A blue sky holiday to New York- Day 1

And finally we saw New York - the most happening city in the United States. It has been two days now since we came back and I can still see the images of the tall buildings sharply cutting into the steel blue sky. I feel like I am constantly on the move either walking or am in a subway on my way to some place.
Whew! What a breathtaking city! It is worth a much longer visit...maybe a month would be sufficient ? Maybe...

We started on Friday evening from Minneapolis and reached at around 12 midnight in New York. We then took the lite-train to Jamaica and with the help of one nice Mr. Mazumdar, we found our way to the hotel. It was so scary and dirty and with so many odd people and noisy bars that we thought we made a mistake reserving a hotel in such a place. But of course, it later turned out that every place in New York is equally scary and dirty and you are not in New York if you don't hear a cop car siren or a NYPD helicopter buzzing above your head.

It was almost 2 by the time we hit the bed-after a small argument and changing the room allocated to us as it was way too noisy even to catch a wink of sleep.
We had too many places to see and did not dare to catch upon the lost sleep lest we lose time to see some place. We stepped out at 9:30 in the morning after a quick b.f. of cereal and juice and rushed to the closest subway to reach Manhattan.

At the Jamaica subway-line E

Our first stop was Times Square. Ther are no words to describe this place- it simpley leaves you STUNNED!


It is so intensely urban -there's people and cars wherever you look and multitude of buildings above you are gleaming at you all the time. It is so crowded that you just need to step on to the pavement and the city will take you around. Everyone of them is so well dressed (and yet there is filth everywhere) and each of the buildings has atleast ten neon lighted advertisements - fighting to grab your attention. There are flea markets and designer botiques, street performers around broadway theatres...
Whatever this place is - it is a landmark no one should miss.

Times Square


Street Performer in Time Square

So, after walking through this human maze we reached the garment district- the center of fashion filled with coture houses and showrooms. And it was time to see another place-The World Trade Center site- it was a humbling experience to see all the pictures of the collosal amount of debris, and removal workers fighting their way into the pile- you can be having it all good all of a sudden your life is snatched away from you. well...

World Trade Center

By now we were exhausted, but we still wanted more of the city- so we came to the financial district- saw New York Stock exchange, walked on Wall Street and Broad Street,stood with Washington (statue) in Federal Hall National Memorial for a photograph and of course the tamed the charging bull.
We walked down from Wall street to the South Street Seaport laced with lovely shops and food courts. There are, again many street performers here and you get a nice view of the brooklyn bridge.



We took a bus ride through Chinatown and Little Italy to reach Lexington and 28th for a delicious dinner at Saravana Bhavan. We somehow managed to get back to our hotel room to take some rest after which we would begin another day of hectic sight seeing.

Blue skies fade to gray

And I need a blue sky holiday! oh phluzzee...
I don't think I get that for another 4 months
So...
What have I been doing all this while when I didn't blog one sentence!
I could have blogged when I watched Pursuit of Happyness, or about our new year celebrations or about the lack of snow in minnesota due to global warming...there are a thousand things to write about and yet I didn't and the reason is that i am LAZY. I wonder how many people can boldly say that. haha!
I am totally de-addicted to orkut now and I am very happy about it. But I am also totally addicted to youtube - so help me! Take a quiz in this website to see how net addicted you are. I wonder if they have some sort of cure for such partial addictions though.
So why am I talking about addiction? Well,I made a couple of videos of my sis singing in Jaya TV for Ragamalika and now I am totally into windows movie maker to make a movie of my own. So do check out my sis's video and also watch out that space for more creative spurts from me.

Gender Inclusivity

I was just going through one of the articles in The Hindu Businessline that talks about gender empowerment in the IT industry- specifically about my earlier company. This company plans to open a satellite center to enable employees, specifically new and to-be mothers to cut down on travel time to work. Also, it has initiated a pilot project for employees giving them an opportunity to opt for a one-year sabbatical at any point in their careers ie. for childcare, eldercare, higher studies or for health reasons. The first initiative is praise worthy though it is about time all companies start implementing such policies and the second initiative is nothing new and was offered earlier too but to utilize it,one should have worked with the company for a minimum of two years and I do not think they are going to change that clause in any way. Don’t ask me how it became a pilot project all of a sudden.

Coming to the main story, if you happen to check out the World Economic Forum index,India ranks an overall 100th rank amongst 117 countries, way below Sri Lanka, China and Kenya in gender gap rankings that is gauged in terms of four parameters-Economic participation and oppurtunity,educational attainment,political empowerment and health and survival. Check this link for WEF ratings. We rank a 20 in political empowerment but a dissapointing 110 in economic participation.Why is this?

Traditionally, in Indian households, with family lineage, living arrangements and inheritance all centered around men, household decision-making too is gladly shouldered by them and women are happy to go with their husband’s decisions on the most important issues such as credit, the disposal of household assets, children's education, and family health. That makes a happy family!
One would think better decisions can be made if there are two minds at work than one.

I have heard many a friend say to me that they prefer a woman who is not career-oriented. Why? Cos’ “The opportunity cost of working” reduces the value of marriage in a woman!!hmmph!

Not to mention the innumerable changes a woman goes through in her life which makes it harder for her to work full-time. Marriage, child birth or relocation needs a woman to forgo a lot more than a man. Corporate houses in India are yet to recognize such issues and utilize women’s capabilities in the best possible manner which can be working out of home or part time working or flexible working hours.

And when is gender stereotyping ever going to stop? At work place, it is always a greater struggle for a woman to prove her strengths because even as she begins a project she has to work twice as hard as a man to prove that she has the same capabilities and without the benefit of networking and most often suffering from lack of support of a good work-life balance.

I have personally felt this when I was previously working. All project meetings used to be regularly sheduled after 6 pm. Any office party where one could socialize with colleagues-ditto or better still it was over the weekends. It works fine for the bachelors...but...

Are spouses allowed?- Oh no! sorry! we have a shoe string budget for this. And both the managers I had during the time I worked with this company used to insist that I stay back after 7 or 8 pm and work ( one guy used to rush after me if I stepped out at 7 and have a look of surprise on his face and say" oh Deepa! are you already done for the day- Jerk!) and all this even though I started my work at 8:30 am in the morning.
Sir, my work timings are from 8:30 to 5:30. It was for my own satisfation that I even stayed back this late and I HAVE A FAMILY TO TAKE CARE TOO. Oh! is that so, we will take care of you in your appraisal and see that you get nowhere. We have all come to believe that if you are going to be career oriented then please forget any personal life.

Coming back to the core issue...creating family friendly systems like flexible working hours, women friendly policies, options to work out of home and a different scale for measuring productivity of women- all this would be a good beginning. Infact,men too need to be given options such as flexi-timing and working out of home. If your spouse gets an onsite opportunity then the partner should be able to work from long distance without giving up his/her job. The truth is that the new generation of men do shoulder family burdens and household chores. They participate in a lot of household activities that were earlier considered an woman's domain. They too sacrifice their careers and are willing to make tough choices for the sake of the family. But deep down it requires a complete mental makeover, a higher degree of acceptance and a good deal of policy changes in the corporate world to bring more women to the workplace and empower them.

Sevikku Unavu

One of my mom's favorite Thirukkural is " sevikku uNavu illaadha pOzhthu siRithu vayitRukkum eeyappadum" literally meaning "when there is no food available for the ears, it will be served for the stomach".This weekend was one such when we had such a treat for our ears that we didn't feel the need for food.

My husband (who also happens to be a pro in carnatic music) regularly did sadagams (riaz/practice) and gave a performance atleast once in two months back in India. That way, even though he didn't want a full time profession in music, he would atleast be in touch with what he likes to do best. And so, we were totally lost after coming here what with new place-syndrome,pressures of work, no guru who would expect excellence from you and push you in the right direction and ofcourse the big question of "where do you actually start of for this?".

Even though we haven't yet found an answer, I am happy that we are going to do so, someday soon. Atleast, the ball has been set rolling...it started soon after my husband and his friend gave a small performance in the Minnesota Thyagaraja Aradhana. After listening to him, the ghatam artist and the mridangist volunteered that they can come over to our place for music practice and be "kutcheri-ready" even though we have no concert lined up. So,this sunday, Balaji and Sriram came over to our place for an extended practice session with their Ghatam and Mridangam respectively and boy was it a treat to listen to all of them together!
After 3 long hours, the music session sadly came to an end and the artists were treated with my wonderful tanjavoor samayal ( I can always claim till you call my bluff :)
I am waitng for the next weekend to come soon when they will get together and practice again.

Caravan of silk and jade

Not being in India, we miss our loved ones...we also miss the honking cars, the morning rush, yummy cusines and the crowded streets.But in December, we miss the chennai-music season the most.
So when we heard about the World beat concert organised by The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, we jumped with joy.
Inspired by the legendary Silk route, it is(was) a presentation of Ouds from Iraq and Iran blended with ragas and thillanas from our very own South India. We were not let down ( oh no, not totally :)...
The program started with a soulful " oud and string quartet" presentation by Rahim Al Haj followed by a not so musical "Blue as the Turquoise Night of Neyshabur". The lowest point in the whole concert was after the intermission when Palukavademira in devamanohari and Mokshamu in saramati were mercilessly murdered. It was totally played out of tune and in an effort to westernise Indian music, they had completely diluted the compositions which only left an insipid taste in the listener's ears and charmed no one.It took us gargantuan effort to stay there even after such a poor display of skills but it paid to be patient. Nirmala Rajasekar, well known veena player here with her accompanying artists Shriniasan Venkatakrishnan on mridangam and Pavan Allalaghatta on tabla lifted our spirits and gave Carnatic music the honor it rightly desreves on a world stage. Her rendition of Rasikapriya and Mandu were the undoubtedly the best pieces of the day.
I can only add one thing here...Carnatic music-You either love it or leave it. Please do not adultrate it.
Oh yes, I do love the way carnatic music is adapted into many tamil film songs, esp. by Illayaraja and there are hundreds of his song that I could give as examples but one of my favorites would be "idazhil kadhai" from Unnal mudiyum thambi" in raaga lalitha...but I guess that takes talent :)
The end was pretty dramatic with a piece from "Mother India" performed by all artists. On the whole it was a good experience. Will I go once again? Maybe not.

"The Vegetarian"

I can't step into the kitchen on Sundays. Period.
This sunday was no different and we set out to go to our favorite haunt "Udupi Cafe" aka Nala Pak in Columbia Heights.
While we were in Bangalore, we used to regularly hunt out new dining experiences -especially vegetarian ones. But here, due to the lack of Indian vegetarian restaurants we restrict ourselves to the 2 veggie places-Udupi and India Cafe for dining and Bombay deli for chats.
So when we saw this sign board "The Vegetarian" about on Central avenue-we had to check it out. But we had no clue if it was a restaurant or just a shop by looking at it.
Anyway,we were determined to venture in. So what if it was located in a spooky place. So what if there have been recent shootings around that area...so what?

We ordered malai kofta and rotis...cos our romance started with malai kofta three years back at Fortune and that is something no one can go wrong with.
Food...though it did'nt taste awesome, it felt homely BUT they could do better - infact way ,way better in terms of cutlery and probably someone needs to tell them about dishwashers.If you're charging $9 for a malai kofta, we come to expect clean knives and plates along with it.The glasses had lip marks on them and the plates seemed so ancient with so many scratches from umpteen uses ( did I say that this restaurant was opened only last month ?)
!!!
They could do some help with interior decoration too-and not pick up some odd chairs and tables bought out of garage sale.
I dont think we would be going there ever again unless there is a need to remind ourselves how good Udupi is.

Tinger Tanger

As a natural instinct, on saturday- we got into the car and were aimlessly driving around when we decided to go to some mall different from the usual.We vaguely remembered passing by an outlet mall when we went to Duluth and decided to venture in that direction. The condition I put down was that we will travel a maximum of 50 miles and if no shop was spotted, turn around and get into a movie theatre. I have been waiting to watch A Good Year ever so long since I saw the trailers didn't want to postpone it to another weekend.
So....around the 43rd mile of our drive on 35N, we did see a board that read "bargain hunting at its best"- Tanger serves you with over 35 shops...I was thrilled with my husband's sense of "distance" and direction.
We naturally assumed that we should reach there in the next exit but that was not to be. After about 10 miles later, we did find this mall and then of course, shopped till we dropped dead. We got additional discount too as it happened to be Veterans day There was no energy left after that to watch any movie and we headed back home with our big hunts.

Of commercials and jingles

Recently, I have been downloading music that gets played as background score in ads - and no, they are not jingles, but they happen to be good tracks from well-known albums.
It goes like this... I watch the commercial...music sounds gr8... I check out the ad in youtube, do some search to find out the name of the album and download :).
My Today's pick is the latest of Geico's caveman series. The background score for this is "Remind Me" by Royksopp (album - melody a.m).
Watch the ad here in Youtube and let me know how you like it.
Another one I liked was Sheraton's $20 million ad campaign. Arabella Harrison sings "We belong"- orignally by Pat Benatar. You could check out the ad, again in youtube here :)

A Sunday pass

This Sunday, we hadn’t planned anything and were wondering how to spend the day when our friends called up to say we could join them for a visit to the science museum. They had got passes for it and we gladly jumped at the opportunity.
Sunday being a Gurupurab, our friends first wanted to visit the Gurdwara and we joined them there as I had never been to a gurdwara before and wanted to see how it is.
As we entered in,we were asked to cover our heads with scarves and were directed to the darbar hall where Guru Granth Sahib was housed. We stood there for a few minutes before the Holy Scriptures to say a silent prayer and bowed. After the prayers and chantings were over, it was time for lunch. We were offered Langar (food made in the communal kitchen) considered as blessing from the Guru. All the preparation, the cooking and the washing-up is done by voluntary helpers called Sewadars.
After this sacred and yummy meal, we set out to the science museum at St. Paul.
We had heard much about the "Body Worlds Museum” and wanted to see all those authentic human specimens preserved by plastination. But our hearts sank when we heard the prices (26 bucks per person) and we decided we weren’t science geeks after all :) We had a lot of fun in the experiment gallery. I was reminded of my younger days when my mom used to take me and my sister to the Birla planetorium/ Periyar science and tech centre in Kotturpuram,Chennai and we used to spend the whole day doing every experiment there.
I didn't care too much about the dinosaurs and collectors items. Apart from all this,there was an enjoyable show/ drama about Judge Oka of Japan and a scary egyptian mummy. That was one sunday!

Election drama

Though I am not inclined towards politics at all, I couldn’t help but watch the debates that go on for each race. With the senate elections round the corner, news papers and TV ads are doing as much as they can to fill our heads with ideas and opinions about each candidate.And Oh! the mudslinging-ads-it is a treat to watch them abuse each other. The ad agencies must be working over time to come up with such quick and witty retorts.
Coming back to debates...
though I have seen something similar in NDTV, debating has never been an essential feature in any Indian election campaign. Here, it is forms the core of a campaign. It atleast gives the people a chance to compare each candidate’s stance on major issues and choose a person sensibly. Did I say "sensibly" -I do not know really…
The candidate is first allowed to make his/her opening speech after which questions are answered on five to six hot issues of the time. I dont need to tell you what the major issues are this time- War...war...war...then of course,federal taxes, embryonic stem cell research , gay marriage blah blah blah...Then there is a rapid question round where each candidate can ask the other a quick question that needs to be answered in a maximum time of 45 sec…
Inbetween all this fun, I saw a full page ad on Star tribune called "Voter's guide Serious Catholics" where they have listed 5 non negotiable issues- Abortion, Euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research , human cloning and homosexual marriage...
Apparently, war is negotiable and so go on and support a candidate who supports war but never in your life vote for a supporter of human cloning.... :)

Subzero fun

Here we are in November and maybe I should start reading a book that goes like "how to enjoy outdoors in subzero chills "...
Last week a close friend of ours had come all the way from Oregon and all we did was spend the two days at outlet malls and the gr8 "Mall of America". Poor us...what can we do when everything (read weather) conspires against us to sit at home or go window shopping.

Though I hate to admit, I love window shopping- if you have exhausted all kinds of topics of conversation with me, then just take me to shop- even your closest mom and pop store would do. :) I get so fascinated by the kind of products retailers come up with and want to have one of everything - I am a "retailer's dream" -so my husband tells me. So whenever we go out shopping he asks me to make out a list of items "needed" lest I get duped into buying unnesessary stuff. And then of course, my window shopping can no more be called window shopping too :)

Well...so you needn't bother to ask me if I enjoyed at the Mall-of course I did. Moreover we were'nt even window shopping- my two friends actually started going crazy over the brands. I think they bought enough to get them thro till next diwali. :) One smart thing they taught me was to first hit the information center at the Mall and ask for the discount brochure. I believe you get it free if you are a AAA member or a student, else pay 5 bucks to get one and believe me,you wouldn't regret it.

Summing it up, weekend was fun fun and more fun- first there was a lot of shopping and we talked so much and watched so many good movies...
It brought alive those campus day memories at K when we would take a walk around the campus late in the night, have a cup of tea ( essentially a sugar-water concentrate) in the night canteen and head back to work. What would I not do to get those idyllic days back again?

High Bridge overlook

I sat down to update my blog today lest I forget my login/ pswrd ..hahaha.
With our lease coming to an end ,we decided to move to scenic suburbs leaving the downtown and checked out quite a few apartments before settling down to one cozy apt in Eden Prairie. We are now looking forward to next month end when we can shift and start living in a new place- that sounds exciting!. hmmm.

Now that the winter set in here,we have pulled up our hoods and find it difficult even to walk from the parking lot to the shop entrance and I think in a few days,I would start writing about "traveling to heated shopping malls":)

There is one place though, I can write about for today - St. Paul skyline from the high bridge overlook. We usually go here when dont have any place in mind and just wanna take a drive. The overlook provides a panoramic view of downtown St.Paul and the upper landing across the river. One can simultaneously see planes landing every five minutes in the St Paul airport , boats across the river and amtrack train chugging along on the riverside. wow!

With I-94 humming in the background, I take a step back and see where I(we) belong- and I see this fast paced, monotonous, repetitive but enchanting life that I can never get enough of and I am ready to jump back into it. Crazy crazy world with crazy crazy people :)

And "The Departed"... :)

Once we start off on the topic of movies or books, I think we can go on discussing the merits and shortcomings endlessly and opinions vary as much as the surnames in a phonebook :).
Now, that said, I can comfortably call “The Departed” as one of the most illogical movies made and vehemently so because it is being praised as this year’s likely Oscar winning movie. We usually check IMDB for any movie review before watching and this time too we did the same but it turned out that this movie did not deserve all the praise it has got.
Well, the movie goes something like this… the state police force is trying to destroy one of the top crime gangs in Boston led by Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson).
Willy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio), straight out of the Police Acadamy is assigned as an undercover cop to infiltrate the mob while Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon), a criminal is planted into the police department as an informer to Costello. Both these spies rise to a positions of power gaining trust and respect from their new bosses. But soon, the mob and the police get to know that there's a mole in their midst and both Willy and Sullivan need to expose the other to save their skins.
Until this point,I should say the movie was gripping…
But the movie comes crashing down and all hopes of a logical conclusion are shattered when they show Damon discovering that Nicholson is after all an FBI agent (!!??!!) planted to find out leaches in the police force.
Wait a minute, was all that brutal, in-your-face violence and raw dialogues just a cover( ???!!) And why in the world is the whole Massachusetts State police force chasing a man who is an FBI agent??!! They have done enough Cops serials, i guess :)
To top this all, Damon who is practically raised by Nicholson gets tipped off for being a mole (???!!)
Thank God,they atleast killed everyone in the end, so that way there would be no loose ends.
Yessir!, Jack Nicholson’s whirling devilish portrayal of an untouchable, perverted mob boss is reason alone to see "The Departed" and Dicaprio and Matt Damon are as good as always. So if you can ignore the glaring obnoxious faults in the story-line, you can still enjoy watching it.
Boy, I would laugh my head off if this movie picks an Oscar for Best Picture.

A good movie after a long while

It has almost been two years since I read the book “To kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee and today I finally watched the screen adaptation of this Pulitzer winning novel.The movie excels the book with delightful naration and perfect cast.

The story is set in Alabama during the times of depression where racial discrimination was the norm of the day. It tells us about a lawyer who dares to defend an innocent black man charged with rape of a white woman as seen through the eyes of his little girl Scout.

The sleepy town of Maycomb finds itself ensnared in a moral trial of Tom Robinson, a young black man falsely accused of raping an abused and ignorant white woman. Scout and Jem's widowed father,Atticus Finch (Gregory Peck) is a deeply principled man and is appointed to defend Tom. It is a forgone conclusion that he would be charged for the crime and stands no chance of justice from an all-white jury. Though Atticus proves beyond doubt that Tom could never have done the crime yet he is sent to the gallows and even before Atticus can plead a second time, Tom gets shot in an escape attempt. The children come to respect their father for his values even while the villagers turn hostile.
Intertwined with this is the story of the children's encounters with their insane neighbor Boo Radley and how in the end he saves their lives from the blind hatred of the white woman’s father.
It is said that Harper Lee went through similar situations in her life and many characters in this story are drawn from her life.
Racism may be irrelevant in a world of today but sadly prejudice and injustice still are not.
Another novel on the same lines but more vehement and much more longer is "Roots" by Alex Haley...but the problem is this was made into episodes for television and I wonder if I can sit and watch all of it.

A day at the zoo

Winter is closing in on us, threatening to come down cold and heavy any time, any day and each day of the week is a surprise blessing or ...
This Sunday too was one such day and we were blessed when we saw a ray of hope and the feeling of warmth to step out in our t-shirts. Armed with a free ticket to the zoo –parking inclusive (courtesy Neera and Mpls Library) we ventured out to Apple Valley to meet our neighbors of yesteryears :).Check out Minneapolis Public Library for further details on the free ticket offer by Macy's. They are offering quite a variety of entry tickets to the museums, art galleries and Arboretum and it might be worthwhile grabbing a few.

Coming back to our story, we hadn’t planned anything else and we decided to pamper the kids in us:).The last zoo I had seen was in Singapore in 2004 complete with Night Safari and Jurong bird park. I had so thoroughly enjoyed it that time ,I was sure that Minnesota wouldn’t let us down.
Well, the zoo here is sure a nice place to visit and the animals are well cared for but I think even Indian Zoos have much more to offer- at least many more animals to see. Probably because of the severe weather conditions, they are unable to flaunt as many species. One of the main highlights of the zoo was the Wells Fargo Family Farm where you get to see goats, pigs, hens and cows- but don't we watch them everyday on our roads in India? Of course, it is very exciting for kids as they get to feed them and pet them.

kid feeding goatiee

The Empress of Blandings

The bird show is right now closed for a month for training so I cannot comment on that but the dolphin show...I cannot even compare it to the one I saw in S'pore. I would just call it informative about dolphins and its nice to watch the them perform cute little tricks.

Some of the must see in this zoo are: the Prairie Dogs-they are just so adorable! the way they dig holes, collect grass and are constantly on watch- ready to jump in the mud and hide themselves; Moose and Caribou- I never knew they were this huge and this lazy :) , tigers- if they are not sleeping they look awesomely majestic prowling about.
the cute little Prairie dog

Worth a visit once if you have kids...

St Croix State Park

We have been consistently traveling long distances over the past few weekends and decided it was time to take it easy and travel closer home. So we picked out the 34,000 acre St Croix state park located in Hinckley. This also happens to be the largest state park in Minnesota.
If you want to rest your tired feet and yet see some place, this would be it.
We took the 12 mile drive along the rustic road inside the heavily wooded area to see the fall colors. It was past peak and many of the leaves had already fallen or had turned brown. The entrance to the park (which was a good 4 mile) displayed the best colors.

Thro' the forest green


autumn comes to a close

I wouldn’t say, it was even half as good as Lutsen, but we can’t crib, can we.
We got up the 136-stair steep Fire tower for a scenic overview of the forest around us. There is a small landing on top of the tower to observe the whole forest and can accomodate a maximum of six people. I was very scared to climb up initially but somehow managed and it was truly worth the effort.

View from Firetower

It was almost 5:30 pm by the time we completed the trail and we wanted to go canoeing down the St.Croix River but it was closed for the day.
You can take a canoe trip ranging from one to four hours through the National Scenic St croix riverway and it costs anywhere between $30-$40. Check this website for further details. We plan to do this sometime soon.:)

towards the evening

Ideas for the coming weekend

I have just been looking at various websites for this week's peak fall color locales. When it is fall, you cannot obviously go anywhere else, can you?
According to Explore Minnesota beautiful fall color can be found at cascade river, grand portage, Itasca, St. Croix and Savanna Portage state parks- the same as given in Star Tribune.
I dont think we can travel more than 80-90 miles this weekend :-) and we have already seen the North shore side...so Grand Portage and Cascade river are ruled out.
lemme see...Itasca- DNR reports state that this is going to be an early fall season here
but distance: 227 miles! out of question

St Croix state park is about 87 miles from Minneapolis, check out here for further details.It states that last week was a better time to go :-( hmmm

Savanna Portage state park is still close to peak color with very less leaf loss and is about 125 miles...

I think it's either going to be Savanna portage or St Croix this weekend...or maybe we will discover some new place closer home

Sep 24th: 2nd day at North Shore

We woke up early in the morning and walked down the lane right opposite to our motel which led us straight to the rocky shores of Lake Superior.
Faraway from us, this endless ocean of water merged with the blue skies above to form the single magical line called Horizon over which the sun broke loose from the chain of clouds, blessing the cold land with sunshine and waves thundered in joy along on the shores and we sat there awed by this spectacular art called nature .

On the shores of Lake Superior

Soon, it was time to check out of our motel and move on with our plans for the day. Our first stop was Sugarloaf cove.Located on Highway 61, this place was home of log rafting operations in olden days (not too very old, if you ask me :). We took the trek down to marvel at another breathtaking view of Lake Superior and the beautifully formed cove and we set off our next destination: Temperance River and hidden waterfalls.

At the Sugarloaf cove

The road separates the trail into two. Hiking south towards Lake Superior, the river forms a gushing waterfall before emptying into the Lake but on the other side is the hidden waterfall. This second part of the trail was pretty difficult with a lot of rock climbing to do and so we took two different routes to reach the falls. Sadly, he could not see the falls while I did and he had the camera and I didn’t:(.
However, I picked this picture on the web to show you how the hidden falls looked like.
Hidden falls- One has to really lie flat on the rock and peep out to take this picture!

Mighty waves of Superior on the southern side of Temperance

Tall maple trees crowned over us and set the forest on a fire. It was a visual treat for the eyes and has left a lasting impression on us. I do not have words to describe their beauty.

For latest information on north shore you could visit http://www.northshorefallcolors.com/

Etched in my memory forever


In the end, we were tired of taking pictures that didn’t do any justice to the richness or luminescence of fall colors and we headed back on 61 to our last stop in our trip- the Gooseberry falls.

I cannot say we enjoyed Gooseberry falls as well as other places. Firstly, we were way too tired after so much of driving and trekking and secondly, this place was far to crowded to admire the fall’s view.

Gooseberry Falls

We didn’t stay on there long and pushed off after a quick look and a small trek around the three crowded waterfalls.
We stopped by at India Palace on W Superior Street, in downtown Duluth, for our first decent meal in two days. We then energetically stepped on the gas on a car-flooded 35 S to get back home and hit the bed throughly exhausted and exhilarated with our trip.

Sep 23:Day 1 of North shore drive

After a good amount of research, we had decided on Thursday that we will drive out on the last weekend of September along the North shore drive until Lutsen and booked a room and car accordingly. But on Friday afternoon, when I was lazing around surfing the web, I realized that fall colors had already reached the peak in Northern Minnesota due to dry summer and may not last another week!
My hubby, a great planner and stickler to details was not very happy with this piece of information but anyhow we reworked our plan and were off on Saturday morning to Lutsen.
We didn’t get accommodation to stay over on Saturday Night but decided it was going to be OK as it was only a 4 ½ hour drive and it wouldn’t kill us to get back home the same day.
We hit off 35 N in the morning at around 9 am after a light breakfast of peanut butter-bread and fruits.On reaching Duluth, temptation got the better of us and we strayed into Scenic 23 instead of choosing the expressway.After stopping over at every scenic byway to admire Mother Nature’s lavish display, we merged into 61 with more than an hour’s loss.

While on Scenic 23

It was almost 2 pm when we reached Two Harbours and hunger was the most prevailing thought in our minds.We headed to a Subway to grab a sandwich and were shocked by the crowd...there must have been atleast 25 people in the queue. So we pursued our next option- an unhealthy but a delectable one of eating doughnuts and chips. After a ten minute break at the gas station, we were back on track.

Our first stop was at Lutsen Mountain.. We took the Gondola ride (Tram/ cable car ride) that took us across a valley to the Moose Mountain from where we saw the breathtaking fall colors on Sawtooth Mountains and Lake Superior's remarkable coastline. We stayed on in Moose Mountain for another hour trekking along spellbound by the vivid colors of autumn where a rush of color paints each and every leaf with a stroke of a shimmering gold or a bright orange or a fiery red and the mountains and valleys are glowing to compete with sun shine.

The Gondola ride

A bird's eye view of Sawtooth Mountain

My photos cannot justify the beauty of this place

It was around 6pm by the time we got back to Lutsen Mountains and we headed off towards Tafte to check out Caribou trail and yes,search for accomodation- as one day was distinctly insufficient. We checked each motel on our way but "No vacancy" was prominently displayed in each place lest we had any hope of staying back.

So we set off on wooded Caribou trail to see the colors of sugar maples and moose maples and reached Cascade lake so serene and untouched by the hand of man. I dont know how long we sat there with our minds so quiet and hearts feeling elated- one with nature. We left it with a touch of sorrow wondering why we ever left behind all this wilderness.


Cascade Lake

We were back on 61 heading back home dissapointed that we couldn't get accomodation and yet hopelessly checking out each motel for a vacant room when we came to Beaver Bay. Surprise of surprises, one motel did have a room available and that too a non-smoking one! We were so thrilled!
It was almost 9 pm by this time and instead of tiring ourselves hunting for a restaurant, we decided by buy a box of cereals an milk from a wayside gas station.

The day finally came to an end with a walk down the streets in the night and a million stars were glimmering over us, hiding the secrets of the day to come.

Where to go this fall: more updates

Star tribune tracking this fall and has given its judgement - there are these 5 best places to go this fall and I dont want you to miss it.
check out this link for details
http://www.startribune.com/462/story/678382.html
also, if you ever wondered why leaves changed colors....u might wanna read this :)
http://www.startribune.com/style/news/variety/seasons/fall/why.swf