Cool, great weather at Lakes Bluegrass Festival in Pine Lake, MN

66 degrees with bright sunshine and a little wind here at the Lakes Bluegrass Festival in Pine River, Minnesota at 11:30 am on Friday.  Weather has been fantastic -- cool.  Last night we watched/listened to the bluegrass bands until 10:45 pm and it was 52 degrees and bone chilling cold if you were sitting still.  Had some extra coats, but will wear more tonight.  Had the electric mattress on as we as the furnace last night.

 Drove to the town of Nisswa, MN about 30 miles south of us Thursday.  They were having Turtle Races that day about 1 pm which drew a big crowd.

Ate lunch there and then walked quite a few curio, boutique, tourist shops.

Yesterday we drove the area, ending up about 10 miles north at Backus, MN and looked up the place where Deane & Dick Messer's daughter, Missy, just bought on Pine Mountain Lake.  Visited with her a bit and she gave us a tour of the place.  Fabulous place and will make them an eventual retirement home.  For now it is a "get away" place, as they are still working and live down in Princeton, MN

Wednesday evening a local band held a free country/polka dance.

Below are photos of the four bands that performed from 5 pm until 10:40 pm

Have taken videos of some of the performances and intend to upload them to Youtube and also convert them to audio MP3 so can listen to them in the pickup as we are driving.
Schedule has 11 am until 11 pm today, with breaks, and again Saturday.

The Lakes Bluegrass Festival has provided a WIFI so I am doing this at a bench behind the CD sales table for the bands where I found an electric plug in and have a good signal; am only a ittle ways from the stage so am also listening to the music

More later, Lynn