Boundary Waters, Days 5 and 6

 Thursday, August 11

It was another beautiful day in the Boundary Waters. We planned to take our drive around the Greenwood Lake loop, looking for charismatic megafauna, such as moose. We packed a lunch of cheese curds, summer sausage, crackers, yogurt, and carrots in the cooler. I hoped that we could do a little hiking, as Jane was feeling pretty good.

We stopped at Kimball Lake first. The Forest Service map showed a trail around the lake. It was likely to be flat, and I assumed it would be an easy walk for us. Wrong. Although there were no hills, the trial was abundantly strewn with roots and rocks. Jane doesn’t have the balance for that, and taking the walker was out of the question.

The so-called "easy" trail around Kimball Lake

We walked a little way, nevertheless. The first lake overlook we came to showed mirror-like water reflecting the trees.

A calm morning

Bracket fungi grew out of a nurse log (a dead and downed tree, which has concentrated nutrients compared to the soil) along the trail. 

Bracket fungi on a nurse log

By the second overlook, a breeze had come up. We took a short cut back to the campground and continued on our way.

Kimball Lake with cattails and ripples

We took an alternate route to Highway 61, the main road along Lake Superior, traveling on a road we’d never been on before. Unlike some of our adventures (such as the Lullaby Creek Road fiasco of last year), the road actually got better once we got away from where the campground traffic had left the road wash-boarded and pot-holed. Our plan was to do the loop in reverse this year. We went up the Highway 61 to Hovland and turned left on Arrowhead Highway. We had not gone very far when we met a man blocking the road with his pickup. He came to the car and explained that we could not get to Esther Lake because the road had washed out.

With our plan for the day blown, we went back down Highway 61 to Judge C. J. Magney State Park. My parents loved this park. We ate lunch in the car and hiked a short way to a bridge over one branch of the Brule River.

Brule River upstream from the bridge

Brule River downstream from the bridge

My portrait on the bridge

Jane's portrait on the bridge

The Grand Marais event calendar listed wood-fired baking and basketmaking demonstrations by the North House Folk School from Thursday through Saturday. We stopped by to see what was going on, which turned out to be not much. The broom maker was chatting with a friend and paid no attention to me as I looked over her table of brooms for sale. The wood-fired oven was just being built. Three young adults were stamping barefoot in a combination of clay and sand to get it to the right consistency for building the top of the oven. They invited me to take off my shoes and join them. I declined. The man supervising the construction squirted water on the clay from time to time. Another woman was rubbing solid chunks of dry clay through a screen of hardware cloth in preparation for hydrating and kneading. That looked like work.

We walked around the Folk School area. There was a cute little house there that I assumed had been built by one of the classes. It had grass growing on it, as was common on Scandinavian roofs. The modern green roof is lined with plastic. I just started wondering how the early settlers waterproofed their rooftop gardens when I noticed birch bark shingles. Clever!

Log house with birch shingles and a green roof

We went to Tofte next. On our way up, it looked like there were some cute shops there, and we’d never stopped. Upon closer investigation, there was one shop, a bakery, a post office, and a general store. The shop had nice things, but nothing we particularly wanted. We looked around the general store as well. It was a typical small grocery, not much selection, and everything in the freezer case looked like it had been there since the last glacier retreated.

The Grand Marais events calendar said there was a local food market at 4:30. We had to ask at the Visitor Center where it was. There were few vendors and many customers. With the short growing season and the excessively rocky soil, I expect it’s tough to get a good tomato in the Grand Marais area.  We didn’t by anything there either. We had lots of lovely produce at the cabin from my garden.

Sparse vendor turnout at the local food market

Following our theme of doing things we hadn’t done before, we went to My Sister’s Place for supper. It seemed like a good burger place. I was intrigued by the Juicy Lucy on the menu. I’d learned about Juicy Lucy, a hamburger stuffed with cheese, on a TV program featuring a bar in St. Paul. On TV, the cheese oozed out of the burger as soon as you bit into it. My Sister’s Place’s Juicy Lucy was made with ½ pound of hamburger. No human being needs that much hamburger in one meal. Jane and I split one. It came with fries and pickles.

Juicy Lucy with fries and pickles

And not much cheese. Look closely. It’s visible, but hardly an ooze.

Where's the cheese?

Still, I would go there again. Maybe order something else, though.

We went back to the cabin and put the jigsaw together again. We switched sides, so Jane did the ship’s sails, and I did the lantern. And that wrapped up a day where things generally didn’t go as planned.

Friday, August 12

Our last day was low key. Our goals for the last day are always the same: 1) don’t go anywhere in the car, 2) eat/drink everything in the refrigerator, and 3) pack.

It was a beautiful morning.

A perfect morning on Hungry Jack Lake

After a breakfast of eggs and stuff with the last pieces of bacon, we went out in the boat. This is the view of the dock and cabin from the lake.

The dock from the lake with the cabin barely visible among the trees

Usually, we head around to the east side of the lake. Today we went to the west. We thought this odd little platform was probably built for loons. Eagles are a problem for loon chicks, so the nesting platforms need to have something over the top to keep the eagles from swooping down.

A loon nesting platform, complete with reflector. Very fancy.

We had quesadilla with leftovers for lunch. It was reminiscent of working in Commons during my college days. You may have heard the food service maxim “when in doubt, throw it out.” In Commons it was “When in doubt, put it in enchiladas.”

The afternoon brought the sad task of packing up. We returned our life jackets to the office and paid our bill. I got Terry a new hat, as per his request. He likes Boundary-Waters-themed hats.

We grilled marinated round steak and a foil pack of the rest of the sweet corn and potatoes. We also ate the rest of the vegetables and drank the last bottle of wine.

Thus ended vacation for another year.

 

 

Boundary Waters, Day 4

 Wednesday, August 10

We got up at 7:00 to get on the water before it got windy. We weren’t so eager that we wanted to start before we had our coffee/tea, and by the time we were ready to go at 8:30, the wind had already come up.

No matter, we went out for a little while anyway. We were rewarded almost immediately by a bald eagle, soaring through a cloudless sky. Of the 15 pictures I took, this was the only one that showed both the white head and white tail. All were out of focus.

Eagle over the lake

The loon family of four, with the smaller chicks, was on the far side of the bay.

Loons far away

Jane rowed over in that direction. We kept our distance so as not to disturb them. The loons very kindly came toward us so we could get good pictures. These are the babies.

Baby loons

The parents came so close to the boat it was difficult to frame them in the photo.

Mom and Dad Loon close to the boat

We drifted with the loons to the end of the bay. I took one more picture of the whole family before we went in for breakfast.

One more family photo

I made eggs with stuff (leftover foil pack potatoes, grilled zucchini, onion, mushrooms, cheese curds, and cherry tomatoes) and bacon. I like how the trees are reflected in my tea in this photo.

Eggs with stuff for breakfast

After breakfast, we sat on the deck, enjoying the cool morning. Motion on the steps caught our eye, and there was a garter snake. It was big, as garter snakes go. It warmed itself in the sun and then went about its snaky business.

Garter snake

After a light lunch of peaches and yogurt, we ventured down to the Chik-Wauk Museum and Nature Center for a talk by a National Forest Service naturalist. The Events listing said it was “Boundary Waters Wild!”, but that was just the generic title of (I guessed) a series of summer talks. The real topic was the black bear. The naturalist was a young woman, full of energy and enthusiasm, and well-prepared for a group of children. I was one of the younger persons in the dozen or so people in attendance, but she went ahead with her activity. I give her a lot of credit for engaging us in the program. Bears, like the moose Kate and I learned about in Alaska, hate surprises. Also, they eat 20,000 calories a day in the fall as they prepare for winter. Jane and I were doing pretty much the same thing on vacation, but I did wonder how a bear found that many calories in the wild. No margaritas there.

Speaking of, we had margaritas for happy hour when we returned to our beloved deck. 

Chicken quesadilla with grapefruit margarita

We had chicken quesadilla for supper and played Mexican train until bedtime. It was a theme.

Boundary Waters, Day 3

Tuesday, August 9

We slept late again and ate leftover pancakes for breakfast. I went to the office for life jackets, but by the time I got back, it was too windy to take the boat out. We went for a walk down the road instead. We saw many old friends, including bluebeads,

Bluebead

Bunchberries

Bunchberries

And thimbleberries. I had tasted a thimbleberry before and found it to be unpleasantly sour. It came into my mind that perhaps the one I tasted wasn’t ripe, prompting me to repeat the experiment. I looked for one that was about to fall off, which is as ripe as it will get. OMG. Still very sour. Don’t know what people see in them. I suppose with enough sugar, it would make a passable jam.

Thimbleberries. So sour.

We also saw this little plant, which I think is pipsissewa. Even if it isn’t, that’s a very fun name.

Pipsissewa

When we returned to the cabin, we heard a loon call close by. We hastened to the dock with binoculars and cameras. One loon and two chicks were swimming on the other side of the bay. I snapped pictures like crazy until they swam out of sight. We saw loons many times today. I took 83 pictures, most of which were out of focus. In most of them, the loons are just swimming, but one of the chicks is stretching in this one. These chicks were nearly as large as their parent, and they were learning to dive.

Stretch!

Jane had the last piece of pizza with a small salad for lunch. I made a chef salad with the leftover quesadilla steak, peppers, and onions, the remaining pico de gallo, cheese curds and mixed nuts. We had yogurt and fruit besides. One of our healthier meals so far.

Chef salad and yogurt for lunch

After discussion, we decided that instead of making cobbler in the usual way, I would bake the fruit and the scones separately so the leftover scones would not get soggy on the fruit as the days passed.

New Age cobbler--bake the scones separately

We did absolutely nothing all afternoon but sit on the deck and listen to the wind rustle the birch leaves. It was very Zen and relaxing. At 3:30, this loon family came into the bay.

Loon family, again

About 5:00, after happy hour started, the loons were back, still far away.

Loons on the other side of the bay

Jane fired up the grill to cook a marinated chicken breast. While she waited for the coals to catch, she looked for--and found--a four-leaf clover! Apparently finding four-leaf clovers is one of her special gifts.

Jane found this four-leaf clover

Along with the chicken breast, I made green beans sauteed with onions and cherry tomatoes. I also boiled some sweet corn. Everything was home grown. It makes me quietly proud.

Farm-to-table dinner

After supper, two adults and two chicks were in the bay. We thought maybe this was a different family because the chicks seemed smaller. We did not ever see them dive. One adult stayed with the chicks while the other one dove and dove.

A different loon family?

While I was busy photographing the chicks and one parent, the second parent popped up right in front of the dock and let out a loony laugh, scaring me half to death.

Geez Louise, where did this guy come from?

It dove and came up with a fish

Loon with fish

Which it took over to the chick who was paying attention.

One chick swims toward the parent with the food

Here’s the transfer,

The handoff

And now the chick has the fish.

Chick with the fish

After many attempts, I finally got all four loons in one frame.

Family portrait

We had scones with baked peaches and blueberries as a late dessert. It was a good day.

Boundary Waters, Day 2

It rained steadily during the night. It is such a cozy feeling to hear the rain and have a roof over your head. Spending a rainy night in a tent is cozy too, but getting up, putting on wet shoes, and building a fire with wet wood loses its romance over time. I’ve had enough of that.

Jane had a problem with the drip coffee maker. The filters that came with the cabin had gone flat in the humidity. She’d avoided a filter collapse on Sunday, but was not so lucky today. Jane has a robust gag reflex, and coffee grounds in her coffee can be a trigger. I experimented with pouring the coffee through a folded filter. Not surprisingly, the coffee was cold by the time it was in the cup. I inspected the coffee maker and discovered that it would run just fine with the top up. I got some clothespins (we use them for chip clips) out of the vacation box and clipped the filter to the basket. Problem solved!

Flat coffee filters and how to prevent collapse with clothespins

We had eggs with onions, green pepper, cherry tomatoes, and cheese curds for breakfast along with fried corn and potatoes and a slice of bacon.

Breakfast: eggs with stuff, fried corn and potatoes, bacon

After kitchen clean-up and showers, we headed for Grand Marais to do a little shopping. While I hoped that our late, large breakfast would obviate the need for lunch, by the time we were done at the thrift store, visitor center, and B FRANK (Ben Franklin), we were both a bit peckish.

So we went to Sydney’s for frozen custard. We ate by the water.

Eating custard while squinting into the sun

The sky was perfectly blue over the lake and Artists’ Point,

Artists' Point

But cloudier over the mainland.

Clouds over Grand Marais

We drove up to Grand Portage National Monument. We watched an excellent film on the fur trade. We love to watch whatever audio-visual presentations are available, since both Jane and I have a history of putting them together. The quality has really improved over the decades, that’s for sure. There was a time when it was all done with slide projectors. Remember those?

On our way back through Grand Marias, we stopped at the grocery store for new coffee filters.

We had steak quesadillas with garden-fresh pico de gallo for supper, along with chips and grapefruit margaritas. It was a lovely evening to sit on the deck. We saw our first loon family—two adults and two brown adolescents way at the other side of the lake. I took a bunch of crappy pictures, of which this one had the best approximation of being in focus.

Baby loons on the far side of the lake. The adults are underwater.

We hoped the loons would come closer before the week was over.

 

Boundary Waters, 2022 Edition

 Why, yes I did drop off the face of the Earth for a week! I’ve been off the grid in the Great North on my annual girls’ trip with Jane. Because we are still nervous about COVID, we drove straight through on Saturday, which took about 11 hours. Our last stop was in Grand Marais to buy a frozen pizza and two small bags of ice. We were exhausted by the time we got to the cabin. We put the pizza in the tiny oven and poured pre-mixed margaritas over ice.

I slept until 7:40 Sunday morning. I can’t even remember the last time I slept that late. I love the chickens, but it was nice not to have to hope out of bed at sunrise to let them out of the coop. Jane got up shortly after I did. I made my tea; Jane had her coffee. We lounged in our jammies for quite a while. I finally got motivated to make blueberry pancakes which, according to our long tradition, we ate with butter, peaches, and maple syrup.

Blueberry pancakes and peaches

We went for a walk down the dirt road. Just outside the cabin, creeping bellflower was blooming in front of some birch trees.

Creeping bellflower

There was no shortage of bumblebees. Many of them were motionless. It was a cool afternoon, but bumblebees are unique among the bees in their ability to elevate their body temperature above the air temperature. This is why they are often the first bees to the flowers in the morning and the last out at night.  Here is a bumblebee resting on pearly everlasting.

Bumblebee on pearly everlasting

Fireweed was also blooming. This one had three beetles foraging among the flowers. No idea what kind. Beetle species are exceedingly numerous.

Three beetles on fireweed blossoms

One of the owners of Hungry Jack Outfitters, where we rent our cabin, told us that the bolete mushrooms that were growing all over the place were edible. We did a little foraging and tried them out. I sautéed them in butter with garlic.

Boletes sautéed in butter with garlic 

We had them on our steak, along with grilled zucchini and foil-pack potatoes and onions. And wine, of course.

Supper, plated

It was raining after supper, so we had to abandon plans to sit on the deck. We put together a jigsaw puzzle, our usual rainy-day activity. I did the left side while Jane did the right. It is fair to say the bottom left was the easiest part. The lantern and the sails on the sailboat were the worst.

The evening's activity

It’s good to get away from civilization now and then. There is only one appliance that runs constantly in the cabin, and that is the refrigerator. When it cycles off, it is dead silent. No hum from the TV receiver, no whoosh of the air conditioner, no beeping cell phone. There are no streetlights or traffic noises. Occasionally a loon will call from a distant lake or a rain shower passes through. So peaceful.