Looking For Trouble On The Middle Coast

I fear in my last couple of posts I may have been a little hard on the Middle Coast. There is more here than corn fields and straight roads. In fact, with a little open-minded exploration, it is even possible to find a twisty bit here and there. And even if the roads are straight, or just gently curved, one thing the area has in abundance is natural beauty.

Over the weekend, I took the Triumph out for a little exercise and exploration.  The two of us found a few interesting places.

Maybe you've noticed, maybe you haven't - it might just be people who are into aviation that do - but there are little airports everywhere.  My explorations took me past Flying Cloud airport. Flying Cloud is actually pretty major, as small airports go. They average about 341 aircraft operations per day, and get a fair amount of small jet traffic. Also, they're close enough to the largest amusement park in the upper Midwest* that said amusement park has to limit the height of its rides in order to comply with FAA regulations.

Looks like pilots may have a "loud pipes save lives" contingent as well.

Continuing on from the airport, I found myself nicely in the middle of nowhere again within five minutes.  Only this particular middle of nowhere has a lot of trees, and roads with curves and stuff.  Fun times!

"Why haven't we ridden this way before?"
"I'm still figuring out the lay of the land, Triumph..."

In this particular neck of the woods, a lot of the residential areas have some wonderfully curvy roads too. Obviously, there wasn't any high speed hooning in residential areas, but I'll take whatever twists and turns I can get.

"This is far more fun than the farm country was, Lucky."

Actually, there wasn't much high speed tomfoolery at all this weekend. For one thing, the roads here are in just spectacularly bad shape. A good part of my attention was focused on simply avoiding road hazards. The other part was avoiding Minnesota drivers. See how they're all bunched up in this photo?  That's how people drive here at all times, regardless of conditions. You'd think we were in the urban jungle, not the middle of nowhere.

"OK, I'm kind of enjoying this.  I still need new shoes, though."
"Yes, Triumph, we're going to get you new shoes soon."

I've been digging around on the Roadside America site**, and I'm getting a little excited about taking the Triumph to check out some of the goofy roadside stuff we've got here on the Middle Coast. Paul Bunyan and Babe statues? We've got 'em. Giant twine ball? Oh yes. Big fiberglass chicken next to the road?  You betcha! There's lots of good stuff, expect more to come.

*Thanks for that turn of phrase, Chris Cope.
**Thanks for reminding me of that resource, Fuzzy.