Boundary Waters '21, Day 1

Jane and I got back from vacation last Saturday. I am up to my eyeballs in tomatoes here at home, but I wanted to get a quick post up since it has been so long since the last one. I wasn't going to obsess so much about the food, but one of my readers told me she could not wait to hear about what we ate. So here we go.

Sunday, August 8: We kicked off our yearly trip to northern Minnesota with blueberry pancakes with peaches.

Blueberry pancake with peaches and maple syrup

The Boundary Waters area is in a severe drought this year. All fires, including the charcoal grill we had planned most of our evening meals around, were banned. We got our fishing licenses and went down to the dock. It soon began to drizzle. Terry would call this a “nuisance rain.” It prevents any outside work without making any real progress toward getting the soil wet. We continued fishing until we were cold and damp, catching nothing.

Morning drizzle on Hungry Jack Lake

After lunch, the drizzle stopped. I started on my trip notes while Jane took a walk. Sunday is usually a lazy day so we can recover from the long drive. We sat on the dock watching water striders and admiring the water lilies.

Water lilies

We saw a herring gull.

Herring gull

And a bald eagle! This picture is the only one in which you can sort of see that the head is white. It has the characteristic profile of our national bird, anyway.

Bald eagle

I cut the porterhouse steak that we intended to grill into strips and made fajitas with onion and peppers from the garden. I made pico de gallo with garden-fresh onion, pepper, jalapeno, tomato, and sweet corn. We ate on the deck and drank margaritas.

Steak fajita with pico de gallo

When Jane finished the dishes, we played Mexican train until bedtime. Vacation was off to a restful start.