The Allison Wonderland

Clue #6

Escape the heat, cook and eat

At this playland far from the masses.

A place to recover or even take cover –

Life here was slow as molasses.

Clue #5

Things looked rosy, a pocketful of posey.
We remember it all too well.
We were happy back then but beyond our ken:
It soon would all go to hell.

Clue #4

We’re moving ahead, no oncoming dread.

Our future’s in our hands.

This new term is about what’s firm

Let’s avoid the shifting sands.

Clue #3

No time, old sport, to play and cavort.

Pursue the grail with your schemes!

Out at night? Then follow the light

To cross the way to your dreams.

Clue #2

Stay away from links and risky hijinks.

Disturb not ground, tree or trail.

Don’t wait for last clue to know what to do;

This year you’ll figure or fail.

Clue #1

Be it turmoil endemic or global pandemic

It’s been a tough year for us all.

So rather than punt, we renewed this year’s hunt:

Join us, it’ll be a ball!

Don’t be odd, stay in your pod.

Keep six feet away from strangers.

Wear a mask when on your task

To keep all safe from dangers.

I haven't posted in a while. The first couple of clues I thought the clue writer was referring to the present pandemic, or maybe an historical reference to the Spanish flu of 1918/1919. So, I tried to connect parks history with 1918.I started to veer toward Harriet Island, hoping that Harriet Tubman was a math ('figure') teacher. She was a public school teacher, not necessarily math. I thought 'old sport' line could be referring to a dog owner talking to their dog ( a dog park nearby), or 'old sport' might literally mean a very old sport like the Hmong Tuj Lub, which has a field in Phalen-Keller Regional Park, referenced in a previous Treasure Hunt. But then, I googled 'old sport' and got a line from The Great Gatsby, by the St. Paul born F. Scott Fitzgerald. I looked where he was born and found a nondescript park near his birth home in St. Paul. Then, other clues led me back to the river area (shifting sands, etc.) so I read up on F. Scott Fitzgerald and The Great Gatsby and found a connection to boating. Aha!, I thought. The Minnesota Boat Club, on Raspberry Island is close to Harriet Island. And F. Scott and Zelda used to stay at/frequent the White Bear Yacht Club in White Bear Lake. There is the St. Paul Yacht Club at Harriet Island, if the Fitzgerald link is just to imply a St. Paul park. Then a clue about 'shifting sands' again told me a park on the Mississippi River, the clue about not 'punting' (a punt is a type of flat-bottomed boat) means going for it, or full steam ahead, which led me to think of the steamboats/riverboats at Harriet Island. When you are on the river  you want to avoid the 'shifting sand bars' or you'll run aground. Then clue 5 came out and I thought maybe the clue writer(s) were harking back to the time(s) they had egg on their faces in 2004 (putting the medallion in a real donut, only to have some animal transport it to a different hiding place, not referred to in the clues) or 2007, when it was found at Hidden Falls Park after only 3 clues because the hider forgot about their footprints in the snow being discovered leading to the hiding spot. so, I looked up the clues to these hunts of 2004 and 2007. I found out that the word 'level' led to the Cleveland Street name that led the finders to the medallion. So, I looked on google maps for Hidden Falls Park and I find a Kenneth Street down from Cleveland (ave/st) leading to Hidden Falls. The 'beyond our ken' clue made me think it was at Hidden Falls, beyond/down from Kenneth St. So, the river was still in play. The 'it'll be a ball' clue was a reference again to the red balls on the power lines that cross the river near Hidden Falls. There's a dog park in Minnehaha Park across from Hidden Falls. Then, Clue 6 comes out and, to me, it screams COMO Park. So, I searched some more on google for history, and I couldn't connect everything in the clue(s) to Como. The 'life as slow as molasses' still made me think of a Mark Twain quote or something about life on the Mississippi River, something maybe Tom Sawyer or Huck Finn would have said. So, I searched some more on Mark Twin, and in his book 'Life On the Mississippi', there is a chapter on White Bear Lake (talking about the legend  of how the name came about form Indian ( Native American) lore. Then I looked up history of White Bear Lake and found that some of the gangsters of the '30's would hide out here  and how there are some drug/alcohol rehabilitation centers here ('a place to cover and recover'), how the Native Americans had/made maple sugar ( the 'slow as molasses' maybe referring to the 1919 Boston Molasses Flood disaster) in the area, and how it was a summer resort for people escaping the life of the cities, etc. So, now, I think, White Bear Lake park is the spot, as long as it's in Ramsey County.

Escape the heat makes me think swimming. WBL is starting to sound interesting. 

picnic shelter might be too obvious but I got nothin better  

Now I just have to go back and make all the clues fit. Lol