Saturday 28/07
We have breakfast (Rice Krispies).
We have 800 km of road today. We plan to arrive at 5pm in Minneapolis where we meet Ludivine again tomorrow morning.
We have a mishap with the car keys.
We eat at Burger King for lunch.
We arrive at 7pm in Minneapolis, which is in yet another state: Minnesota.
We stay at a Hilton hotel (one of the 8 different brands they have). It’s nice, with 2 queen beds for 120$.
We take a shower and then head to the Mall of America, where we eat Poke Bowls at Poukei.
We do some laundry.
We work until 1am.
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Sunday 29/07
We meet Ludivine at the Mall of America, where we eat (Lebanese food for us, Poke Bowls for the kids). She spent a wonderful stay at her friend’s lake house.
We then drive to Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
We have a nice last dinner together: sushi of course..
We stay at a Holiday’s Inn in Milwaukee.
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Monday 30/07
We have breakfast at the hotel.
We go to Walmart to do some back-to-school shopping.
We drive to drop Florence and Jules off at their (YMCA) summer camp, near Burlington. It’s a great initiative that Isabelle took: she indeed registered them both at a local summer camp. I hope they will enjoy it. It lasts 5 days.
We eat Poke Bowls with Ludivine in Chicago, at Pokiology. I then also check out another poke (Poke Poké). The ‘Poke Bar’ project is more and more maturing in my head.
We go to the airport to drop off Ludivine, “for good” this time. We indeed realized (a bit late) that she had to take an exam so as not to miss a whole school year. We registered her for 3 months in a ‘jury’ school in Brussels.
We struggle a bit to pack the tent in the orange bag, which Ludivine will bring back to Belgium.
We are only the 2 of us! It has been over a year since that happened!
We relax on the terrace of our hotel, with our phones. We took a hotel outside the city, for 2 nights, in Aurora where there’s a large outlet.
We have a nice dinner at the ‘Two Brothers Roundhouse’ restaurant/pub nearby.
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Tuesday 31/07
I wake up at 9:30am; almost 11 hours of sleep!
Ludivine arrived safely in Belgium. She wrote a very ‘moving’ message. We are so proud of her. We talk to her.
We have breakfast at hotel.
We go to the outlet.
We stay from noon to 8pm. We even have lunch there.
Shopping in Victoria Secret, American Outfitters (incredibly comfortable skinny jeans!) and the usual Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger and Ralph Lauren. Nothing really fancy but it is nice to buy some new clothes. Almost none of the clothes we’ve been wearing for a year will be used anymore…
We go to eat sushi. We take them away and eat them in the hotel, on the terrace.
We spend the rest of the evening in the room. I prepare our stay in Chicago until 1:30am.
