Twin cities

There's a really great apple orchard about 50 miles west

Have you been to the RR museum in Duluth?

Taconite mines.

North Shore of Lake Superior. Most beautiful place on earth.

Ford used to have tour of their assembly plant, may be shut down.

go see the used equipment jockeys in Hopkins, several other places.

See a Twins game.

If you got big bucks, buy a scalp ticket to a Wild game.

Go fishing on Mille Laks lake. There's launches to just rent a ride. They're killing 'em but hard to get around the slot limit.

Visit the Indians (casino) and give them your hard earned money.

Take a drive on Hiway 61 south of the Twin Cities.

karl

One more. Go shopping all day at Mall of America. (I'd rather clean out a sewer)

Karl

Mid Continent Railway Museum -

North Freedom, WI This is near Wisconsin Dells - Circus World museum is also nearby.

Lake Superior Railway Museum -

Duluth, MN There is also the Northshore Inline Marathon from Two Harbors to Duluth on the morning of the 15th. This is the largest inline skating race in the US with the top pro teams from around the world. The finish line is next to their Omni Theater, not far from the Lake Superior Railway Museum.

St. Croix Railroad Inc. -

Hudson, WI Large scale model club on 9 acres.

AxMan Surplus -

St. Paul, MN the St Paul store has more mechanical stuff than the others. Not as much as it used to. They used to have large amounts of electronic test equipment but that has mostly disappeared.

Mall of America Bloomington, MN The amusement park in it has two rollercoasters. Has more interesting stores than other malls, because it has more stores.

I-35W Bridge Collapse site Minneapolis, MN The 10th Ave / Cedar Ave bridge has a new bike/walk/spectating lane that has a great view of the work being done. The parking ramp behind the Holiday Inn Metrodome is within a short walk. There is also Town Hall Brewery (brew pub) next door, that has very good beer and very good food.

The Stone Arch bridge (Great Northern, converted to walking bridge) just up the river has a great view of the lock, dam, and falls on the Mississippi. In the same area, there is the Mill City Museum

with information about flour milling in Minneapolis and the Mill Ruins Park that has various displays about the mills that were at the dam. The Gutherie Theater has public viewing areas with great views of the Mississippi.

Within 200 miles? I'd give Hutchinson Technologies in Eau Claire, WI a call and see if they're doing any tours in that time frame. The assembly bay is quite an amazing bit of manufacturing technology- they make all the machines in house, with the exception of the UTA and Adept robots, and the automated lines are able to hold tolerances measured in millionths (I know there are grinders that do this, but this is the only mechanical forming equipment I've ever seen with that kind of accuracy.) They've got a building up in Hutchinson, MN as well where they do the prototyping, but I don't know if they let vistors in there.

It's basically a glorified sheet metal shop (they make disk-drive suspensions,) but it is really something to see if you get the opportunity- while it may be a glorified sheet metal shop, it is that in the same way that a supercomputer is a glorifed pocket calculator. The machines do have computers on them, and the robots obviously are computer controlled, but the bulk of the equipment is actually mechanical, with series of forming dies that open and close using a cam shaft- which makes them quite a bit more interesting to look at than your average CNC equipment.

Far as I know there are only three places in the world to see that job being done, and the other two are in Asia.

If you like that one, there's also the Bush's bean factory in Augusta. There's actually a lot of manufacturing in the Eau Claire area, it just depends on what you like. Many of them have reasonably tight security, so it would pay to call ahead.

As long as people are thinking of plant tours, there are the two local craft breweries. Summit is larger and in St Paul.

Surly is very small, you can stand in one spot and turn around to see the entire brewing area. It is in Brooklyn Center, just north of Minneapolis on Hwy 100. Unfortunately they only have tours about once a month. Looks like you would have to save this one for another trip.