Today began with a breakfast of champions.

Straight from the Bain-Marie at our hotel.

Rumour has it, this is egg – beside it is bacon.

MoD, who likes to put a positive spin on everything, speculated that the ‘bacon’ was probably healthier than the real thing.

Post our brekkie, we headed off to find the mandatory soy latte.

No luck, but we did find a coconut latte……ok, that would do. Not too bad. 

Then onwards to the reunion meeting spot (Holiday Inn) where a group met to do a walk/run fundraiser for RADD-Run Against Destructive Decisions.

We thought the walk would be at least 10km so arrived aptly prepared including hats, sunscreen and water.

As it turned out it was only 4.82km. Perfect, given the day was already upwards of 20 degrees Celsius (68ish you Americans). 

We headed up part of the 400 mile Woods Trail. 1.41km to be exact.

Turned around and came back.

I have to say we are a good looking lot.

Post that walk, some of the party claimed to be heading into the bar for Bloody Mary’s. 

Well it was 10.30am you know!

We of course, did not. Being the respectable peeps we are.

Or maybe because at our age, the liver screams too much and we had to save ourselves for the finale school reunion evening. Tonight. 

We then went in search of another coffee. 

Life is short, I need to stay awake for it.

We found a place right in town that served bitter as hell coffee. 

But it was soy, and MoD does indulge me, so I was loathe to complain. 

Post coffee we decided a bike ride might be in order. 

We did a perfunctory google for bike rentals and headed off.

Few blocks this way, few blocks that way. Bit of off the track downtown wandering. 

In the heat. I was starting to get warm.

We should have just waited for the iPhone to tell us. After all, whenever we express a desire for anything, within a few moments THE Book (that would be Facebook) starts sending us adds.  Such a coincidence.

Turns out if we had looked up when we left the coffee shop, we would have seen the bike rental place across the road.

Which turns out, doesn’t do that anymore and they redirected us back to the Holiday Inn, where we had just finished our high school reunion walk. 

By the time this all transpired, of course we had to go back to the hotel for a nanna nap. Once we were refreshed and energised, we headed off to check out that bike rental. Even though, by this time in the day, I had to admit that HELL, it WAS actually hot!

Never mind, we were on a mission to ride around the lake.

Which we did.

Detroit Lakes is a BIG lake. Still, the bike renter guy assured us we could do it easily in the two hours we rented the bikes.

About half way around the lake, I pretty much lost my will to live.

It seemed like such a LONG way. And we weren’t stopping, not for photos, not for black squirrels, not for anything. We had two hours to get around! We did it in 1.10.

It was windy. Naturally the wind was against me. Like it always is.

Don’t like wind. Or hills.

Or any incline.

Or heat.

Or rain.  The list goes on.

Not sure why I bike. Although my usual biking is on the flat in perfect conditions. As befits my status in life. 

There are some fancy schmancy houses on the edge of that lake.

And a black squirrel 😊 which we didn’t get a photo of……

The boats at the lake are at least 90% Pontoons. MoD wondered if they use them to conserve gas (petrol you Aussies).  Nope, MoD. Look at the ‘donks’ on those babies, as big as any donks on any ski boat I have ever encountered. 

Of course I had to explain what a donk was.

Seriously, bloody Nu Zulander/Americanite.

It’s the motor, boyfriend. 

That big thing sitting on the back of the boat.

Dangling, if you will. 

Anyho, after our bike ride, it was back to the hotel for another nanna nap before the evening farewell high school reunion function.

And what a hoot! (That’s an American saying, I am sooooo integrating).

Seriously, such a great group of people, interesting, really kind, nice and fun.

And really interesting food as well. Stuff I would never eat in Aus. Hell I probably couldn’t find it in Aus. Oh wait. I live in NZ. Stuff I would never eat in NZ.

New besties from Washington State and Colorado.

There was a band for the start of the evening but they left far too early.  Damn, I was just getting into that toe tapping good ‘ole country music.

Actually it was a mixture and I quite enjoyed it. 

Oh well, we probably needed an early night after all that socialising and catching up on 1977. Or was it 1997?

So we headed back to the hotel at a relatively reasonable hour only to have a band blasting from the pub next door until oneish.

Sigh.

I felt like an old person and wanted to complain to the front desk.

But I didn’t.

Instead we watched American TV.

There are many many channels on America Network TV, we may have about 30 or 40 in this hotel. 

You might think that’s great. Well to be honest, anything is better than NZ TV.

But.

And this is a big BUT.

For every ten minutes there are 10-11 adds. I know this, cause I counted them.

For every 10-11 adds, at least 40% are pharmaceutical adds.

For every pharmaceutical add that goes for 2 minutes, 1 minute is dedicated to contraindications.

Sleep it is.

Before I go though, here is some trivia.

To turn the power switches on here, you switch up.

The Holiday Inn has a TV in the ladies bathroom AND you can recharge in their couches.

Sleep awaits. Battle Lake tomorrow.