On the Sunday before the U of M journey, Grant wanted to hit up Grand Avenue for some lunch and sunshine. I obliged and brought the camera for a short journey.
This is my favorite pic out of the group. The kid sitting on the statue was being yelled at off-screen by his mother. Obviously, the statue is not meant to be climbed. He paid no mind and surveyed the lay of the land from his new perch. I had no idea that statue-climbing would become more relevant on Monday...
Future Urban Explorer
This one below is for a friend with a strange obsession with weiner dogs. It's about a three-and-a-half foot tall carving that looks rooted in the yard. We didn't get close enough to examine if it was a statue simply dug in or if it was carved directly from what used to be a tree.
We happened across Summit Lookout Park a bit later on. The park itself was rededicated in 2008 and features a nice, barren patch of grass lined with benches. There is also a dedicated brick walkway surrounding an interesting statue of an eagle owning a snake. The park itself is set high above a road where Summit splits off to the left - the name of the street escapes me. It provides, fittingly, a bird's-eye view of part of downtown St. Paul.
It was a gorgeous day, and these folks took advantage by playing croquet. They're all very formally dressed, as you can see. This was on the first nice, hot(tish) day of the summer so I could imagine some of them were a tad uncomfortable. Still, this is a great use of the public park.
Seriously. Croquet? I like their style.
The Brave
The Snake
We saw a house not much further on which appeared to be hosting some kind of upper-crust social function. Further investigation confirmed our beliefs - there was an open house piano recital just inside. Completely uninterested in the piano recital, we asked if we could take some pictures from their yard and were kindly obliged.
Off to the left of the yard were the ruins of what used to be an old train supply station or something. I wasn't listening very carefully. It was interesting architecture, and the foliage creeping across the old stone arches made for some interesting color contrast.
There was also a playground extending out from a hill in the backyard. This viewing point was raised about six feet off the ground from the bottom of the playground, but a walkway extended directly to us from a higher point.
I returned home in the late afternoon and decided it was time to try to capture the gorgeous trees in our courtyard. Don't be too jealous - they only look this good for a couple weeks out of the year. As of now, those pink petals are littering the area outside our windows.The friendly neighborhood duck was back at his post near our pool. I'd been hoping to catch him swimming one of these days, as I'd only ever seen him lounging poolside and working on his tan. In the surest sign of summer I've seen so far, he dove in and went for a swim.
Usually, non-residents are not allowed in the pool but we've adopted Duck E. Fresh. He's cool enough to qualify as an honorary pool resident. Once the pool opens this week, I fear we may not see him for a while. He's cool with Ryan and me, but I don't know how he feels about the rest of the people who will be descending on his home in short time.
The continued adventures of Duck E. Fresh
Finally, Ryan and I headed out to Lake Calhoun to check out the...ahem... scenery in the area. A favored activity amongst avid people-watchers in the Minneapolis area, this was a perfect night for a saunter. As you can see, we weren't the only ones out.
The Tin Fish
The tree came in focus perfectly here, as well as the shine off the water right by the beach front.
Lake Calhoun.
I finally had a chance to experiment with manually adjusting my camera's settings to try to improve the quality of sunset pictures. These are my two favorite sunset shots out of about 30 I took to test out how different settings work. The colors were vastly improved simply by switching the camera into a landscape mode. Still, there's a lot to be learned about how to properly take this style of shot. I sprung for a second battery for long expeditions already, and I am pretty sure I need to purchase a tripod in the near-ish future.
On a boat.
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