Three weeks down, five to go. [How we’re just over a month away from returning to Louisville is beyond me.] We’ve been in Texas for just shy of a month now and we are thoroughly enjoying it. We’re staying in an apartment on Rainey Street right in the heart of downtown. While the apartment building is more “frat house” than we’re used, the location couldn’t be more ideal – we’ve got food trucks and restaurants galore within a block of our apartment, we’re right on Lady Bird Lake (aka the Colorado River), and are a quick 1-2 mile walk from East Austin and South Congress.
View from the apartmentSnickers and Matt on Lady Bird Lake
The weather has been nothing short of amazing. While the rest of the country has been getting their first snows of the year, we’ve been soaking up the sun and 80 degree days. Working from home certainly has its perks when you can take a meeting in a bathing suit at the rooftop pool! Matt was able to work remotely these last few weeks (sadly he’s back on the road now, in Chicago, no less), which has been great.
The city is so colorful due in no small part to all the street art adorning walls everywhere. Another thing we really love is the abundance of food trucks; Austin might even give Portland a run for its money with how many there are. It’s nice to have no shortage of food options around every turn. We’ve eaten our fair share of TexMex and barbecue washed down with margaritas and beer; there are plenty of breweries and we’re slowly making the rounds. We’ve done lots of “urban hiking” to explore the city, went trail running in Hill Country, and to visit some of Matt’s relatives near Dallas. There’s still so much more to do, see, and eat and we’re going to squeeze in as much as we can in our last month here!
After being months behind on our food and beer calendar, we finally caught up right before we left Minneapolis. October’s beer and food pairing was a bock and pretzel. We’ve enjoyed the more snack type pairings this year over last year’s heavier meals, and we can’t turn down a carb.
For the beer, we went with the tried and true Shiner Bock – hearkening to our impending move to the Lonestar State. The beer is lightly hopped and finishes smooth. A perfect complement to the salty pretzels. We simply chose a highly rated pretzel recipe from Allrecipes.com, and it’s listed below if you’d like to give it a try. The pretzels are best right out of the oven; they will keep for a while but definitely lose that “fresh baked” deliciousness after a day or two.
Cheers!
Pretzels
1 (.25 oz) package active dry yeast [or 2 1/4 t of bulk yeast]
2 T brown sugar
1 1/8 t salt
1 1/2 C warm water
3 C all-purpose flour
1 C bread flour [can just sub all-purpose; in this recipe I used whole wheat because we ran out of all-purpose and it turned out just fine]
2 C warm water
2 T baking soda
2 T butter, melted
Coarse kosher salt
Dissolve the yeast and brown sugar in 1 1/2 C warm water and let stand until frothy (~10 min.). Add salt and flour and knead on a lightly floured surface until dough is smooth and elastic (~8 min.). Place in a greased bowl, turn to coat, and let rise until doubled in size (~1 hour).
Combine 2C of warm water and baking soda in a dish. Once dough has risen, punch down and divide into 12 pieces. Roll each piece into a 3-ft rope, about pencil thin, and twist into a pretzel shape. Dip into the baking soda/water mixture and place on baking sheet. Allow to rise for 20-30 minutes.
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Bake in preheated oven for 8-10 minutes until golden brown. Brush with melted butter, sprinkle with salt, and enjoy!
Minneapolis came and went, but before we drown ourselves in Tex Mex and finish out the year we want to give it an appropriate send off.
Minneapolis Report Card
Food
B+
Beer
B-
Walkability
A-
Cost
B+
Weather
B-
Parks
A
Activities
C
Overall
B
Minneapolis was completely unplanned, but turned out to be a really solid experience. We arrived at the end of August when it was still hot and humid and swarming with mosquitoes and left at the end of October when the leaves had mostly fallen from the trees and there was more than a slight chill in the air. Having an actual season change was very welcome and it was even nicer knowing we wouldn’t be sticking around when the temperatures dropped below zero.
We were pleasantly surprised with the food options; coming to the midwest we didn’t have high expectations but we were blown away with the abundance of different food options and happily ate our fair share of food. A favorite of ours was Lotus, which happened to be right across the street from our apartment, but we also enjoyed the Brewer’s Table at Surly and World Street Kitchen (get the Korean rice bowl and thank us later) to name a few. We didn’t partake in as many breweries as we would’ve liked, but Fulton, Dangerous Man, and Sisyphus all had excellent brews – though we’d advise skipping Lakes and Legends unless you’re really into Belgians, which we are not. And if you find yourself in Menomonie, WI Lucette Brewing is worth a stop for some pies and pints.
Food and beer aside, Minneapolis had some top-notch parks which were incredibly accessible. We were able to walk all over the city to the Mississippi River and along the chain of lakes, and we were never further than 1/2 mile of a park. Being around so many natural lakes was so different than any other part of the country and, although she’s hardly a water dog, Snickers loved splashing along the banks and chasing all the migrating geese. We loved not having to drive much, especially coming from Denver where we were always in the car. The biggest drawback for us was having to adjust our expectations in regards to hiking. We sure did miss the mountains.
Would we go back? Probably not unless we were visiting friends/family – it’s just not a “vacation” city. Would we live there? Nope! While we thoroughly enjoyed our time there, we just wouldn’t be able to stomach the winters.
Stars in ThorpIce Age Trail
Mississippi River, MinneapolisMill District, Minneapolis
Coming from Oregon and Colorado we knew that we wouldn’t have access to the same level of hiking in Minnesota, but we did our best to find some places that satisfied our need to get outdoors. While we didn’t do nearly as many hikes the last few months, we were able to get our shoes muddy a handful of times.
Theodore Wirth Park
Theodore Wirth Park is located right in downtown Minneapolis. The park has an extensive mountain biking network that can also be utilized for hiking and trail running. During the week the bike traffic is lighter, which made it a great option for getting in some weekly trail runs. We typically ran the back loop, which is a great 5 mile option, but adding in loops from the front portion can easily get the mileage up in double digits.
6.2 mile (10 km) Theodore Wirth Park Trail Running loop Garmin tracks
T Wirth Park Run – I think I had big eyes filter on 🙂
St. Croix State Park
St. Croix State Park is located about 95 miles north of Minneapolis on the St. Croix River. The drive was much longer than we anticipated, but we enjoyed our day trip north. The park has miles of trails throughout for all fitness levels. We set out to hike the Two Rivers Trail, which goes along the St. Croix and Kettle Rivers. It was overcast and a little rainy that day, so the trail was all but deserted beyond the Kettle River Overlook. The trail was single track and mostly flat so we opted to run it instead. It ended up being an easy 8 miles and afforded great views along the river.
8 mile trail running loop in the St. Croix State Park Garmin Tracks
The Ice Age Trail is located entirely in Wisconsin and runs for more than 1,000 miles along the edge of Wisconsin’s last glacier. The trail runs through more than 30 counties and is primarily used for hiking and backpacking, though some sections are also open for snowmobiling, bicycling, and cross country skiing. The two times we visited Thorp, we took some time to hike a section of this trail. The first time we did a 3 mile out and back hike with Casey and the second time we ran the same 3 mile portion. The trail is heavily wooded and passes many lakes in the few miles we traversed.
3 mile trail running out and back on the Ice Age Trail near Perkinstown, WI
This totally fell off my radar, but on our last weekend in Colorado we got out and hiked South Boulder Peak. We initially set out to hike to Bear Peak, but when we reached the saddle some other hikers told us that South Boulder was less crowded so we changed course.
We started at the Mesa Trailhead just outside of Boulder. The trail winds its way through Shadow Canyon before climbing to the saddle where you can ascend to either Bear or South Boulder Peaks. The first part of the trail was very exposed; with no tree cover the Colorado sun can be relentless. Luckily the bulk of the hike was through a relatively forested area. The trail was quite steep and littered with boulders and pine trees as it wound it’s way up. We did lose the trail a couple of times, but enjoyed scrambling up the boulders and making our own way.
Devil’s thumb
Towards the top, before the saddle, there is a section of fire-scarred trail from a fire that broke out in 2012. That section was strangely eery after coming from the pine forest. The climb to the peak was relatively short – and strenuous – and the views from the top were magnificent.
Scarred section of trail
Once you summit, you are offered 360 degree views of the foothills and Eastern plains. We spent some time resting, taking photos, and trying to corral our mountain pup who loves bounding up rocks and going to edges and giving her humans a heart attack.
We made our way back down the mountain and treated ourselves to some beer and grub from Avery Brewing to celebrate another successful 6 mile hike and cheers to the end of our Colorado adventures (for now).
Our two months in Minneapolis came and went in the blink of an eye and now we’re en route to Austin to round out the year. We loved getting to see the leaves change and spend some time with family, but I can’t say we’re sad to leave the ever-dropping temperatures. Now, onto the land of chili, barbecue, and lax gun laws!
Most of you (does anyone still read these?) probably thought we only blogged about beer and hiking, but Minnesota has had us changing our tune. Instead of blogging about those two things we’ve blogged about…nothing. We’ve seriously neglected this poor blog and it’s become our own red headed stepchild.
Nevertheless, we’re here to tell you a little about Minnehaha Falls. A couple of weeks ago we decided to get out of our pj’s before noon and walk around Minnehaha Falls to Lake Hiawatha. It was a sunny, crisp fall day – perfect to be out exploring. We got to the falls along with apparently everyone else in Minneapolis. Having seen our fair share of waterfalls this year in Hawai’i and Oregon we weren’t overly impressed, so we spent most of our time walking the Grand Rounds. The leaves were changing and we just enjoyed our time leisurely walking along Minnehaha Creek and letting Snickers play in the water.
Minnehaha Falls
One really cool thing about Minneapolis is that 95% of residences are within a 10 minute walk or 1/2 mile of a park, so pretty much everywhere you turn there’s another park. And the best part is it’s not just a playground on some grass, it’s actual lakes and wooded areas. The Grand Rounds is a 50 mile parkway system around the city of Minneapolis that encompasses natural features of the area: creeks, lakes, woodlands, wetlands, etc. And it has quickly become one of our favorite features of the city.
Snickers at Lake Hiawatha
It was a great way to spend a (cold) fall afternoon!
So…we kind of phoned it in for August, which is a shame because it was such an easy pairing.
August’s pairing was watermelon and wheat beer. Totally easy, right?! We got really busy in August with the honeymoon and moving that we just found ourselves out of time, and by the time we finally got around to it watermelon was already out of season.
For this we ended up doing a beer and beer pairing, which ended up not being all that bad. We had some leftover beers from our wedding that ended perfectly fitting the bill. Our “watermelon” was New Belgium’s Heavy Melon – a watermelon lime ale that was crisp and refreshing. We followed this up with New Belgium’s Mothership Wit, which was spicy and crisp.
Well, we’re over halfway finished with our time in Minneapolis. It’s felt extremely busy and has flown by. Minneapolis was a spur of the moment decision during one too many drinks on our honeymoon, but we’ve been pleasantly surprised by how much we’re enjoying it here.
The weather started out warm and humid, but it quickly cooled off and we’ve been enjoying an extended fall – something you don’t really get in Kentucky. And, since we’re relatively close to Matt’s side of the family, we’ve been able to spend a couple of weekends with them. We haven’t gotten to many breweries or out on as many hikes as we did in Denver and Portland, which is likely do to just being busy and getting tired. In the 5 weeks we’ve been here, we spend 2 weekends in Thorp and 1 in Louisville so we really haven’t had as much time in the city as you’d think.
Aerial view of the courtyard from our apartmentMatt and Snickers play in the Mississippi River
We really like the amount of parks and lakes in the city – in fact, they designed Minneapolis so that practically no house is more than 5 blocks from a park. Pretty cool! The food scene has also blown us away. We’ve been pleasantly surprised by how many really good restaurants there are around us….and how the ethnic food is actually spiced well. We had a difficult time finding good food in Denver so we’re definitely indulging.
Loring Park fountain at night
We were able to make it to the Minnesota State Fair our first week here, which was a lot of fun and really different than the Kentucky State Fair. It’s the second largest attended fair in the country, behind Texas which runs for twice as long. We ate our weight in cheese and dairy and drank more than our fair share of beers. They had some great local brews from places like Surly and Fulton. Beth’s favorite part was the Princess Kay of the Milky Way butter sculptures and Matt’s was the All You Can Drink Milk booth. Unfortunately we didn’t get to partake in the milk since it was last call by the time we found it (yes, they had a “last call” on milk).
Minnesota State Fair
Butter sculpturesCheese haul from La Granders
Some things we’re liking:
Loring Park – just a block from our apartment and really nice to walk around during the day
Overall, we’re really liking our time up North. We’ve only got three weeks until we head down South for the winter, so we’ve got to squeeze in a lot more activities and beer.
[This is the second half of our honeymoon! Sit back and enjoy, we sure enjoyed doing this. -Matt]
After our week in Africa, we hopped on a plane headed to the Mediterranean. Greece has been at the top of Beth’s travel bucket list for as long as she can remember so this was literally a dream come true. We had initially planned to spend the first half of the week in Athens and then the latter half in Istanbul, but with all the unrest in Turkey we decided to extend our stay in Greece and travel to some of the islands instead. We ended up visiting Crete, Santorini, and Athens; all of them were beautiful and so different from each other despite being in such close proximity. Our main goal was to relax and enjoy ourselves with not much on our itinerary.
Our first stop was Crete, which is large enough to spend an entire week exploring. We took a flight from Athens to Heraklion and stayed right on the Gulf of Heraklion in the Sea of Crete. Our hotel room overlooked the port so we saw ferries coming and going all day. We stayed at the GDM Megaron and loved it. Our first day there started slowly with an indulgent breakfast – this hotel had one of the best continental breakfast spreads we’ve ever seen, including house-made confections and any specialty coffee you’d like – and some time at the rooftop pool. The weather was hot and humid but the water was refreshing.
Rooftop pool in Heraklion, Crete, Greece
From there we decided to explore the city on foot. Heraklion is a large metropolis with lots of people and shops. We found a Greek coffee roaster and picked up some beans to take home with us. While wandering around we stumbled upon an old bastion around the city. Since we were the only ones there, we ended up spending the entire day walking along the bastion and viewing the city from above. It encircled the city and ended at the water where we dipped our toes before eating some fresh seafood and gyros. The food in Greek was so fresh and delicious. That evening we found a small beach and went swimming; it was crowded even at 8pm! The water was so salty, calm, and buoyant that we were able to float without exerting much energy. It was incredibly peaceful and a lot a fun.
[The Greek coffee at this roaster left a bit to be desired, but we use it for some good cold brew once we add a bit of coconut milk. -Matt]
Greek roaster in Crete
Artistic shot of the coffee bean dispensers
Sitting on the balustrade around heraklion
The Mediterranean from Crete!
Crete
We had read that the Samaria Gorge was one of the must do things in Crete, so the next day we drove across the island to do the 11 mile hike. Let’s just say, before we even made it to the trailhead we knew our time would’ve been better spent staying in Heraklion. The drive itself was about 3 hours, which should’ve tipped us off to skip this adventure, but the hikers in us pushed on. The trail was relatively easy: it was very rocky and a bit technical, but it was all downhill. We finished the 11 miles in under 3 hours. The trail ends in Agia Roumeli where we had some ice cream and dipped our feet into the Libyan Sea. From there we had to take an hour long ferry ride to Sougia followed by a 2-ish hour bus ride back to the trailhead. It was an exhausting day to say the least. Overall we would NOT recommend the hike unless you’re staying in Chania and have more than 2 days on the island.
[I agree- if you have only a few days in Crete, skip the all-day (and expensive) trip to Samaria Gorge. And if you have been to a place like the Red River Gorge in Kentucky, you have seen better, in my opinion. -Matt]
Bridge to ghost town in Samaria Gorge, Crete
Iron Gates in Samaria Gorge, Crete
From Crete we took a 2 hour ferry ride to Santorini. Santorini is idyllic Greece and is likely what you picture in your head when you hear the word. We had a little issue with the rental car company, which ended with us being charged a ridiculous amount for a Smart Car, but that’s a story for another day. We stayed in Oia surrounded by gorgeous whitewashed cave houses topped with bright blue domes. Matt booked us an amazing cave house in Finikia, just a short walk to Oia. If we had more time here (sadly we only had about 30 total hours) we would’ve gladly holed up in the cave. These houses were former wineries and maintained much of the original structure including large vats in the floors used to collect the grape juices.
Santorini, Greece – This is one of the postcard views
What a view of Santorini!
Sitting area in Santorini
Cave house in Santorini- very cool
We trekked down 300 stairs to Amoudi Bay and swam in the warm waters (highly, highly recommended if you go), ate fresh fish at a restaurant on the water, and watched the gorgeous sunset on our way back up. It gets very crowded at sunset because it’s apparently a very famous spot to watch, so restaurants fill up and the narrow streets get packed like sardines. Before we had to leave the next day we stopped for some beer at Santorini Brewing Company – we tasted the Red Donkey, Yellow Donkey, and Crazy Donkey (our favorite of the bunch) and took a bottle of Slow Donkey (a wine barrel aged brew) to enjoy outside.
Sunset in Santorini; how romantic!
300 steps to get to the iconic bay in Santorini
How fantastic to have a boat in this Santorini bay
Beautiful, clear Santorini water
St. Nicholas church in the background of this Santorini swimming hole
I just couldn’t do it, but it looks like fun!
Sunset in Santorini
Our last stop of the vacation was Athens. We stayed in downtown and were walking distance to everything. Our hotel had a spectacular view of the Acropolis; it’s pretty amazing to have breakfast and cocktails surrounded by ancient ruins. We spent most of our time in Athens leisurely exploring the city on foot. Our first full day we went to the Acropolis – word of warning it is very crowded in the morning. We ended up paying more for a private tour because the line was so long, but if you go later in the day there is practically no line. Between the Parthenon, the temples, and the theaters (which are still used for concerts!) we were in awe the whole time. The amount of architecture they’ve preserved is amazing – in order to restore the buildings they must have 70% of the original structure. [You can see the restored pieces are much more white-colored than the original pieces which are more yellow/beige -Matt]
We spent a couple of hours walking around the grounds and exploring some of the sights not pointed out on the tours. If you walk around the perimeter there are caves to the gods, churches from the Turkish rule, and so much more. [You HAVE TO walk round the perimeter of the Acropolis, around the Festival Road, since so much of it is off the beaten track, but still so much a part of the history of the Acroplis-Matt]
Heavy construction on the front side of the Parthenon on top of the Acropolis
Yeah… Lots of gorgeous, ancient steps in Athens
Sampling some Greek brews!
You can see RESTORED pieces in white and originals in the more beige color
What a beautiful day in the acropolis
Matt posing in the Acropolis (could he have been an Ancient Greek muse??)
Walking down the street you’re likely to see some ancient ruins preserved right next to a modern high rise; the juxtaposition was unreal. We visited the gardens and walked around the Agora as well. We ate a lot, napped a little, and capped off our evenings with a glass of wine or Ouzo just enjoying the last of our vacation and the start of married life.
Acropolis night shot from our hotel rooftop bar
Acropolis night shot from our hotel rooftop bar
Acropolis night shot from our hotel rooftop bar — just wanted you to see how close we were to it
Combined with Africa, this truly was a trip of a lifetime and one we’ll never forget. [It was a long trip to get from South Africa to Greece, which had it’s own story to it, but it was truly beautiful and we are glad we had such a diverse experience even in the short time we had for the honeymoon. -Matt]
mattandbethtravels 