Returning to normal Minneapolis life has been pretty great. What I’ve discovered about going on long trips is that you appreciate things you have at home, like your garden and your very comfortable bed and Triple Rock. I missed Triple Rock.
Thursday was the sixth annual draft party. We had it at our house this time, which made things a lot easier, even though I had to worry about my furniture getting sullied. The most memorable part was when Pete stripped down to his underpants and sat in the kiddie pool in the basement (which was meant to represent the mine lake at Joe’s cabin). It’s not the kind of memory you want, really, but the party was still awesome.
The downside to having just gotten back from vacation was having to go to work the next day. One should never have to work the morning after the draft party. It hurts.
Friday, we were awaiting the delivery of a roof base rack and kayak rack that would allow us to take our kayaks camping with us. The base rack arrived early, but the kayak rack still wasn’t there when I got home. We put the rack on my car, then packed, then had some food while waiting for UPS. Right as we gave up and decided to leave without them, the UPS guy showed up. We put the kayak rack on, strapped the boats to the car, and started a nervewracking journey to William O’Brien State Park. (I was very nervous that maybe we’d done something wrong and the kayaks would fly off and murder people on the highway. They didn’t.)
Despite the rain over the weekend, camping was awesome. (Plus the rain gave us an excuse to go have lunch at Smalley’s in Stillwater.) We took the boats out on the lake on Saturday, then Sunday morning attempted the river. We gave up on that pretty early because it was so incredibly difficult paddling upstream, but I think part of the issue was that the St Croix was ridiculously flooded. (The water was so high the boat launch had to be removed. We paddled all over the underwater parking lot and watched people attempt to put in giant boats from the driveway.)
We had a pretty small campsite, so Matt and I ended up setting up our tent right next to the picnic table. Very near sunrise Sunday morning, we woke up to some animals fighting and growling at each other in terrifying ways in the woods, and then the sound of something climbing around under the tarp over our picnic table. That obviously meant raccoons, and we were too nervous about rabies to go out and try to scare them off. They ate a bunch of snacks and fruit, and probably are the size of cows right about now. Also, if you want to see true rage, try telling Wendy that some raccoons raided the campsite. She has a history with those assholes.
We came home Sunday before it became one million degrees, and hung out around the house. (That’s another thing you’re really excited about after a long vacation.)
Yesterday, we went to the Twins game. It was the perfect weather, and they actually won just for us. Work gave four of us tickets to the day game Wednesday, so maybe they can even manage two in a week!
I’ve been working slowly on my thousand photos of Europe! Here are some sets that are now public: Cinque Terre, Monte Carlo, and Barcelona.