Minneapolis was the largest US city I had not visited, and I remedied that in August 2024. I had a soft spot for the city, anyways, being the home of Mary Tyler Moore, and my friend Catherine had a hankering to go there as well, it being the home of Prince. So we went together and explored, on bike, by driving, and by taking Ubers. We saw Paisley Park, the Minnesota State Fair, cycled extensively around the central city, went to some live music, ate out at a retro steak place, and generally rocked the town. It wasn't only us rocking the town though, there were two terrific storms that came through on our first evening, and during the rest of the mostly cloudy visit, we saw whole trees, big ones, down all over the city. I would have appreciate more sun than we got but it was a lovely visit. We never quite made it to St. Paul.
Photo List (Total 309 Photos)
Click bolded headers below to view, or click "just the best" for quick tour
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Central Minneapolis (184 photos) - Many of these photos are from our first day in Minneapolis, during which we rented bikes and drove around the central city quite a bit. It was, as Catherine noted, like being in a barbeque, it was so extremely hot and humid. There was a terrific storm, actually two of them, in the evening and then in the night. This gallery starts at our hotel, explores the old industrial area near the Mississippi River, follows the river up to Hennepin, then into the central financial district. When we hit Murray's Steak House, the gallery switches from our daytime ride into an evening out at Murray's, and then a walk to First Avenue (a legendary music club where Prince performed) though an extreme storm. We saw music there, and the day after, took photos outside the venue. After that interruption, the gallery returns to the first day with a focus on skyscrapers and our trip up the lovely and weird Foshay Tower. It returns back to the area around the hotel, and then the gallery has a few divergences that didn't fit anywhere, including a visit to the University of Minnesota - Twin Cities and to a mall north of the downtown.
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Outer Central Minneapolis (87 photos) - We visited a bunch of things that are close to the centre of the city but not right in the core. This includes the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Loring Park, the Walker Art Centre and the lovely sculpture garden there, and we cycled beside a few of the lakes south-west of the downtown. I visited the sculpture garden twice, with Catherine on her last day in town, under some considerable cloud, and then again when I returned to Minneapolis to stay overnight before my flight home, when I had just enough time to re-visit the park in bright sunlight.
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Paisley and Fair (32 photos) - We left the urban core of the city to visit Paisley Park and the Minnesota State Fair. Paisley Park is the home and studio of Prince, now a museum. The building was unimpressive to my eyes, very eighties, white tiled, not many windows, it had the feeling of an eighties office building like a Children's Aid Society. It was also situated within a very short distance of an expressway. But what was going on here was the creation of remarkable music, in several studios and two performance spaces, and that's what mattered. The tour was quite good at showing how the space was used and in telling the story of Prince's rise. They were very serious about no photos inside, except in the last room, and inserted people's cellphones into sealed bags for the tour. My camera had to be left behind, and someone radioed for it once photos were allowed. Immediately after the tour we drove to the Minnesota State Fair, where we went up the Ferris Wheel, I had a pogo dog, and Catherine had a pretzel without cheese.
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Other (6 photos) - A small number of photos here, some of the airport in Minneapolis, one taken at Pearson in Toronto, and one while driving out of Minnesota.
