Three Days in One: My Trip to the Great Lakes

Let's start this day off with a trip to the zoo. Minnesota has been BEAUTIFUL so far and the zoo at perfect weather. The clouds in the sky toned down the sun and was the perfect back-drop to the tall trees and green grass. We went on the Minnesota Zoo Monorail, and lucky us, it was the Dr. Seuss edition so the whole time the tour guide was reading in rhymes. Scoti (Travis' niece) was really good during the monorail, but didn't actually take much interest in the animals. Whenever I go on 'explorations' like that, I always anticipate a dinosaur jumping out of the trees and eating the train - though no such thing happened on this trip, but most of the animals were just as scarce as the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park. Right after the monorail tour the Dolphin exhibit put on a show, it was SO fun!!! There was a boy dolphin that was 48yrs old, a momma dolphin that was 24yrs old, and her baby dolphin that was just 10 months old. Super cute family and very talented. We visited the grizzly bears after that and I have never seen bears this active. One bear kept swimming back-n-forth in front of the glass with a curious expression. At one point two bears started to rough-house a little bit and the third bear came over to regulate, slapped one of the bears on the shoulder and growled - it was pretty cool.

We came home after spending the morning at the zoo to take a nap before we headed out to a Minnesota Twins game. I don't know how long I'd been asleep, but all of a sudden Travis is shaking me awake and telling me Prior Lake, MN was just given a tornado warning. Not much longer after that did we hear the sirens. That was a pretty eerie sound, not like the movies, but not something I've ever experienced before. The storm passed us, but it got pretty intense there for a minute. You'd think 'oh we have a tornado watch, so the game is SOL' but actually the sun came out, the sky cleared up, and we were off to the ball park about an hour after the storm passed.

Baseball in Minnesota is NOTHING like baseball in Arizona. Minnesotans actually cheer for THEIR team and there is definitely a strong sense of spirit in the air. The park was huge and had some tasty food! Travis went to town on the most amazing nachos I've ever seen, and I enjoyed a foot-long hot dog - yummy. The umpire ejected the Twins coach in the 7th inning but other than that, the game was pretty eventless. We left at the end of the 9th still 0-0. On the radio we were able to enjoy the final minutes as the Twins win the game 1-0.

This day felt like 3 totally separate days. Probably because each event was separated by a nap and each event was so different. I love Minnesota! The people are nice, the scenery is beautiful, but I love the weather most of all. Rain, clouds, cold breeze...sign me up!