Uptown Art Fair

This weekend, uptown is having it's annual art fair. Uptown is actually south of Minneapolis - not really sure why it's called uptown, but it is. I didn't realize how big this art fair actually was until I was reading the little booklet I picked up while we were at Old Chicago a few days ago. This art fair is the #2 fair for attendance statewide (second to the Minnesota State Fair). This got me thinking "the state fair is a lot bigger than uptown.... what are we getting ourselves into by going?", but it was early and the rain had finally let up, so we ventured off.

We decided to ride our bikes; for one it was pretty nice out, or so I thought, and it was only about 4 miles away, along the street. You can read about our bike ride here. Once we made it, dripping in sweat, we found a place to land our bikes. Now this is uptown, where people are green... it was actually a pain to find a spot since all the poles had been taken, but luckily we found one... right next to the light rail petition signer enthusiasts.


At home, I was craving some coffee... thinking ahhh once we get there it'll be so nice to have a cup of coffee (or how I like it, sugar and cream with a little coffee) and walking around looking at the art booths. But the bike ride and the humidity changed all that... all we wanted was some water. Too bad the water was $3.00 a bottle. So we toughed it out until we got up near a store to buy a real bottle of water (McDonald's had them for $1.50, eat that beverage booth)

After walking a little ways we did stop and get a smoothie to share... mmmm a real fruit smoothie!

There were some pretty nice booths, of course I gawked at the photography and we ooooh and aaah at the unique paintings and wood work. Walking around in the uptown mall area was nice, it was shaded, not crowded.... to begin with. Things started to pick up when I took this shot:

Once we made it to the top of the hill to Hennepin Ave, we realized the place was starting to fill out, and that we totally forgot to put on sun screen... really what were we thinking? I was even wondering why I didn't wear a sports bra because I was practically sweating through the shirt I had on. But we went north a ways til it directed us to turn around and went south to Calhoun Square. I suggested we walk the south route inside (in the A/C) then come out the other side of the building to walk north along the street and head back to our bikes. AHHH the coolness was so nice. There were booths and sidewalk sales going on inside Calhoun Square (Kyle asked if I knew about it, which I didn't really I just wanted to be in A/C for a while, but I pretended I knew all along, hee hee), I was also trying to save his red forehead from getting much worse. We stopped at the kitchen store, where they had many food demos and samples going on (SWEET, Lunch!) We had this Calamari and Chorizo Paella... cooked in one HUGE ASS skillet! Check this out:


We also had these yummy Pork Dumplings with excellent soy dipping sauce. She made it look so easy making these dumplings, we'll have to try at home. Oh and they had recipe cards for all the little samples they had. Of course I picked them up, I love trying new things.

Speaking of new things, I just made some Baba Ganoush! And it actually turned out good! I've made it before, but I've never been impressed with how it's turned out in the past.
Okay back to the art fair. Once we made our way through Calhoun Square we got to the end again and picked up where we left off on Hennepin Ave. This time heading north. From the time we got there in the shaded mall area to now, in the hot, sticky, sunny, crowded, Hennepin Ave area, the crowd had pretty much quadrupled!

It was no longer a leisurely stroll gazing at art work from afar... so we pretty much booked it back to our bikes. And hopped on the trail to head home.

We decided to take the trail back instead of risk our lives by the road again. The trail is only about a mile more than taking the driving route, but it was worth it since it is a secluded trail, that's a little flatter as well. You never notice hills until you're riding them on a bike :-)