Fair Hills

The MN Master Naturalist convention is partnering with the Detroit Lakes bird festival this year so we all met at the Fair Hills Resort on Pelican Lake which is 6 square miles and up to 55 feet deep. They are just opening up for the season so when I got to my room it was about 90 degrees in there. The electric baseboard heat was going full blast. I opened all the windows but it was still hot. A friend had the same thing happen to her so she explained the knob on the baseboard functions as an on/off switch. This is a beautiful place with tennis courts, pickleball courts, boats and kayaks to borrow, shuffleboard and a small golf course.

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After dinner (wild rice hotdish) Al Batt spoke. He was born in southern MN on a dairy farm. He likes to watch birds too. He was so funny everyone in the room was cracking up. This is his 5th time coming to the Detroit Lakes birding festival. I wish I could be so funny.

 

The Beach At Summerly

Beatriz Williams is the author of the historical fiction novel called The Beach At Summerly. The story takes place on Winthrop Island. The story is told by the teenaged Emilia Winthrop, a descendent of the original settlers but now the daughter of a caretaker on an estate owned by others. Emilia is a year round resident while the estate owners on the island are only there for the summer. She is enthralled by the single young mother of three who is related to the estate owners. Emilia babysits for Olive Ransford who has lived in many countries and has had many experiences. Olive encourages Emilia to go to college, to travel, and most importantly, leave Winthrop Island. Emilia hesitates because she wants to care for her mother who has had a stroke and to help her father and younger sister. Emilia and Olive's lives become intertwined. Eight years later, when Emilia is a professor at Wellesley college, their lives become intertwined again in a surprising ending. This was a very entertaining story to read.  

Miesville Ravine Park

 

Today I was driving north from Prairie Du Chien, Wisconsin, and decided to take a midday walk at the Miesville Ravine Park near Cannon Falls. I hoped to see a cerulean warbler. I was disappointed not to see or hear a cerulean warbler but I did see Rose-breasted grossbeaks, black and white warbler, American red starts, a yellow billed cuckoo, red bellied woodpeckers, and a gray catbird.

I Was Told There Would Be Cake

Sloane Crosby is the author of I Was Told There Would Be Cake. This book is a collection of her essays about her life living in New York and her family, her roommates, and her friends. One story I found to be particularly funny was about a friend from high school to whom Sloane had not talked to in over 15 years. The friend calls her up, announces she is engaged, and invites Sloane to be a bridesmaid. Sloane reluctantly agrees even though she dislikes weddings. The bride to be starts calling every day taking up too much time and making more and more crazy requests that Sloane has a hard time refusing. The author is funny. She is not "David Sedaris" funny but she is funny.

 

Prairie Du Chien

Prairie Du Chien is a surprisingly flat town surrounded by dolomite cliffs. Here is a building on Saint Feriole Island. This island has great walking paths and biking paths. Two bridges come over the west branch of the Mississippi River. Lots of people were fishing today. Previously mussel shells were collected here for pearl buttons. Mussels were taken until the mussel population failed and plastic buttons were invented in the 1940's.

Like Hollywood, they even have their name up on the hill only it's  not the full name, just the initials.

Lots of nice parks in this town. Little flags on the street posts in the park bear the name and picture of each 2024 Prairie Du Chien high school graduate.

 

The Soulmate Equation

I listened to a silly romance book called The Soulmate Equation by Christina Lauren. In this story Jess is a single Mom raising her daughter by herself. Jess was raised by her grandparents because her Mom has addiction issues and her Dad bowed out of the relationship. Through her best friend she hears about a company called GeneticAlly. This new business is setting up a genetic database hoping to match single people with their soul mate. Jess, in a moment of utter frustration, sends in a spit sample only to find herself matched with the CEO of the company. She is asked to help with publicity on this match by dating the CEO and getting paid $3000 a month to do it. This was an entertaining story. Life would be so much simpler if we could find out soul mates scientifically. 

Effigy Mounds National Park

I am staying in Prairie Du Chien in Iowa but today I traveled only 4 miles to get to Effigy Mounds National Park. This is an ancient cemetery and a spiritual place. This mound is shaped like a little bear.

These are the first ones I saw as I walked up the steep hill. I heard a wood thrush, a red bellied woodpecker, rose breasted grossbeak, American redstart and a red eyed vireo.

This was a bigger bear mound.

I was so excited to see a pair of Baltimore orioles. Five seconds later I see a pair of scarlet tanagers. Bingo! This is my lucky day.

I walked as far as the twin views. I was sitting on a bench, all alone, minding my own business, when a tree between this view and the other view came crashing down and fell off the cliff. There wasn't a lick of wind and it was very startling to hear such a crash.

This is the other twin view. A little south of here, closer to the level of the water, is a group of bear shaped mounds in a row called marching bears.

 

Dubuque

Today I was driving northwest from Clinton, Illinois. I got to Dubuque in the early afternoon. I thought I would pull over and explore this beautiful town on the Mississippi. I parked and started walking around when I saw the National Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium. I decided to pay a visit. Lucky me, I got a ten dollar discount on admission because I am a Mom. I visited the aquarium with fresh water and salt water animals. They had an outdoor area with a kestrel, red tailed hawk, bald eagle and a barn owl. They had a history section about the river and the people who lived on the river.

My ticket is good for two days so I could go back but I don't think I will as I am staying an hour north of Dubuque.

 

The Life And Times Of The Thunderbolt Kid

 Bill Bryson is one of my favorite authors. The Life And Times Of The Thunderbolt Kid is a story of his life growing up in Des Moines, Iowa. He was born in 1951. He had an active imagination and thought of himself as a super-hero who could fry people with his thunderbolt looks. He had friends who were good influences and other friends who were bad influences. Dropping items on diners at at the shopping mall was done by Bryson and one of his friends who was a bad influence. He writes a hilarious book.

Then We Came To The End

 Joshua Ferris is the author of Then We Came To The End. The novel is about working at an advertising agency or rather the characters who worked there. Like all offices there are characters, romances, and office pranks. Reading this book reminded me of watching the TV series, The Office. One guy is sure he will  be fired for taking the chair of a coworker soon after they left. The chair haunts him. In truth no one knew he took the chair and no one cares but he doesn't know that. People always gather in the cubicle of the office story teller (gossiper). One of the employees dies of a heart attack. He leaves something in his will to one of his coworkers who wasn't expecting it. He has no idea why the guy left him a totem pole. He visits the totem pole at the guy's house until it is sold. Then he puts the totem pole in a storage facility. This was a very entertaining book to read. The head honcho at the agency appears to have it all together but behind the scenes she is the most conflicted person unable to act in her own best interests.

Wright

This afternoon I drove to Dayton, Ohio to visit the Wright Aviation Center. I got a tour of Orville and Wilbur's bicycle store. This was their fourth of their five bike stores. They always rented their stores. The height of the biking craze peaked in 1902 and the Wright Brothers made good money. At the time their safety bicycles cost $100. Translated into to the economy of today, that bike would cost $1400.

The Wright brothers also had a printing press. They published several newspapers but none of them stayed solvent very long. Orville went to school with Paul Laurence Dunbar. Together the Wright Brothers and Dunbar published a newspaper focused on the black neighborhood in Dayton. That newspaper only lasted 3 editions. Dunbar went on to become a prominent poet, short story writer and novelist. On the second floor they had a parachute museum.

This is one of the $100 bicycle.

 

Hopewell

Yesterday I left Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania and drove west. I went through Maryland and stayed for the night in West Virginia, right next to the border of Ohio. This morning I drove two hours to Chillicothe to visit the the Hopewell Culture National Historic Site. Here is one of a grouping of burial grounds in Ohio. Inside these burial grounds they have found shells from the Gulf of Mexico, grizzly bear teeth from Montana, copper from Michigan, silver from Canada, shark teeth from Maine and mica from North Carolina. I walked around the grounds imagining the people who were buried here. This felt like a very spiritual place.

 

Beyond The Door Of No Return

David Diop is the author of Beyond The Door Of No Return. The translator is Sam Taylor. The historical fiction novel starts out in Paris in 1806. A botanist, Michael Adanson, lies on his deathbed trying to figure out a way to let his daughter, Aglae, know of his life in Senegal. He once pursued the daughter of a Senegalese leader after she returned from three years of slavery in the United States. He found the daughter, the beautiful woman, and he writes to his daughter about her. The story is told by the Europeans, not the Africans and it reads like an adventure story. I have never read a book anything like this before. I enjoyed the scenery and the botany and the adventure.

Tom Lake

 Ann Patchett wrote Tom Lake in 2023. This is a family novel. Three daughters want to know about their mother's life prior to her marriage to her father. In her earlier years, before she had three daughters. Lara was an actress in a summer theater group in northern Michigan called Tom Lake. She starred in the play, Our Town. The person who played her father in the play went on to become a famous movie star. Their father was the director of the play so he knew both Lara and the famous movie star. The daughters are begging for details as they pick cherries on their farm in Michigan. Patchett is a talented writer and I totally enjoyed this family drama.

The Girl With No Name

 Marina Chapman, with the assistance of ghostwriter Lynne Barrett-Lee, is the author of The Girl With No Name; The Incredible True Story Of A Child Raised by Monkeys. This true story starts at age 4 when a girl in Colombia is kidnapped, taken out to the jungle, and abandoned. She is four years old and wearing a dress and panties. The year is 1954. She cries alone in the forest, hungry and lonely. After a week or so she notices the monkeys foraging for food. She decides to copy their behavior to keep herself from starving. Soon she figures out how to get up into the canopy. Over time the monkeys come to accept her. One monkey cares for her when she gets sick from eating the wrong kind of nuts. He takes her to a waterfall and has her drink water until she vomits up the poisonous nuts. Over time she becomes feral. She forgets how to speak. She walks on all fours. She is a survivor. Now she is married and living in London. Some of the proceeds of her book go to help combat child slavery and human trafficking in Colombia.

Rainy Sunday Afternoon

I completed a couple of manicures today.

 

Crow Mary

 Kathleen Grissom is the author of Crow Mary, a book inspired by a indigenous woman named Goes First who married a white man named Abe Farrell in 1872. At the time she was 16. Since she was from the Crow Tribe and white people called women Mary, she became Crow Mary. Her story, her life, her loves, her successes and her failures make for great reading. Crow Mary lives with her family in Canada and Montana, often traveling great distances to seek a better life. In some ways Abe is a brave and kind man. At other times he is selfish and cruel. Crow Mary is the dependable steady rock of a woman upon whom her children rely. This was a very interesting story. Some parts are very sad. The forward to this incredibly moving story is written by Crow Mary's great granddaughter.

The Motion Picture Teller

 Colin Cotterill is the author of the novel The Motion Picture Teller. This story is set in 1996 and  mostly in Bangkok. Two bachelors hang out together in the evenings. One is a postal worker. One works in a video rental/mini-market. Together they enjoy films together. They watch Thai films and foreign films. They seem to have a great friendship. Through a local man they come across a new (to them) film called Bangkok 2010. Both men love the film and decide to do research on the actors and why the film was never released. As it turns out there is a group of people who do not want the movie released. When the former postal worker figures this out, he starts a new career as a motion picture teller. He describes films in detail and keep the village people entertained for hours. I enjoyed reading this humorous book about the friendship of two men in Bangkok.

One Puzzling Afternoon

 Emily Critchley is the author of One Puzzling Afternoon, a mystery historical fiction novel set in a small town in the British Isles. Edie is 84 now but in the book she is a schoolgirl living with her mother and father in the same house she lives in when she was 84. Her mother tells fortunes which both embarrasses and scares Edie. Sometimes her mother really is able to tell a fortune. Edie becomes friends with one of the wealthy, popular girls at her school. Her friend disappears at age 15. At age 84, Edie is determined to find out what happened to her friend all those years ago. This book was interesting because the narrator, Edie, has dementia. Sometimes she knows she has dementia. Other times she is highly offended when people treat her as forgetful. I thought the book was beautifully written.

The Bird Hotel

 Joyce Maynard is the author of the novel, The Bird Hotel. This is literature and historical fiction and travel writing. The story goes over 40 years. The story starts out when Irene is 4 years old and living/traveling with her Mom and the Mom's boyfriend as they travel across the country to attend a music festival called Woodstock. Irene is a neglected child who really doesn't understand that she is neglected. She ends up living with her Grandmother who tells her never to speak about her mother anymore. Irene grows up to be a talented artist. Tragedy strikes her again and she just up and leaves. She ends up in Central America at a hotel. The owner of the hotel, a kind and giving woman, takes her in and gives her space to heal. Eventually she inherits the hotel and brings it back into full service supervising the many necessary repairs. Irene meets many characters in her life as a hotelier. She leads an interesting and fulfilling life. I could honestly tell that the author has spent time in small villages in Central America. I loved reading this book and hated to see it end.

Hoot

 When I was in Florida my cousin brought a bag full of paperback books. I read several including Hoot by Carl Hiassen. This author is always good for a comedy book set in Florida. This one is about a 7th grader named Roy. Roy has moved to Coconut Grove, Florida from Montana. He isn't happy about moving to Florida. With all the 7th grade drama in school, Roy approaches the problems like a full grown adult in a 7th grade body. There are bullies and there are those who are bullied. Bullies don't work on Roy. Roy glimpses a barefoot boy in town and tries to find out more about him. In the process he discovers that a construction company is trying to hide the fact that there are protected species of burrowing owls on the property they are building on. Overall this is a very funny story.