Day 34: July 11, 2026. Minneapolis MN

Ann dropped Patti off in time for she and Dick to go to friends' house to join them for a Women's Basket professional game: The MN Lynx and the NY Liberty. Our friend Naomi has been a season ticket holder for a number of years, and she knew all of the tricks to have a wonderful experience.  We were joined by their daughter, Anna, and then her wife Diane joined us later for lunch.

Besides the logistics of going to a game where 1000's of others are going, it was great to figure of a secret parking spot at a very low prices, and then get oriented in how to enjoy everything from the warm ups, to cheering the team on in their electric slide dance when they won.  It is amazing at how loud the crowd is when they get riled up.

The game was exciting and both Dick and Patti knew many of the players on both teams.  We are fans of this basketball league, but there are no teams near us.  We especially enjoyed seeing some of the stars who are so terrific. Some of the shots were crazy good.  And, in the end, the Lynx won which was very fun. Everyone was of their feet for a long time. It was a great event.

On the walk from the Target Center to where we would eat lunch, Patti had to stop by the statue of Mary Tyler Moore from her time from 1970-1977 as the star of The Mary Tyler Moore Show which was set in Minneapolis.

The lunch was nice, again getting caught up.  We had a great server and enjoyed the food. Diane rode her bike downtown and back home.  And she avoided all of the traffic. Anna just graduated from college and is headed off to be a Fulbright Scholar, so it was great to hear about her plans. Always nice to get together with long time friends.

We were in Minneapolis where so much happened this past winter during the invasion of the city by ICE. Sadly two residents were killed by ICE during this painful time. The residents of the city have honored both Renee Good and Alex Pretti with spontaneous memorials at the locations where they died. The city had protected the memorials by routing traffic away from them. We found each of them and took time to think about what had happened. It was really sobering! As we left each one we had quiet conversation about how we had experienced the time at the memorials. Such a real mood shift from earlier in the day.

Then, we went home to bed.  Tomorrow would be another busy day with friends. 

Day 33: July 10, 2026. Minneapolis MN

The day started on a rough note.  Patti started to not feel well in the night.  Her friend, Ann, who she was to spend the day and night with, brought her over a test kit and she tested negative for COVID and Flu A and B.  Yay!  Good news.

That meant that Patti could go off and have some nice adventures with Ann.  They went to Minnehaha Falls Park (although never got to see the falls).  Then off to another lovely park, Wood Lake Nature Center. It was such a nice day to walk around the lake, talk and see so many wonderful birds and animals including muskrats and turtles.  All of the green was so appreciated. It is so brown and dry in San Diego this time of year.

For dinner, Patti joined Ann's family at her daughter's down town Minneapolis restaurant.  It is always fun to catch up on family news, and the food was outstanding.

Meanwhile, Dick had a day just to himself including a nice dinner out, and then watching World Cup soccer in Spanish on our funky AirBnB TV.  You can follow a whole lot in Spanish even if you don't understand the language. We have caught a lot of World Cup games during this trip.

A good day being back in the Twin Cities which is where Dick and Patti met over 35 years ago.

Day 30, 31, and 32: July 7, 8, and 9, 2026 Rochester, Minnesota, and eventually Minneapolis, Minnesota

The next two days drastically changed in terms of the focus. We were very grateful we were in Rochester to be helpful, as well as Patti’s sister. Paula was back from her leg cabin to get some dental work done and so she was available. And then the main stay was Patti’s brother, Perry.  He lives three blocks away from Mom and is her primary caregiver.  He does an amazing job.

The next two days consisted of taking shifts of spending time with our mother at the local hospital. There Patti, Paula, and Perry worked together as a team splitting shifts to have time there supporting Mom.

So following an opportunity to be at the hospital to say goodbye,Perry, and Paula supported Patti and Dick continuing on our way as was our original plan. We needed to start our journey home which will happen over the next week and a half and include about 3000 miles.

Early afternoon on the ninth brought us to our suite Airbnb home in South Minneapolis. There we would settle in for several days of resting and visit visiting friends.

The visit to Rochester didn’t end the way we had helped. But we were grateful to be able to do a little to help with the family. Oh, it’s so hard to be so far away from family as their age.

Early afternoon on the ninth brought us to Minneapolis. We could see a variety of signs that clearly linked to the struggle with ICE earlier in the year. South Minneapolis, where we are staying, was a the heart of ICE action, including where they killed two people. We will visit those sites over the next few days. We found our Airbnb home in where we would settle in for several days of resting and visit visiting friends.

Day 28 and 29: July 5 and 6, 2026 Rochester, Minnesota to Eau Claire, Wisconsin back to Rochester

Sunday morning brought us to church at Bethel Lutheran Church. This is a church where Patti grew up and her mom has been a member of for nearly 60 years. It was lovely to see their head Pastor, Anjeanette. She is a very special long-term minister with our family. Always lovely to see her. And the service was full of really well done patriotic music with a very fine inclusive message. It was nice just to be able to stretch out the Fourth of July, a little bit longer.

After lunch, we headed off to Wisconsin. We first stopped at the National Eagle Center in Wabasha. This area has a tremendous amount of bald eagles, especially in the winter. The Center participates in rescue and educational programs. We’ve been here one time before, but we really were glad to see their latest exhibits. One of their animal educators was available to talk to us for quite some time before a bus load of people from a river cruise arrived. We were glad those people were getting a chance to experience the wonders of these magnificent birds. And, we enjoyed a special exhibit about the American bicentennial centered around an eagle theme.

The drive was so very green.  Green is a color that when you see it in souther California in the summer means there has been intensive irrigation, not rain. We mis the green!!

Another hour further down the road, we came to the home of our nephew, Matt and his new wife Sofie. We were at their wedding a few weeks ago and we were really pleased to get the opportunity to come and see them in their home. We had a delightful evening together over dinner and sharing stories of our African safari and their lives. We appreciated hearing about Sofie's role as a middle-school Social Studies teacher and volleyball coach. She is so creative in her approach to teaching. Matt is an accountant in an agency helping people with employment and housing needs. He loves being part of an organization helping people,. They are really a wonderful young couple and it was fun to hear about their work and other things going on in their lives.

Then we were back to Rochester ready to settle in for several more days before we needed to hit the road.

It was a quiet day on Monday the sixth. Dick became more and more sure that it wasn’t allergies or a cold that he had picked up while we were in Africa, but indeed  a sinus infection. We got some help from our local family to find the easiest urgent care and had a really positive experience there where they confirmed yes it was a sinus infection and yes, he needed antibiotics. He was really tired of feeling so tired and having his head hurt so much. So we were pleased to get the medication and he was needing and to spend extra time sleeping just fighting off the infection.

Patti went back to her brother's home to use his WiFi to complete several work obligations.  While there she looked out the back window to see a deer. Perry and Jodie feed them in the winter but here was one on a warm Summer Day.

As we were about to go over to another nephew's house, Josh and his partner Makiah, Patti’s mom had a terrible fall as she tried to step out the front door to check her mail. She was able to call for help from a jogger who was running by, who alerted us.  Patti then called her brother. It was clear that Joan had really hurt her leg and, after quite a struggle, we got her into Perry’s car and he whisked her away to the emergency room.

She was seen by a doctor with x-rays and scans, and it was clear that she had broken three bones at the bottom of her leg and ankle. So she was admitted to the hospital and the long week of dealing with the medical system was underway.

Day 26 and 27: July 3 and 4, 2026 Rochester, Minnesota

So we are really back in the US, although not really on the right time yet. Jet lag can really kick your butt, especially when it’s a seven hour difference.

Both of us tried our best to sleep in but woke up too darn early. Dick appears to have picked up some kind of a sinus infection and is needing extra sleep right now. It’s nice that we have some time. We have about a week at Patti’s mom’s where we can kind of kick back, have some family time and relax.

In the morning of the third, Patti had some work things to print off for work and was able to do that over at her brother Perry‘s house. Then, Perry, his wife, Jodi, and Patti and Dick hung out for a while and then went out for lunch. Jodie was taking advantage of it being a holiday for 3 July so she felt like she was really sneaking away to be able to go out for lunch on a Friday.

Next, we went and got the oil changed on our car which we knew needed to happen while we were on the trip. So nice to be able to hook up with a local Toyota dealership and get the 30,000 mile check up with our car and oil change so we’re now good to get us back to San Diego.

For dinner, we went out to Canadian Honkers. This is an iconic Rochester restaurant that was started years ago when there were lots of Canadian geese in a park in downtown Rochester. They were attracted to the open water year-round due to the power plant. We all ordered the all you can eat shrimp and walleye. We are not starving on this trip. Eating so much food.

Then a quiet evening and off to bed.

We woke up early on the Fourth of July thinking happy 250th birthday USA. It’s a strange and odd birthday time. There have several years recently that we’ve been in Rochester on the Fourth of July, and the plan is to join Patti‘s brother and sister-in-law down at the local park for a concert and watching fireworks. Crossing our fingers it won’t be raining.

The concert in the park was excellent.  Everyone had a wonderful time.  We all settled in following the concert to wait for the fireworks to begin.  They started at 9:45 and were lovely. And then they stopped at 9:47. Everyone sat and waited.  Was there some type of problem with the fireworks, maybe a computer glitch.  Most people stayed in place.  Finally after around 15 minutes, they turned the flood lights on.  Was it REALLY over so soon?  No announcements, and people began to leave.. Over the next few minutes, as the crowd was moving, we could hear the thunder, and then the rain started lightly. We wished the people in front of us felt more urgency. We were not too wet by the time we were at the car but the skies soon opened and heavy rain began to fall.  

No one could understand what had happened. A two minute fireworks display was not what we expected! Later we found out it was a perfect storm of troubles:  It was reported that some of the fireworks crew had heat stroke, which was surprising since it wasn't that hot. There were other technical problems with setting the fireworks off. And then the storm was coming. Since they had already taken down the sound system so no way to give announcements.  A rather dud of a way to celebrated the 250th year of the US.  But, as many people said, maybe appropriate for the type of year we had had.  Happy Independence Day!