Emily visits Emily, Minnesota!

When Barry noticed the city named Emily in Minnesota on the map, I didn't give it much thought at first.  But when he said we could route ourselves right through it on the way to our next campground, I got more enthusiastic.  I figured for a person named Emily, i.e. Me, there would be plenty of photo ops -- and there were!

Arriving in this small city, population 827 as of 2013, we found the city park and parked Pearl.  We then walked around from there.  Being as small as it is, it was no problem to walk from one end of town to the other, stopping to take photos along the way.

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I've never claimed to be much of a saint, but hey, if the name fits!

Turns out that I have another connection to this place other than simply its name. Although I didn't remember it as we walked through town, this rural telephone company, ECTC, installed a Nortel CS 1500 in 2008 to replace their legacy DCO (digital central office) equipment..  The CS 1500 was an IP call server that I worked on in my previous life as a telephony software developer.  My memory of the specifics is a little vague, but I am almost positive that at least a couple of my co-workers back then actually traveled to the site in Emily to assist in the installation and integration of the CS 1500 into ECTC's network. Pretty cool connection, if you ask me!  (Thanks Jim G. for the article that helped me remember about this!)

Before leaving the tiny city that bore my name, I had to stop in at the gift shop (plus ice cream parlor!) and get a couple of souvenirs.  We added the wooden magnet to our magnet board, and soon I am sure I will get a chance to wear the sweatshirt, as we're starting to have some chilly nights being up north with autumn approaching.  

I guess I am an "Emilyan" for the day!

​I figured that there would be several cities named Emily around the US, but turns out, this one claims to be the only one.  Knowing that, I was even happier that Barry noticed it on the map!