Skip to main content

Faribault Bike Ride Makes Us Buy Meadow a New to Her Bike

Scott had some shoots south of the metro so we tagged along for the day. 

After shooting the quickest shoots I've ever done we ended up in Faribault. We got food at the lowest rated Mexican restaurant in the southern Minnesota city. My instincts say these folks don't have a taste for authentic Mexican food and I was right. Restaurante El Colibri was so good.

The trick to finding good Mexican food is avoiding the places that have the typical Mexican restaurant decor, you know the ones with the painted seats. 

We brought along our bikes so we could take the Sakatah Singing Hills  State Trail. 15 miles from Fairbault is the namesake Sakatah Lake State Park. There they have 4 bike in camp spots (they were reduced to two because of COVID). We thought about bike camping there , but sites are first come first served and we'd hate to bike there with all our stuff only to find they were full.

Always doing tricks.

Instead we just went for a nice, really flat, bike ride.



The trail was mostly right next to the highway. I'm not sure I'd call the roar of trucks soothing.

It was still a nice change of scenery. Normally we only bike in the city. 

When we got to Warsaw, Minnesota we decided to turn around and follow the roads along Cannon Lake.

There's Cannon Lake, Theo.


We had passed by Shager Park and promised the kids we'd stop at the swing set on the way back.

These kids sure do love swings.

whoa.

Other than the Trumpkins this wasn't a bad park.

While biking the trail I noticed Meadow had to keep standing up to keep up with us. We knew her bike was a little small for her and were planning to wait until next spring to get her a new one. When I looked up bike sizes for kids we realized she was riding a bike two sizes too small. 

I talked Brooke out of getting a cheapo bike and buying a nice, gender neutral, bike that Theo could use down the road. We found this lightly used REI Co-op bike with gears and about 1/4 of the price it retails for. Rich people selling their stuff on Facebook Marketplace are great (RIP Craigslist).

I'm glad we picked one that had gears and hand brakes. Already I could tell she was riding so much better.

The bike also came with stickers to customize it. She added her name and a few others. 

I liked the simplicity of the bike and didn't think it needed all the other accessories she had on her old bike. We let her keep the doll seat though. Also notice the ant stickers she chose.

That was my touch. I now always make jokes about ants crawling up her bike seat; the ant stickers are the perfect foil for dad jokes.

We raised her seat when we got back home and took a nice ride through the neighborhood. Cool, ride Meadow boo.

The dad we purchased it from said he would take his daughter to the Theo Wirth Mountain Bike Trails. I know we don't need another outdoor activity, but I'd love to find an inexpensive mountain bike for me to go with her. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Iron Range Camping for Work and Fun

Scott had more shoots this weekend. This time it took us way up north. With Meadow back in school we left Friday afternoon.  Luckily Meadow's teacher canceled their afternoon meeting and we were able to leave earlier than we planned. To break up the long drive we camped for the night at Mille Lacs Kathio State Park . We booked the last site, I can't believe people are still camping. When we were setting up our tent Meadow said, "Why are other people so close to us?" We don't go to normal campgrounds very often I guess.  We set up early and went on a hike before dinner. We should have brought our canoe along, but a hike would do.

Meadow's 13th Birthday Party

We woke up to down pouring rain.  Once the rain had slowed down, Theo and I walked over to the Kingfield Farmers Market. Theo picked another Bundt cake as his treat. I have never seen it so dead.  I got some rhubarb to make jam and Israeli bagels that I wasn't expecting to be long. On our walk home we also picked up some free pots and a Minecraft book.  Both of our vacuums have bit the dust. I was trying to hold out until Black Friday to buy another one when I saw there was deals thanks to Prime Day. Theo said he's never seen me this excited before, not even my birthday.  I used up all of my gift cards I'd earned from Medica. Yeah, I know, it's weird. Walking for two years got us a vacuum. I had vacuumed in the morning with our old vacuum and then again with our new one. Ew. Usually I'm the one stressing out before guests come over but this time it was Scott.  We both have blind spots for different parts of the house I guess. We originally thought we'd have her ...

Backcountry Camping with Kids in Theodore Roosevelt National Park

Day 1  Back in May I stumbled upon Theodore Roosevelt National Park. I had no idea there was a National Park in North Dakota and that it was the northern end of the Badlands. Usually our summer vacations coincide with Scott's work trips. Since he didn't have any this summer I thought we should take advantage of actually taking a vacation. What, my workcations are always classics? I suppose a second real vacation this year wouldn't hurt. We definitely have more time than normal. As long as we took Covid-19  precautions and avoided people. We finally settled on a time to go. Blake joined us so we borrowed our dad's van so we could ride together. Scott had just driven from Michigan the day before. Blake had met my parents in Wisconsin to get the van and then drove from Duluth to pick us up. I offered to drive since I literally only drive twice a month.  I was still pretty tired from a long drive home. Since we were near Fergus Falls we had to stop by the abandoned state ho...