Chapter 2: Two Roads Diverged In a Wood, And I…I Was Stuck In Delaware
Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright;
the band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light,
and somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout;
but there is no joy in Mudville — mighty Casey has struck out.
--"Casey At The Bat", Ernest Thayer
WEDNESDAY IN THE REAL WORLD
If by Mudville, you mean Dover, Delaware, then yeah—no joy was to be found on Wednesday morning. We’d crashed at my parents’ house and awoke in the morning tired and grumpy. Oh, and we had no clothes except what we were wearing, and no toiletries because ours were presumably on their way to Minneapolis.
We had some breakfast and scrounged up some toothbrushes from somewhere and then packed ourselves into the van to drive back to our house. Our goals were modest: a shower and a change of clothes.
Seriously, we were in bad shape here. Drew made the trip home wearing nothing but a diaper and sandals.
Our plan Wednesday was to shower, change, and then track down our missing bags. We got the first two items accomplished fairly quickly. Showering that morning felt like being kissed by angels.
I was still feeling grumpy, though—it felt awful to be in my house knowing I was wasting another day of precious annual leave from work. Julie was on the phone with the Minneapolis airport talking to Gail of Southwest Airlines. Gail hadn’t seen our bags yet, but she promised to let us know if she did. Awesome. They were probably in Seattle by now.
We had no food in the house. Part of the drill in vacation preparation is eating everything in the fridge and pantry before you go so nothing is left to spoil and give you a nasty surprise when you return. So, we had our first gourmet meal of the vacation: everyone got subs from
Wawa.
Wawa is a Philadelphia-area institution and quite simply the greatest convenience store in the world. If you don’t have a Wawa near you, I feel sorry for you. But don’t worry, they are expanding. I even saw a few in Florida last time I was there. Anyway, they were having their annual summer “Hoagiefest” where their 10-inch subs are $5 apiece. Their food is surprisingly good for a convenience store.
Shortly after lunch, we got a call from Gail at Southwest in Minneapolis: our bags were there! She would be holding them until we arrived on Thursday. That was a huge relief.
Of course, this means that they probably were still in Baltimore on Tuesday night when we were trying to retrieve them and hadn’t traveled until Wednesday morning, so we could have gotten them back except for airport workers who were either clueless as to what bags they actually held or just too lazy to get them for us.
There’s not much to tell about the rest of the day Wednesday. We had a 6 a.m. flight out of Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C. on Thursday morning. Figuring a couple hours for travel and a couple hours for security, breakfast, etc., that meant we needed to spend the night at my parents’ house and wake up at 1:30 a.m.
Ugh.
It was even worse for my dad, who would be getting up at that hour just to drive us to the airport. He wouldn’t even get a vacation out of it.
Needless to say, we drove back to Dover and went to bed early that night.
As the opening lines of the chapter read, somewhere the sun is shining and hearts are light. Let’s take a look at that alternate universe, where everything works like it should and flights aren’t cancelled and people actually get to enjoy their vacations. Here’s what would have happened Wednesday, if we’d made our flight Tuesday night:
WEDNESDAY IN THE ALTERNATE UNIVERSE
The Oblivious Family woke early, having thoroughly enjoyed the Phillies’ epic 9th-inning comeback against the Minnesota Twins the night before in which the Phils had ever-so-briefly recaptured the glory of their 2008 championship season. After a hearty hotel breakfast featuring fresh, cooked-to-order food made of the finest ingredients, they jumped into the rented minivan/limousine and drove to get grocery supplies at Whole Foods, where everything in the store was always on sale.
Alternate Universe Mark led the way, cutting a dashing figure as he led his family on another adventure.
Alternate Universe Julie cast adoring glances at her husband while she kept everyone organized, content and on-task.
Alternate Universe Sarah was thrilled to help care for Alternate Universe Drew…
…who was a perfect angel in the back seat, totally content everywhere we went.
Meanwhile, Alternate Universe Dave and Alternate Universe Scotty were always excited to ride along, refrained from becoming addicted to electronics, and never once asked if we were there yet.
The Alternate Universe Oblivious Family drove through Minnesota to Duluth, never once encountering any traffic along the way. Then they proceeded up the beautiful Lake Superior Coast, driving all the way to
Tettegouche State Park where they did a glorious hike to see this waterfall:
Then they backtracked south along the lake, stopping to enjoy the view at
Split Rock Lighthouse State Park (incredibly, there was still snow on the ground in July—must have been another cold Minnesota winter):
And
Gooseberry Falls:
They took several family photos where all six of them were looking at the camera and smiling brightly with eyes open, and all of the strangers they asked to take the photos were happy to do so and composed the shots perfectly, never forgetting to include the spectacular sights in the background.
They spent the night in Duluth, having dinner at
Fitger’s Brewhouse along the lake shore, where both the burgers and the homemade root beer on draft were absolutely divine. Alternate Universe Drew took care of changing his own diapers throughout the day and sat calmly and quietly through the meal at dinnertime, and the three older Alternate Universe children looked at Alternate Universe Mark and said, “Dear Father, thank you for providing for our needs daily as well as giving us this day of wonderful memories and adventure.” And Alternate Universe Julie batted her eyes at Alternate Universe Mark and said, “Your vacation planning is absolutely perfect. There’s nothing I would have done differently. I’m so thrilled to share life with such a strong, handsome, brilliant man.” And Alternate Universe Mark gave them all an aw-shucks smile and said, “I’m just happy to be of service, and give you all the joy you deserve.”
Then, they linked arms and enjoyed a sunset stroll on the path next to Lake Superior.
THURSDAY IN THE ALTERNATE UNIVERSE
Thursday began with yet another gourmet breakfast at the hotel and then a joyful three-hour drive up to the very northern border of Minnesota, where they visited
Voyageurs National Park. Voyageurs protects a large area of lakes and islands along the Minnesota/Canada border and was created to honor the French fur trappers (“voyageurs”) who used the interconnected waterways to explore and settle the area over 250 years ago.
The kids were very excited because they’d been signed up to participate in a Ranger program where they could learn the lifestyle of the voyageurs and, more importantly, take a ride in an authentic period canoe around the lake. Children under 5 were not allowed, so Alternate Universe Mark had graciously offered to spend quality bonding time with his youngest son so Alternate Universe Julie could experience the life of the voyageur. They all had a blast and afterwards retired to the lakeside where Alternate Universe Julie whipped up her signature sandwiches featuring a spread combining the nectar of the peanut and a red wine reduction that just explodes on the taste buds for a savory delight. The kids begged for seconds, but they had to save supplies for the rest of the trip. After that, they were back on the road for another joyous drive to the town of Bemidji.
THURSDAY IN THE REAL WORLD
All of the above may have been slightly exaggerated, but those indeed are the activities we missed out on by having our flight cancelled. As a kid, I visited both the Lake Superior coast and did the canoe ride in Voyageurs, and I had good enough memories of that trip that I wanted my kids to experience them as well. It was definitely a bummer. Maybe next time, Minnesota. Anyway, back in the real world…
The alarm went off at 1:30 a.m.
There’s no way to make that sound good. Because it isn’t good. It sucks.
The only good thing about that hour is that the roads are clear, so by the time we got into the van and on the road, we sailed through Maryland. Even the highways in D.C. were fairly clear, and that never happens except at oh-dark-thirty in the morning. We reached the terminal at Reagan Airport around 4 a.m., where my father wished us well and heroically drove our van back to his house in Delaware. He really went above and beyond the call of duty for us on this trip.
We got through security quickly—amazing how that happens when it’s 4:00 a.m. and you have no luggage other than your carry-on bags—and found our way to our gate. There was another rainstorm moving in but it wasn’t supposed to be as severe as the storms we’d faced on Tuesday.
We found some pastries for breakfast and some much-needed coffee from Dunkin’ Donuts in the airport. Then, before we knew it…things actually went as planned.
We boarded the plane on time. That was a good first step.
Then we took off on time. Also good. A couple of hours later, we landed…in Milwaukee. Our new flight gave us a layover here. We had a couple of hours before the hop to Minnesota, so we explored the Milwaukee airport a bit. I’d heard rumors of a strange magical location here before, and was on a quest to find it. And I did!
Do you ever find yourself totally discombobulated after doing the TSA Tango in the airport security line? Well, Milwaukee has you covered! They’ve helpfully provided a Recombobulation Area for you.
They also had a nice little play area to keep Drew busy.
And you can’t kill time without taking Scotty to the crappy gift shops.
We got on the next plane and took a short hop over to Minneapolis. Finally, two days later, we were ready to start the vacation. We went to the baggage claim and found Gail, who indeed had all of our bags ready to go. We thanked her for her help and then walked across the street to the rental car lot, where we were still hoping that Enterprise had honored our phone-handshake deal and kept our van ready for us.
As it turned out, the communication there hadn’t been perfect, but they did indeed have a van for us and honored our original rate. With that, we could finally relax and start traveling!
We drove about five miles and then stopped. We were all hungry. We had planned to shop for our food supplies once we’d arrived, but in this case hunger took precedence and we decided to buy lunch. Instead of the usual fast-food chains, we opted for a different fast-food chain:
Culver’s. This is a Midwest chain that has no locations on the East Coast. So we figured we might as well try something new.
And we actually liked it a lot! It’s still greasy fast food, but they had a couple of things going for them. One: fried cheese curds. These little bits of heaven are like mozzarella sticks, except with little melted nuggets of cheddar cheese inside instead. Excellent! And very nutritious, because the Midwest is known for nothing if not for healthy eating.
The other secret weapon was the frozen custard they offer for dessert. Custard is basically the same thing as ice cream, only fattier. Which also means deliciousier.
So Culver’s got a thumbs-up from us, and a promise to go back whenever we got tired of PB&J sandwiches. Speaking of which, we found a Wal-mart nearby and loaded up on our road trip supplies. This is our way of saving money on the trip so we can afford to be on the road for two weeks and see so many things. Unfortunately, trying to fit the supplies into an already-stuffed minivan means the kids end up looking like they’re playing a game of 3-D Twister as they pretzel themselves in and around the various boxes and bags. Ah, memories.
We set out for Bemidji. That’s where we had planned to stay on Thursday night, and it would have been a much more convenient stop coming from Voyageurs National Park instead of Minneapolis. Nevertheless, I didn’t want to have to keep changing and cancelling reservations, so we’d made the decision to drive there from the airport and then catch up with our plan. Also, Julie really likes saying “Bemidji”, and I didn’t want to deprive her of the chance to see it.
The drive was four hours from Minneapolis, but luckily the adrenaline from traveling beat out the exhaustion from waking up so early. We made it to our hotel, a new
Country Inn located right on the shore of Lake Bemidji, and got checked in. There’s a nice walking path all along the lake shore that goes into town, so we took a walk to stretch our legs and find a place to eat dinner.
There’s one major tourist attraction in Bemidji, and it’s a truly iconic place. I’m talking about a real bucket-list destination, the kind of place your kids will talk about with their children someday. And it may have taken us three days to get there with all of the corresponding exhaustion, stress, and frustration that went along with it, but all of that seemed like distant and minor trifles now. We travel in order to show our kids the world. To give them experience they’ll always cherish, and never forget. To show them that humanity is both very much the same and very different all around the world. And now, adding to that rich legacy, we could show once more that all of that investment and struggle was all worthwhile. Because we could see giant concrete statues of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox.
I’m sure the kids really appreciated this moment. They kept asking if we could leave to go get pizza, but I’m pretty sure that’s their way of saying they were honored to be there.
We found a chain restaurant called the
Green Mill that specialized in Chicago-style deep dish pizza, which sounded like it would hit the spot right about then. And it did. Not the best we’ve ever had, not the worst, but it satisfied hungry stomachs.
We walked along the lakeshore back to the hotel (that Country Inn was really nice, by the way) and enjoyed the late afternoon weather. We were finally hitting the wall and ready to catch up on some sleep. We went to our room and opened our bags to get our pajamas and toiletries unpacked. And that’s when we got our last kick-in-the-you-know-what from Southwest.
Our clothes were wet.
Seems as though our bags had been left on the baggage carts out on the tarmac during those big storms back on Tuesday. A couple of bags were better than others, but now we had to go about emptying the bags and trying to dry clothes around the room while we slept.
Yes, Southwest Airlines received a very strongly-worded message from me that very night. And to their credit, they did reach out and work with me to make things right. But that doesn’t change the fact that this was really crappy customer service. From a company that usually does much better.
We finally collapsed into bed. The nightmare was over (we hoped) and we would hopefully be back on track the next day. We still had a great deal of the country to explore.
At least the hotel clerk had hooked us up with a nice room. I’ll leave you with our view.
Coming Up Next: Our first encounter with the mighty, rushing Mississippi River. A DISMeet in spirit (with bacon). And more excitement than you could possibly handle as we drive across the amazing landscape of North Dakota.
Did you survive? Please tell me you survived.
aboard, Ellen!
Still not happy about that.
