Left Rochester about 8:15 a.m. on US52N. Took SR19W at Cannon Falls to Northfield.
Arrived in Northfield about 9:30 to no visible evidence of the Great Northfield Raid of the James and Younger gang. This was a little surprising given how quickly every town in America can tourist-up the most remote rumor connected to history or crime. And here we are with both history and crime covered ,and no big signs, “Get your Northfield Raid souvenirs here today.” There is a local history museum downtown but it had no signs of life this early on a Sunday morning. I’m sure they have something on it, but…hey, what the heck…they were here, and now I was here. A connection of sorts.
You can readily see why they wanted to get at the bank here. It was supposedly a very prosperous farming town in the 1880s, and still is today. The town now has something like 17,000 residents and is obviously prosperous and upbeat. I liked the looks of the place.
Neat old Post Office in Northfield.
Nice little square in the old, downtown section. I suspect the bank was in this area.
River directly behind the little square above.
I took SR19W to I-35N and headed toward Minneapolis. Weather forecast is for rain today throughout my intended route. Sure enough, Murphy’s Law was in effect. The rain hit as I was going through, or better stated…around this large city. I took I494W around and, fortunately, it was Sunday morning traffic, i.e., not too thick. But thick enough to get your attention when visibility is reduced through rain-soaked goggles. West of town I-494 turned into I-94W. At this time the rain started coming down heavier and I decided I wanted a coffee break and a break from the rain. I pulled off the highway and into a McDonald’s. I figure if the coffee was hot enough to get an old lady a couple of million bucks in a lawsuit it would meet my purposes. It did. I took my book, and two large coffees and an hour-and-a-half later the rain stopped and I rode north toward Fargo, ND.
Spotted the spires from the highway and just had to stop and see this.
St. Mary's Catholic Church - Melrose, MN
The brick pattern is distorted I think because of the digital picture process. Like showing a stripped shirt on TV, the TV digital "painting" of the pixels has to line up exactly or you get a wavy pattern.
Got to Fargo about 5:00p.m. and checked in to a Super8.
So…not much of a report, but I’ve got some fill-in complaint and information stuff.
Interesting Sports Event
While stopping for breakfast yesterday in Ashland, IL, I read in the local paper where the local quarterback, senior Wil Lunt almost broke the Illinois-state passing record in their game against Bloomington Central Catholic High. He was 34 for 52 attempts and 573 YARDS, only 16 yards short of the state record. I would expect we may hear that name in a couple of years. By the way, they LOST 42-37.
Soon-to-be Official Complaint to Sony
Last trip I left my big camera behind. The good news was it was at my friends Claye and Sylvia’s house, so I got it back. This time I left my small camera (Sony Cyber-Shot) charger behind in West Plains, Mo on the second night out. This is a nuisance because it’s the one I can use while riding, or on a moment’s notice. The big one just isn’t that flexible.
Problem: Sony, as is usually the case with them, uses a special connector and one can’t just use any charger, it has to be made for this camera. But can one find it conveniently? Of course not. I stopped in at Best Buy here in Fargo because I discovered on-line the other day that they carry a lot of Sony camera equipment. No connector. In fact, the guy told me I could probably only get one from Sony.
Now, that works doesn’t it? I have to order through Sony and wait until I get home because Sony in all their concern for their customer can’t see that if I lose it I’m probably NOT GOING TO BE AT HOME!! And I’ll probably WANT ONE WHERE I AM!! Not WHERE I’M GOING TO BE!! Hello!!! Any of you slant-eyed customer-lovers out there??
My choices are to either purchase a stand-alone battery-charger (~$60) so I can continue to use this camera on this trip, or wait until I get home and try to buy one from Sony. I looked briefly at their website and didn’t see where I could get one. I really like having the smaller camera “on the ready,” so we’ll see. I may be forced to spend the additional money. The good news about that approach is 1) Sony would probably charge me ~$30 for the charger, meaning I would only pay $30 for the convenience of having this camera NOW, and 2) Sony wouldn’t get another dime from me…a concept I really like to think about. We’ll see.
Weather’s looking pretty sloppy for this coming week as I turn for home. I may get through tomorrow without significant rainfall, but after that it’s looking really bad back toward the west…and heading this way. I’ll have to figure out how to make some lemonade with it.
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