Three day weekend Small Adventure

Long weekends mean more time to explore

I like three day weekends. It feels like so much time off work, time to explore and to go places. There is enough time to enjoy some fun things, and by the time I start to get bored then the weekend is over and I’m ready to be done. (The time expands when you are doing new things; so it feels like you are doing so many things, and there is so much time passing.)

On President’s Day weekend I was ready to have adventures in new places. It was extremely (EXTREMELY) cold outside; by Monday the windchill was -40 degrees. So it was not a good weekend for outdoor activities. But there is always something good to do on Small Adventure weekends!

I first visited Ice Castles, on the grounds of the Minnesota State Fair. “Ice Castles is an award-winning frozen attraction located in four cities across North America. The experience is built using hundreds of thousands of icicles hand-placed by professional ice artists. The castles include breathtaking LED-lit sculptures, frozen thrones, ice-carved tunnels, slides, fountains and much more.”

I was there during the day, but you could see the colored lights a little bit. And I know that if I had stayed longer, it would been really beautiful to see! You can click on the website, and see the structures all lit up at night.

There were carved ice sculptures, ice slides, ice caves, ice tunnels, and an assortment of structures built from ice. I really liked all the signs around, explaining about how the ice buildings were created! (I’m a librarian; we’re always going to enjoy value-added information about whatever it is we are seeing!)

(It did take me a little while to move past my grade school days of reading in Dynamite magazine about the 1978 movie Ice Castles. But that’s a me issue, probably not one most attendees will have.)

I was just passing through, on my way to Stillwater; so I wasn’t able to see it with the full effect of the lights. But in one tunnel, that you can see in the lower left photo above, there were these art flowers in ice that were lit up. (You have to picture the rest of the tunnel walls curving up over those flowers, across the ceiling, and down the other side to make a not-terribly large tunnel.)

There were also opportunities to stop by the food and beverage areas. I wasn’t there for long, so I didn’t get anything; but the lines were omnipresent, and people seemed happy with their warm beverages and snacks as they trudged around the area and went down the big ice slide!

And then I was nearly frozen, so it was time to go somewhere warm! I headed to Como Park. I’ve been here a couple of times before, and arrived just under an hour before it closed. So this was going to be a fast trip. I anticipated it would be pretty emptied out by the time I arrived - but I could not have been more wrong! It was absolutely jammed with people, so crowded that I was having trouble getting through some of the more snug walkways. (I was brave and didn’t panic! I turned up my headphones to listen to good podcasts until I could squeeze my way past the men who were determined to expound on all their botanical knowledge.)

This is absolutely an amazing place to visit! Sure, it’s especially great on a day when it’s so cold outside, because the conservatory is so toasty warm. And in addition to that, you can see how beautiful the plants are. Whatever you can see in the pictures here, just magnify that by about 100 times! It’s really a lovely experience.

And after that, I was off to Stillwater for a weekend of lazy adventure!

I stayed a couple of nights at the Water Street Inn. The inn was lovely, and I had an amazing view of the St. Croix River and Wisconsin - which you can see in the third picture. It was fairly pricy to get a room with a view of the river, but as an occasional thing I don’t mind a little fancier place. (Usually my overnight adventures involve camping or staying in moderately crappy hotels.) And I was having a celebration weekend, so it was worth it this time.

I don’t know if it’s clear, but in the third picture, looking at the bridge over to Wisconsin, you can see a hockey rink below my window! I love this about Minnesota: you are never very far away from a place to play hockey, or at least to go ice fishing or skating on a lake. This is an outdoors-y culture, and I love that.

Usually I’m quite brave about being outside in the cold. But it was SO COLD that weekend! The temperature just kept falling. So, not a lot of outside things. Even just walking down the block was very unpleasant. I was therefore very happy that I had such a nice room, and such a great view! I did make small excursions outside, darting across the street for beverages, down the block to the bookstore (Valley Bookseller - very nice!), and such. But I also spent a lot of the day huddled near the fireplace, looking out the window at the frozen river, and reading lots of library books.

I did of course zip out to go across that bridge to Wisconsin! It was SO COLD that the trip was quite fast. But I went out once during the day, to see everything there was to see. And then again at night to enjoy the lights.

The lights! I was surprised the first evening when I was sitting there as the sun went down, and colored lights came on at the beginning of that bridge and back along the walkway down the side of the hotel. They changed color, and at some point in the cycle they would flash. I loved seeing them. And it was fun when walking across the bridge that evening.

Not a terribly exciting sounding weekend! But it was fun for me. And I always like the adventures of getting out and seeing new things that I haven’t seen or done or tried. So, when the small weekends involve beautiful things to see, and interesting things to do, and of course lots of library books to read, it is a success.

Have you had a celebration weekend? Do you have one coming up? Do something fun for yourself! Life is short, and it’s good to take the opportunities we have to do fun things!