sure sign that anything will be reeled in.

Between the five of us, we had nightcrawlers, minnows, wax worms and artificial lures. And between the five of us, just three fish were reeled in … after trying four different spots on the lake over the course of a few hours.

Jay caught a bass and Kelly caught a couple of sunfish … and me … well, my fish tale caught a bunch of laughs.

At the third spot of the day, I put a fresh wax worm on the hook, tossed the line overboard and my bobber immediately was pulled under water.

"Oh, I’ve got something," I exclaimed. I began reeling it in, but the line felt so light.

And then we saw it … a minnow? a chub? nope … a baby bass!

The guys all laughed at me! I was laughing too!

It was the biggest … er, smallest … fish tale of the day!

Despite the lack of fish in our live well, we all had a fun afternoon on a beautiful lake. I don’t see my cousins all that often … a few times a year, at most. And I learned something new on the trip back to town.

Kelly and Sean were talking about a skink invasion in a wood pile on their property. Skinks are in the lizzard family and, as described by Sean, look sort of like a garter snake with legs. When cousin Chad heard the description, he started to shudder at the thought of such a critter.

"You’re just like your dad!" I said, knowing all too well my uncle Eldy’s disgust for any reptile … especially snakes. You even mention the word snake around Uncle Eldy and he gets the shivers. It’s kind of funny … only because I have a tremendous dislike for snakes. I guess some things just run in the family!

The Brother-Do List

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Most of my married friends keep "Honey Do" lists for their husbands, filled with things like fixing the leaky faucet, cleaning out the gutters, mowing the lawn, caulking the windows and other tasks that just don’t appeal to us womenfolk.

I have no such luxury of writing a Honey Do list. I mow my own lawn, I smash the centipedes that need smashing in my basement and I think I can remember how to operate a caulk gun.

For all of the other, more difficult tasks, I have my "Brother Do" list. It’s kind of like a Honey Do list except, well, he’s certainly not my honey. He doesn’t yell at me like I imagine a honey might if he’s pressured too much by his wife to get to work. My brother doesn’t yell because I pay him … and he doesn’t listen to his wife when she says he should be doing the work for free.

The $20 I pay him to clean the gutters is $20 I’d save on a hospital bill, because about the time I’d get over my fear of heights, I’d probably fall off the ladder. My brother is afraid of heights too, but for money, he climbs up to the second step from the top and graciously scoops out the tree leaves that have clogged the gutters.

For a fee, he has replaced nearly all of the electrical outlets in my house, and for free he has been known to stop in and help me move my mega-sized entertainment center when I decide to change my living room scenery up a bit.

Most recently, my brother agreed to install a new sidewalk in front of my house … it looks so much better than the old one that was crumbling away. And to think, all I had to do was fix him a delicious meal of chicken fajitas and write out a check!

Some of you may know I have three brothers, and may be wondering just which one it is that is so kind to help me out from time to time.

It’s simple, really. If you’ve read anything about birth order, you probably know that the first born is usually the responsible one. He looks out for his younger siblings and helps them in a time of need. That would be my brother Kevin.

I studied birth order in one of my child development classes in college, and the link I provided above was quite interesting. It breaks down birth order by oldest child, middle child, youngest child, only child and twins. Ironically, it described my brothers and I pretty well. The oldest … mechanically inclined (Kevin is a machinist), the middle are creative (I always tell people Randy speaks fast for a living and I write fast … the auctioneer and the journalist), and the youngest …destined for a career in sales (Jason is, what else, a salesman!)

So when it comes to getting my "Brother Do" list completed, sorry Kevin, but you will be at the top of the list every time.

What’s in the water?

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We stood on the dock and peered into the green muck that stretched along the shoreline at Lake Bella Tuesday afternoon.

“What makes the water green?” asked Okabena-Ocheda Watershed District Administrator Dan Livdahl.

“Algae,” replied Andy, the young boy I mentor in the Ocheda Beavers 4-H Club.

“Allergy?” asked his little sister Alissa.

Andy just shrugged his shoulders … after all, his little sister is just learning!

For the past two summers, Ocheda Beavers 4-H members have taken part in a water sampling project with Dan, the watershed man. Last summer, we helped him collect samples on Lake Ocheda, and on Tuesday, we wrapped up sampling on Lake Bella.

It was a much better experience this time around. It wasn’t 90-plus degrees like it was on our June sampling date … and the boat actually started this time. No need for oars!

I was the club’s leader back when Dan asked if we would be interested in helping him collect water samples. It sounded like a great Community Pride project for our club members, a chance for them to learn something about our lakes, and an opportunity for some, like Alissa, to take her very first boat ride.

Along the way, I developed a greater appreciation for the lakes that were essentially in my front yard and back yard while I was growing up in the Ocheda Valley (I found that reference on an old map of Nobles County several years ago). And, for the first time ever, I had a boat ride on each of the lakes.

Twice each month, from June through September, our club members joined Dan to collect water samples at various depths on Lake Bella this summer. The samples were sent to a laboratory in New Ulm, where they were tested for Chlorophyll-A levels, suspended solids and phosphorus. In addition to collecting water samples for the lab, the kids used a Secchi disk to measure the transparency of the water. On Tuesday, Andy and Alissa could see about 31 centimeters into the water … a far cry from the seemingly crystal clear waters in the northern part of our state.

The data collected from this summer’s experiment will be analyzed and sent on to the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. If the data shows problems in the overall health of Lake Bella and Lake Ocheda, both could end up on the state’s impaired waters list. Dan anticipates both lakes will be deemed impaired at some point … the MPCA creates a new list every couple of years, with the next declaration made in 2010.

While many of our club’s members are too young to understand a lot of the technical data behind the research, I think many of them have learned the importance of keeping our lakes … and our environment clean and healthy.

The kudos go to Dan for being such a good and patient teacher.