If you recall last week, Craig and I had a GREAT getaway “up Nort” in Crosby, MN. Crosby is about 2 hours North of the twin cities which is about 2.5 hours North of our house for about a 5 hour drive with stops.
Craig and I thought about it and we haven’t had a true few day getaway since January in 2017 when Carver was just a few months old. We’ve gone on a day trip or an overnight stay but never like this!
I’m going to be doing a few good blog posts on our trip to Crosby for several reasons: A) Honestly, Crosby is a huge tourist town/area for mountain bikers. If I make blog posts about our time there (recommendations etc.) they may find my blog! and B) It turns into a work trip for tax season.
But today, I’ll just give a general overview of our time! We left after I got off of work on Sunday morning (I feel like that’s how we begin every vacation) and headed up to Minneapolis. We wanted to break up the trip and our AirBNB wasn’t available for check in until Monday.
We had Valley Fair (a huge amusement park) on our bucket list. Tickets were about $38 each AND parking was $17 for the day! We checked into our hotel early (LOVE the early check in options!), parked our bikes in our room, and got there as the gates opened!
Valley Fair was mostly disappointing. It was WAY cooler when we were younger. It was REALLY crowded and it only got worse as the day went on. The rides were cool but for example, we waited in line for 30 minutes, we were next and they closed the ride for high winds. So then we went to the next one, waited in line, and they closed because of a mechanical issue. It was a LOT of waiting in line. The rides were fun when we were on them but not worth waiting THAT LONG. By 2 pm we were trying to find food. The lines were so so long. The food was very over priced. We just wanted water, there weren’t many drinking fountains, so many of the rides/food stands were closed so the ones that were opened had an unbearable wait. We ended up heading out a little earlier than we planned. It was one of those things that we did it, had the experience and now we are good until the boys are old enough to go and enjoy and then we are going on a week day!
Our night in Minneapolis was GREAT! We ordered pizza and wings, (a classic Craig/Kalissa meal) to our hotel room and watched Shark Tank all night. We don’t have regular TV at home so this was a treat! It was super low key. Craig and I have this kind of rule – we don’t plan anything. We find that if we plan too much, we get more stressed and crunched. GO WITH THE FLOW is our motto. And our flow had us sitting in our hotel room all night 🙂 Shout out to Renaissance in Bloomington! The hotel was GREAT! We felt fancy, they let us check in early, breakfast was fabulous, parking was EASY! We will stay again!
The next morning we had the breakfast buffet, chatted with our super cool Air BNB host, and hit the road! On our way up we drove right by Lake Mille Lacs. I’ve never seen it before. You can’t even see the other side of the lake in some places. In Iowa, we don’t have many lakes. OBVIOUSLY MN is the land of 10,000 lakes so seeing a lake is a little mesmerizing. So much so, we had to pull over and explore!
I found some sea shells for the boys, we pondered what this jelly stuff we kept seeing was! Can someone help us identify it? Anyway, the lake made for a beautiful drive. I kept wondering – WHERE IS THE CORN? Where is the corn guys. Forests and swamps on both sides of the road. I was so amused by the lack of crops that I pointed out every corn field I saw and made sure to announce it to Craig who was less amused.
Also, where are your Kwik Stars? What is a Holiday? I can’t fathom not having a Kwik Star or Casey’s gas station in each town. It truly baffled me. I realized how much I trust Kwik Star – it just feels like home to me.
We FINALLY pulled into Deerwood, and then Crosby. Our Air BNB was SO CUTE. Craig and I will for sure try to stay there again! We felt very safe, we were so close to the downtown, she had little baskets with goodies in case we forgot anything, the garage was large, it was so cutely decorated and Nicole was available by text our whole trip! She checked in on us and gave us some stellar recommendations! I snapped a few pictures to share! This was our first Air BNB we ever rented and it was an AWESOME experience!
Alright, sorry for the cliff hanger! That’s about all I have for Part 1 – Part 2 we actually hit the trails so stay tuned!
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I design and create a variety of quilting, cross stitching, and graphic tees as well as quilting themed stationery, stickers, notepads, cards, and more! I’d love for you to check it out!
I worked at Ruttgers Resort years ago in the kitchen doing pots and pans, cleaning the walk- in cooler and doing the laundry, aprons, dish towels etc. for 50 cents a hour. That was in the late 50’s. I was trying to earn money to go to beauty school after I graduated from high school. I made it to beauty school which costed $298.00 for the 9 month course. Imagine what it costs today. I live in Fergus Falls ,MInnesota and love our state. We used to play basket ball with Crosby when I went to high school in Verndale Minnesota. Nice choice for a vacation spot. Welcome