Tag Archives: dragon boat

A day at the fair

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On Thursday, we not only walked down the trail, we also strolled around at the Beltrami County Fair, where we worked in the Bemidji Pioneer booth. These are some photos of the horticultural competition. You’d think I actually was a gardener, from as often as I post garden-related photos!

Here’s today’s quote, from Bethany:

"It’s pouring out!"

Not only was that quote before we started walking, it was before we even met for the day. In fact, it was over the phone as she called to say she was on her way.

She still wanted to walk; she just wanted to borrow a shirt with sleeves.

We skipped the trail and hit the sidewalks on Minnesota and America avenues. I tried not to take any garden pictures, but there was one too pretty to turn down. We also checked out a nice house for sale. The rain was pretty light until near the end, when it started coming down hard enough that I looked down the street to see how far away my apartment was.

We were scheduled for a shift in the Pioneer’s booth at the fair from 2-4 p.m., so we headed over there around 1:15 so we could wander around for a bit first and take some photos. It was a quiet afternoon in the booth; not many people were in the commercial building, compared to what I would expect for the weekend. We talked a lot with the woman in the ACLU booth on one side of us, and I got one of my fingernails done by the guy in the booth on the other side. We also stopped to chat about the Lake Bemidji Dragon Boat Festival with Brian Bissonette at the Paul Bunyan Telephone booth, and I visited with my insurance agent, Ken Cobb of Pine Country Insurance.

Of course, I ended up taking pictures of flowers at the fair, too. :)

Here are two pictures for today’s quiz:

 

Wednesday’s photo was from the Masonic Temple near downtown Bemidji.

Have a great weekend!

– Laurie

 

 

 

 

Flowers and puppies

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I probably sound like a broken record, but I love the opportunities we have to see beautiful flower gardens, and to see them again and again as the summer progresses. This garden on Lake Avenue near our trail along Lake Bemidji is one of my favorites. I like the variety, the mixture of heights, the close meshing of foliage. I’d probably prefer an even closer meshing; some might say messy!

We walked an hour early today because I went to my daughter’s house in Red Lake Falls for a little welcome-home gathering for their new puppy, a pomeranian-chihuahua cross. It’s called a pomchi.

They named him Butters, after a character from "South Park," a show Jada is not allowed to watch.  But she seems not too curious about why her parents named a dog after a dairy product.

In this photo, he is munching on a pig’s ear I bought him on the way out of town. He spent much of the afternoon sleeping, wherever he was placed: In between feet, on a chest, curled up in an arm. Then he woke up and started biting our feet. Cute pup!

But back to walking.

It was a great day to walk today (Wednesday; I’m working hard to get this done before midnight!), not too hot, not too cold. On Thursday after our walk, we’ll be at the Pioneer’s booth at the Beltrami County Fair from 2-4 p.m.

Today’s quote, from me: "We should have T-shirts made with ‘Trail’ on one shirt and ‘Mix’ on the other, and then we’d have to walk in the right order."

Bethany decided they should have the reverse order on the back.

Today’s mystery picture:

Yesterday’s picture was the bird bath at the park outside Baker Park Apartments near Bemidji State University.

Enjoy the fair if you go!

The Dragon Boat Festival is getting under way too. The Tourist Information Center is decorated for the event:

Yeah, I went a little crazy with the photos.

– Laurie

The Dragon Boat Festival is upon us…

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One of the perks of walking along the waterfront every day is that we get to see events unfold, whether it’s the Bemidji Jaycees Water Carnival, Art in the Park or, now, the Lake Bemidji Dragon Boat Festival. We walked past the boats today, although if it wasn’t for Bethany pointing them out, I might have missed this photo. I noticed a pile of life jackets to the left of the boats and completely missed the boats! (I guess you could say I "missed the boat" … yeah, I know, that was bad.)

Competing in the races sounds like fun, but I haven’t taken the plunge yet. A bunch of my co-workers literally took the plunge last year when their boat capsized during a race. That was the part that made me the most wistful to be on the team. Obviously I’m not the most competitive person around, if falling off a boat is appealing to me. :)

The other day I glanced through a publication on walking to lose weight. It said that if we could carry on a conversation, we’re not walking fast enough! Heck, we chatter the whole time, whether we’re huffing and puffing or not.

Today the black plastic that has been walling us off from part of the trail had been moved a little, so we used a different access to get up the hill to Lake Avenue. It looked pretty easy, but we had to dig pretty hard for footholds, and grab onto whatever we could find to pull ourselves up.

"It’s always an adventure!" Bethany exclaimed as we huffed and puffed our way up the hill.

Here’s our view as we came out into the sunshine. The construction on the future bike trail changes every time we walk through. It looks like things might be beginning to take shape.

On Friday, Bethany announced a new feature of our blog. We’re going to be sharing close-ups of bits of Bemidji such as architecture, decoration, lettering, etc., and asking readers to leave comments with their guesses (or certainties!) of what is pictured. The idea came from a contest we held more than 25 years ago at my old job at the Crookston Daily Times. It was fun then, and I hope it will be fun today.

So here’s your first one. I’ll give you a hint: It was taken within our walk paramaters, which includes downtown, the waterfront, Bemidji State University, Diamond Point Park, Lake Avenue, Birchmont Drive, and Beltrami, Minnesota and America Avenue from 15th Street to downtown. We don’t walk all of that every day, but we rarely walk outside that area.

Good luck!

– Laurie