THE ANSWER TO THE ATTACHMENT PROBLEM
TWO HARBORS, MINNESOTA
A DAY IN DULUTH
FUN WITH FRIENDS IN HACKENSACK, MINNESOTA
STARTING OUR TOUR OF THE DAKOTAS
RON'S POTPOURRI
BARB'S THIS N THAT

Pictures to go with all of these stories are on the  July What's New page

It happened again with the last issue of this newsletter; some of you received it as an attachment. I was ready to give up and never do it again because I knew how frustrating it was for many of you to not be able to receive attachments. When I sent out that email saying I would no longer do the newsletter as I had been doing it, I got a flood of responses saying that they hoped that I wouldn't quit. Those of you who are traveling like we are reminded me that they can't check the web and would miss all the details.  Judy Ashford, editor of Computer Trails (a birds of a feather group from Escapees dealing with computers on the road) gave me the information that I needed. AOL and some of the other free or nearly free ISPs limit the size of the emails they accept to 32K. My last newsletter was 36+K. Now that I know, I will limit the size of the newsletter by one of three ways. I will write more often with less to write about, I will curb my words or send the newsletter in two parts if I just can't cut it. So we are back in business. Thanks for all of your support. We really like letting you know where we have been and what we are doing and it appears that email is far more popular than the web even for those who aren't traveling.

When we left Grand Marais, we did not travel Route 61 right away because that first day when we were there, we discovered a large messy construction area and wanted to avoid that. We went straight up the hill across from 61 when we left the campground then turned left on County Road 7. It was a great road with no traffic and when it met up with 61 again, we were past the construction.

Route 61 is not in good shape. It was so bumpy and we were shaking so hard, we couldn't drink our coffee. There were good stretches south of Superior and eventually became a nice smooth road.

We didn't have a clue what awaited us at Two Harbors. What a pleasant surprise we got. This lovely town and the Burlington Bay Municipal Campground was wonderful. Our site right on Lake Superior, was long and level and the manager was very friendly. When we called for reservations, we were told that all we could have was an overflow site, but when we arrived on Friday, we were given a full hook up site and the rate was only $21.00. We had to move to a partial hook up site on Saturday, but again we were on the lake and that rate was only $19.00. After I posted the last newsletter and we were settled in Two Harbors, I called Mr. Erickson at the Standard station in Grand Marais to let him know that the story I did on their
situation had been posted so he could look at it. Before I hung up, I told him where we were, how nice it was and that we were on the lake. I also made sure he knew what the rate was. His response was simply, "okay."

Two Harbors has two harbors---Burlington Bay and Agate Bay. The old downtown is historic and there was lots to do. The weekend we were there they were having their 10th annual Folk Festival, but the music we overheard wasn't to our liking. We walked around the pier looking for ore boats in loading
position on one of the three loading docks, but none were in port when we were there. There is a historic train station complete with two old locomotives and the charge to tour the train station is minimal. We had been to many such stations so passed on that. The shops downtown are just normal stores. We went into the bike store looking for a new tire for Ron's bike, and what a hoot. He didn't have much in the way of
merchandise, but was fun to talk with and he did have what Ron needed. I wanted a new seat cover for mine, but he didn't have that. I went into the shoe store next door and he didn't have much in inventory either. The downtown has a lovely laundromat/dry cleaners though. It was very clean, and besides
magazines for browsing, they had a deck of cards on the table so one could play cards while waiting.

On Route 61 the shops were cute and well stocked. We should have had lunch at the Cup and Saucer or the Vanilla Bean Bakery & Cafe but we were trying to eat up leftovers. The Older Sister had lots of unusual greeting cards of a Victorian Flavor.

We were so satisfied to sit and watch the ships go by and watch the lake that we didn't venture further. We understand that two nearby state parks are very popular and well worth visiting. Gooseberry Falls and Split Rock Light House State Parks have lots of hiking trails as well as other tours. Next time!!!

We enjoyed church on Sunday. There were two Lutheran churches on opposite corners in town. We picked one and enjoyed the contemporary service. After church we asked why two churches of the same denomination were so near. Long ago, one was Swedish and one Norwegian and it just stayed that way. Later we found a third Lutheran church in town.

There is an attractive band shell in town and we understand that on Thursday evenings in the summer, there are band concerts featuring Minnesota's oldest city band. Too bad we weren't there on a thursday.

I wanted to find a mall because I needed some make up  (Clinique) which I can normally find at one of the mall's department stores. So on our last day in Two Harbors, we drove our little truck south to Duluth. When we had talked to our friend Tom (in Hackensack) to get directions to his house, he told us it would be worth unhooking the car from the motorhome to stop in Duluth on our way to his house and eat lunch at Grandma's Saloon and Grill on Lake Avenue "next to the lift bridge." Rather than unhook the car and do all of that on our way to Hackensack, we decided to include his suggestion for our day in town. We are so glad that he suggested it. In the first place we had no idea that Duluth would be so much fun especially Canal Park where we found the original Grandma's. But first a little about Duluth.

Duluth is next door to Superior, Wisconsin, and with the twin ports on Lake Superior, they have the distinction of being the leading bulk cargo ports on the Great Lakes as well as among the busiest in the nation. Some more facts:

The Twin ports
* ship 30-40 million tons of cargo each season.
* are the farthest inland seaport in the world (2,342 miles from the Atlantic Ocean)
* have 17 miles of channels, 45 miles of frontage and dozens of commercial docks.
* serve nearly 200 foreign flag vessels each year
* serve an average of 1,000 Great Lakes Freighters (Lakers)
Some of those Lakers are 1,000 feet long and carry 60,000 tons per trip.

Canal Park is the focal point for ship watching and is beautiful with a lovely lake walk and bike trail (bike trail is asphalt and next to the board walk). All along the walk we were serenaded with sea gulls and waves licking the rocky shore. It was fun to watch the lift bridge go up so the big ships could get through. And right next to the bridge is Grandma's so we went in to have lunch.

Grandma's was delightful. Hanging from the ceiling are all sorts of old things and I could have spent the afternoon trying to see everything. Tom had suggested that we try the wild rice soup and the onion rings which he added were award winning. After looking at the wonderful menu and noticing several unusual items, we decided that we would order a cup of the soup, a side order of onion rings and we would split the Buffalo Chicken Sandwich. We wanted to taste it all. When the soup arrived it was in a bowl the size of a cereal bowl. We were sure that the waiter had misunderstood and brought us a bowl rather than a cup. He hadn't. And he added, "good luck." The soup was so thick that our spoon would stand up in it and it was full of big chunks of white chicken meat. I ate half of mine and was full. It was very rich. When the huge sandwich and onion rings arrived, I knew we were in trouble. The sandwich was hot and spicy which we liked. It is described as "a tender breast of chicken lightly breaded then fried, tossed
with buffalo HOT sauce and topped with lettuce, tomato, and chunky blue cheese dressing. Yummy. If we hadn't been such pigs, we might have tried some of their special desserts which were on a separate menu. It was a good thing that we ate as soon as we arrived at the harbor and could spend the rest of the afternoon walking off our meal. By the way, we did not eat anything for dinner that night; we were still full.

Also in Canal Park are some interesting shops. There were a few that were typically touristy, but we really enjoyed browsing the Duluth Pack Store which carried unique north woods gifts. They had a large selection of canoes, clothing and gear. The Blue Heron Trading Company and Grandma's Marketplace were also interesting.

We drove around town (looking for the mall which was out by the airport) and enjoyed seeing the houses which are built on bluffs overlooking the lake. We wished we had had time to tour the Ore Boat Museum which is a floating museum inside the U.S.S. William Irvin or to explore many other things at the harbor.

On our walk at the harbor, we learned a few more interesting facts about Lake Superior. It is equal in size to Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire and Vermont. If Lake Superior would lose all of its water, it would flood all of North and South America with one foot of water. The lake is 350 miles across east and west, and 160 miles north and south, covering 31,700 square miles. There are
2,980 Mlles of shoreline enclosing 2,935 cubic miles of water. It sure is a beautiful lake, but after spending several weeks on this lake we were ready to head inland.

We left for hackensack on Tuesday, July 20. Our route from Two Harbors to Hackensack was south on U.S. 61 until it ran into I-35. After just a few short miles on that, we took off on U.S. 2 (west). U.S. 2 west of Duluth was new road with wide shoulders. What a breeze it was to travel on that road and there was very little traffic. When we got to State Route 200 we turned west and discovered that we had been
spoiled. Route 200 was a little rough, but they were working on it so it may be better some other time. We had a little excitement as we crossed the Mississippi River at Jacobson's Landing. The sign before the bridge said, "Narrow bridge. Two trucks must not be on the bridge at the same time." We approached cautiously as there were no height/weight restrictions. The river was way up and overflowing the banks
by a lot. We figured it had been the big July 4th storm that caused that.

There was no traffic again and Ron joked, "Traffic is getting me down," then chuckled. There were no houses either. It was a quiet drive. Our next turn was onto state route 58 (south) towards Longville then at
Longville we headed west again on County Road 5 until we got to their road. It was an easy, comfortable drive.

It was great to see Tom and Carol Vind. They are neighbors (11 doors away) at Valle del Oro (Mesa, Arizona) and when they knew we were coming through Minnesota, they invited us to stop by their place. They have a modest but very comfortable home on big, beautiful Woman Lake. Tom had trimmed some trees prior to our arrival and after just a little jockeying, we were parked facing the lake. What a view we had.

They have an inboard/outboard speed boat as well as a pontoon boat and made sure we knew that we would get lots of boat riding as well as swimming. Carol and Tom swim from their dock and take the pontoon boat out to a deeper spot in their bay.

Shortly after we arrived we were in the speed boat for our first tour of the lake. It was wonderful to feel the breeze through our hair. If that wasn't enough of a treat, we saw loons and heard their cry. I had never seen a loon before and then Tom and Carol took us to the tree which is home to a bald Eagle. He/she was sitting on a branch just looking at us. We were in heaven.

Carol and Tom belong to Salem Lutheran Church in Longville and she is the chairperson of the monthly (June, July & August) Smorgasbords. The July one was scheduled for the day after we arrived. Even though Carol had some foods to prepare for the church dinner they found time to show us around the lake and she had a delicious pot roast cooking in the oven while we went for our boat ride. After dinner they took the boat out again this time going all the way to Longville so we could get ice cream cones in town.

Wednesday dawned perfect and we did more boating. Carol had to leave early for church and Tom left at 4:30. While they were busy, I worked on email and a little of the web site stuff that I needed to do. It was wonderfully relaxing. At 5 p.m., Ron and I went to Longville so we could attend the Smorgasbord too. First of all the church was lovely and we enjoyed reading a little about the church's history. Carol and Tom had arranged their work schedule so we could all eat together. There was a ton of great food. Swedish Meatballs and a special recipe of mashed potatoes are the mainstay along with rice pudding. They also had turkey and a variety of salads, desserts and breads. It was all delicious. After dinner, I had fun pitching in to help the young girls bus tables. One lady working the dinner, came up to me and asked (in a friendly but curious manner) "Who are you?" We all got a laugh out of that. It was fun being like part of the community.

Because the meatballs, potatoes and rice pudding are so great, I have included them on the recipe pages of our web site.

http://www.movinon.net/Recipes/Maindishes/SwedishMeatballs.htm
http://movinon.net/Recipes/Sidedishes/Bakedmashedpotatoes.htm
http://www.movinon.net/Recipes/Desserts/ricepudding.htm

On Thursday Tom took us to Hackensack (they are in between both towns) and their co op where I got some great buys on spices, cheese and other goodies. Besides enjoying more time on the lake, we played bridge with their Thursday evening duplicate group. We didn't come in last, but we weren't far from the bottom. We enjoyed their friends in the bridge group but especially enjoyed eating cheeseburgers and onion rings (Tom really likes onion rings) at Florio's Grill and Tavern in Longville prior to bridge.

Friday evening, we played on the lake and I never tired of seeing the loons and other waterfowl. In the evening they had six other couples over for more duplicate bridge. This time we did come in last due to my terrible playing at the end. I blew one hand so badly (we went down 5) that I just couldn't concentrate and played more foolishly the next few hands. Ron was embarrassed. The saddest thing was that my poor playing gave our opponents such a terrific score that they beat Tom and Carol who are excellent bridge players. I was ready to quit forever, but I may do it again after the memory fades.

Saturday was more fun on the lake and we hated to think about leaving. In the evening, Tom took us to Arthur's Restaurant at Ten Mile Lake. Because they had been there before, and knew how large the meals were, we only ordered a selection of appetizers and were completely full at the end of dinner. Everyone's favorite was Arthur's Lavosh which I had never had before. It is described as "crisp Armenian cracker bread, Danish cheese and a dusting of parmesam cheese" along with a variety of toppings that can be ordered separately. We added onions, canadian bacon and tomatoes. It was huge and very tasty. We also ordered onion rings, (but they weren't nearly as good as Florio's or Grandma's) and super nachos. The restaurant is huge and because it was Saturday, they had a live band playing in the main dining room. We were on the screened in patio which was also huge. The entrees did look good, but very large.

We were originally going to leave on Saturday, but Tom and Carol talked us into one more day and we agreed for several reasons. We were relaxing and having a great time,our hosts were fun to be with and we thought we would like to attend church with them on Sunday. Church at Salem Lutheran was very nice. We were glad we stayed. We had gone to the early service (8 a.m.) and came home shortly after the service to get ready to head out. It was sad to say "good bye."  It took a little maneuvering to back out of their driveway and after hugs we were on our way. It was a pleasure to get to know this neat couple better. We hope we can be together again sometime.

When we left the Vinds, we planned to stop for at least one night at Itasca State park which was on our way to Grand Forks. We took County Road 5 to Hackensack then went north on State Route 371 to State Route 200 and turned west. We turned in at the east entrance of the park and followed the road as it wound in, but when we got to the entrance station, there was a long line of pop up campers and others just entering the park. We had wanted to be at that park so we could walk in the headwaters of the Mississippi River, but all of a sudden, Ron looked and me and I at him and we said together, "Lets not." We had had enough of state parks and campfires, but thought that a state park on a Sunday wouldn't be busy. We kept on going and turned north on State Route 92 until we got to U.S. 2 when we headed west again. We didn't know where we were going and that was just fine. This is what we like about not making reservations.

U.S. Route 2 was terrific again. It was four-lane and in great shape except that we were heading into a fierce storm. When the rain came it was so hard that we could barely see so we pulled off into the town of McIntosh and parked in front of the high school. It was past time for lunch anyway. After lunch we researched the campground directory and decided that the Laramore Dam Recreation Area sounded good. At just 28 miles west of Grand Forks in North Dakota it has proven to be a wonderful stopping point. This is a huge campground with long, wide sites. We have a water and electric site for only $12 (with the Good Sam discount). There is a very nice golf course here ($17.00 for 18 holes) and they have an internet hook up for me. We were only going to stay one night, but are on our third day. It was a perfect spot to set still and finish the work on the  newsletter. There is no one here  where they put us.

We went for a long walk through their big, beautiful arboretum yesterday morning and if I can finish this we will ride the bike route into the town of Laramore (3 miles). There is not much to the town, but it would be a nice bike ride. I have the CD playing my favorite songs and Ron has CNBC on so he can watch his stocks. He also cleaned out some of his files which is a job that was about two years over due.

This would be great spot to spend the summer. The monthly rate is $170 and it is near enough to Grand Forks that it would be nice. While the rest of the country is swealtering we are comfortable because there is a nice breeze.

Barb's excited about being counted in the next census when the census takers come to the campgrounds to count full-timers. Some are against that on the theory that they will find some way to tax us. I like to be positive and think that we should be considered as important citizens. We pay taxes and consider it our duty. Now how about that national fishing license for full-timers.

It was time to destroy lots of old financial records and I thought of buying a paper shredder, but then decided that a couple of matches would be cheaper. I finally made use of a campground fire ring. We don't normally have campfires because of Barb's asthma. I have been a little careless about throwing away papers with information on them and have resolved to be more careful.

Have you noticed how some of the letters in the RV magazines have become so technical? The debates are endless on gear ratios, tire pressure, suspension, and after market equipment etc. It seems that these people have a lot more trouble than I do and you all know about my mechanical ability. Maybe ignorance is bliss.

I'm a real believer now. I wasn't too excited about getting a cell phone, but it has been terrific. It is so convenient and actually has saved us some money. That always scores high with the old accountant.

Book sales have been soaring. We only have a few hundred books of our original printing of 5,000 left. So we just ordered another 5,000. We are excited that you all like our book and recommend it to others. Thanks a bunch.

I just read in the Escapees Magazine that on March 31,2000, the Operations Center in Washington, DC, has made provisions to count those people without a permanent home. They will go to all campgrounds and record those people. I think that this is wonderful and maybe after we are counted they will realize that we are a large segment of the population. Once they know that we are here, I am optimistic that they will be more understanding of things such as PMB etc. I will be in a campground on that day and hope that you are too. We need to be counted.

If you don't have a friend who lives on Woman Lake in Minnesota, there are 13 resorts on that lake or the other lakes that adjoin it. Four of those resorts have campgrounds.

We are heading to Minot (Why not?) and then down to Theodore Roosevelt National Park. We don't plan to hurry through so I hope to have a lot to report. After North Dakota, we will visit the Black Hills, Crazy Horse and Wall drug among other spots in South Dakota. We hope to meet up with Colleen Sykora whom I have never met. She and her husband are working in Hill City, SD.

We hope your summer is going along fine. We are having a wonderful time and each day we are on the road, reinforces our choice of lifestyle.

Happy trails!!!