I’m sitting on a plane back home right now (Jerome, destination Minneapolis-St.Paul), I just took off from Mexico City airport. More on that trip in the next post! There has been some criticism lately that there has not been any news about me and Seraina, and I thought this is the perfect opportunity to continue our story about what has happened during the last 3 months! This is going to be a one-sided post, Seraina’s life has not seen as much travel as mine has. Therefore, the below is written out of Jerome perspective.
I left you on a cliffhanger that I was going to Idaho (and some other place maybe?). However, I just found that I left out some things that had happened even before that. So, I will cliffhang you even more.
First, I did a short road trip at the end of August to a small city called “Arnolds Park”, just at the border between Minnesota and Iowa. There is a small amusement park there that I visited, containing two rollercoasters. Find some pictures below. Besides that, the city is very picturesque, lying directly at the shores of a small lake.
Another important mention is the Minnesotan State Fair! While we know fairs as such in Europe as well, the ones here are on a completely different scale. The State Fair takes place on a piece of land in between Saint Paul and Minneapolis. It has first taken place in 1859 and has since grown to an absurd size. The area it takes place on is built for this sole purpose only, and different companies have built infrastructure there just for the 12 days per year the fair is open. Highest attendance on one day was 270 thousand people. The fair contains pretty much everything you could imagine, starting from different kinds of vendors, forming one huge open air department store (you can buy anything from a crane to a dog treat). At the same time, there is a big emphasis on crafts, arts, and livestock, all with awards (for the best cow or bread). And there is also a rides section with carousels and such.
Most importantly, the fair is all about food. This seems to be attendants’ goal: Eat as much food as possible. This is easier said than done: People are crazy enough to stand in lines longer than one hour to get a pizza or any other food. Based on local’s behavior, it is then common to brag about the different foods that you have eaten at the fair. Let me do that now as well, we had corn dipped in butter, a bucket of fries, corn dogs and finally a dill/pickle beer (sorry Molly, but that one was disgusting!).
Now we can talk about my trip to Idaho! I flew into Salt Lake City, sadly did not have time to do any sightseeing as I had a meetup planned in the evening in Idaho Falls, where also our customers facilities are located. After a beer and some fresh Idahoan fries (Idaho is known for potatoes. And seemingly only that. Idaho Falls even has a potato museum!)
The next day, after our customer visit in the morning, I had a full afternoon ahead of me with no plans. I decided to drive to Grand Teton National Park, just below Yellowstone National Park. I must say, this was an amazing road trip, I think I can let the pictures speak for themselves.
One thing worth mentioning is that I, by chance, found a small alpine coaster on the way back. Of course, I had to ride it! After that, it was already time to fly home.
One week later, I was attending Pack, a trade show with focus on packaging and manufacturing. And this show took place in Sin City. Yes, I travelled to Las Vegas! 😊
First of all, it was very hot when I arrived. Somewhere between 35 and 40 degrees C, about 100 freedom units. I arrived on Saturday, with all Sunday left to explore, so I stayed at the hotel up until the evening as it was just too hot to go outside. Some early arrivers and I went out for dinner that night, and then a bit later toured the strip. I must say that I was very impressed by all the bling and kitsch. What they built into that desert is surreal. Both sides of the strip can be walked, and you can pass from building to building (AC’d zone to AC’d zone). Some smaller (but still wide!) side roads act like an enclosure for that cold air, cooling down outside areas. Most buildings have open doors at all times, meaning that you constantly cycle between 35 and 20 degrees C.
When walking up and down the strip are never further away then about 10 meters from a slot machine. At the airport, the terminals have walkways on both sides of the building, enclosing slot machines in the middle, so you can gamble up to your final boarding call.
The architecture is also fascinating. They built small New York, a Pyramid, an Eiffel Tower, and the newest addition, the “Sphere”, a huge spherical LED screen that makes night day.
Important to mention is the food! I was lucky enough to eat breakfast at the “Peppermill”, a restaurant famous for its many appearances in American television (that amount of food would feed anyone a whole day, at least twice). And I had the chance to try Wagyu beef for the first time at a Gordon Ramsey restaurant – I was very impressed!
Besides all this glitter and showing off wealth, I want to close my report about Las Vegas by mentioning the bad circumstances many people must live in – in and around of Las Vegas. Two blocks from the strip you are confronted with the hard reality that is a lot of homeless people begging at intersections, sleeping in makeshift tents, in places that are deemed unsafe at night. Las Vegas for sure displays the extremes that exist in the United States best, from pomposity to the poorest of the poor in just a couple of meters, and it should remind you in how fast any human can fall in this country. And I feel very sorry for the ones that do and find themselves in such a horrible situation.
Back in Minneapolis, I went to my first Baseball game (a minor league game hosted by “the Saints”). I really enjoyed the atmosphere. Between innings games were played. One of which I have to tell about here. I would call it “shuffle the group”, where 5 people all had a sign each with a big letter on it. Goal: Reposition yourself in a way that those letters form a word. The letters were S N T I W. It is important to mention that Minneapolis has a baseball team as well. And we were in the twin cities. And that that team is called the Twins.
Well, those unfortunate humans were not able to spell the word TWINS in 60 seconds. We all laughed and shouted and cheered. With tears in our eyes for different reasons. :’D
I also went on an excursion with Molly to Adventureland in Altoona, IA. Some of the coasters were not ridable (were already put dormant for winter), but the ones that were ridable were a lot of fun. The Gerslauer Eurofighter coaster called “Monster” was the best of the bunch. The park was not well themed, and we were unhappy about the very small food selection available (we found some fries and some bad looking burgers, that was basically it!). Sorry folks, no Nerdtalk this time, just not enough to talk about!
My final trip that I will mention in this report was a 1.5 week trip across the mid-west. Starting in St. Louis, I had barbeque twice on the same day (and both times it was absolutely fantastic!). The next day I travelled to Decatur IL, then Jonesboro AR, with nothing special worth mentioning. The next day, we transferred over to Memphis, where we spent the night and had the chance to check out famous Beale Street. Memphis is known for its blues scene, and we then had dinner in a diner on Beale Street. On our way back to the hotel, someone from our travel party (an actual US-American) mentioned that he wanted to quickly take a look at the architecture of one of the hotels, as he deemed it special. We walked into the lobby of that hotel and found ourselves in a beautiful lobby that was an open bar. On a sign next to a big indoor fountain it said: “Slippery when wet, No coins, No petting”. Confused I turned to my colleagues and told them about this, until we realized that this was actually that famous hotel where Ducks walk up to the indoor fountain twice a day and take a swim in it. I had heard about this story before, and we laughed at the coincidence.
From Memphis we flew to Detroit the next day, where we visited another of our customers. Located in Sandusky OH, we stayed that weekend. Friday, the whole Buhler crew went out and enjoyed a nice dinner near the seafront, after which we joined a very loud concert in a shack in the small city port. Sadly, Saturday was very rainy, no chance of going outside. I planned to visit Cedar Point, but the weather just did not want to improve the whole day. Sunday, the weather was better, and we drove over to Cleveland to see a major league football game: Browns vs. 49ers. Before the game, we participated in what is called “Tailgating”, a tradition where people set up camp in front of the stadium, barbequing and having a good time. The atmosphere inside the stadium was fantastic. In contrary to soccer games in Europe, all fans sit spread out randomly throughout the stadium (no home or guest sector). People are all kind and nice to each other, even if they are fans for the opposing team! Very impressive!
The Browns finally (the local team, the underdogs of the game) won the game spectacularly, 9 seconds before the end of the last quarter, after the 49ers did not hit a kick from the 25 yard line (this is fairly close). In consequence, the stadium exploded 😊. This was amazing to watch.
After driving back to Sandusky, I took my chance and went to Cedar Point for the last 45mins of its opening time and was able to ride “Magnum XL 200”, a legendary steel roller coaster. This coaster broke multiple records when it opened many years ago, and I chose it as the first and only ride I was able to go on that day. Cedar Point is one of the most popular and famous amusement parks, and it is a real shame I could not stay there longer. I will be back!
And this is it! I know that this post is very long, and I will keep it shorter next time (publishing a bit more often would also help) 😊. As previously stated, I was just abroad in Mexico, and will tell you about that next time. We are now preparing for winter and will soon be heading out for my first and Seraina’s second vacation here in the US. Not telling yet where we will go, but locals here thinks that we are either dumb or insane in what we are going to do. You will have to wait for the next post to find out why 😊. See you soon! Below some fall pictures from up here, it is absolutely stunning!
