My garden statue has been reading for a long time!
This sight greeted me this morning on the way to the mailbox. The only camera I had on hand to capture it is my crappy old Sony DSC-S500 Cyber Shot. I was glad it was able to show the detail of the spider web. Please have a wonderful day, even if it’s rainy!
Birders on the shore of Lake Superior, Wisconsin Point.
No, I’m not writing about Mother’s Day, but about a lesser known and newer commemorative event that celebrates birds. Yesterday, I participated in the second annual International Migratory Bird Day, held in Superior, Wis.
White pines on Wisconsin Point.
I haven’t been to a birding event in years, partly on purpose and partly due to other demands in my life. I like to think of myself as a recovering birder. I took up bird watching in seventh grade and was active in the birding community through my twenties – even participating for a year on the Audubon Expedition Institute, where I travelled across the country in a yellow school bus for a year with 24 other people interested in birding and the environment for master’s degree studies.
It was during that experience that I overdosed on birding. I came to realize that people stopped looking at birds once they had identified them. I rebelled against the obsession to name everything with feathers that I saw or heard. I rebelled against using eyesight aids like spotting scopes and binoculars – wanting to view the birds instead as part of their surroundings.
But I still feel an affinity with birds. My upcoming novel is about them, after all, and this event seemed a good excuse to get outside on a rare warm spring day. We met at Wisconsin Point, a long sandbar just outside the city. A small group of us spent three hours birding. We didn’t see very many birds but there were bald eagles, chickadees, scaups, red headed ducks, lots of blue jays passing through, and the requisite ring-billed gulls. I do admit to looking through a spotting scope (and the world did not end!), but I tried to keep it to a minimum to allow others the opportunity. After birding, we went to a local inn to listen to some presentations about migration.
My camera isn’t built for bird pictures, but I do love the lighthouse and the white pines on the point, so I thought I’d share photos of them with you.
The Wisconsin Point Lighthouse.
Icicles hanging down from the ceiling of a sea cave.
Icelanders resembled Minnesotans (at least of the last generation) in this regard: if nature has condemned you to life in a continuously foul climate, you have no choice but to ignore it and proceed with your plans. If you wait for the weather to improve before doing anything, your bones will have crumbled to fine dust. – Minnesota author Bill Holm
Despite the National Park Service urging people to visit another day because the wind chill was twenty-five below, my son and some friends traveled to the sea caves in the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore last weekend. We weren’t the only ones disobeying the feds to see this natural wonder on the south shore of Lake Superior. Since the parking lot was full, a line of cars was already parked on the main highway. This added ten minutes to the twenty-minute walk we were expecting across the ice to the sea caves.
It was no mean feat just to get this far. My son, who is a teenager, and his friend, would have much rather stayed home on the couch, little balls wrapped in comforters, playing computer games. “Why do we have to go?” They challenged more than once. After about the fifth round of such questioning, I was reduced to, “Because you’ll have fun, dammit!”
Once they were off the couch came the trial of getting them to wear more than one layer of clothing. Exhortations about how cold it was were met with more, “Then why do we have to go?” Somehow, the mother of my son’s friend (Charlotte) and I got the boys dressed and into the car. The wind direction made the walk from our car to the lake the coldest part of the trip. Charlotte and I were surreptitiously looking at each other, questioning whether this adventure was wise, and, although they would never admit it, I could tell the boys were happy they had been forced to wear so many layers.
Once we got to the lake, we joined the others on a hard-trodden snowy path along the shore. With the wind at our backs, the sunshine helped us feel warmer in spirit than perhaps in body. After about half-a-mile into the mile-long walk, I marveled at how warm my feet were. I thought my toes would be the first to go.
We were joined by snowshoers, skiers, dog walkers, and people pulling sleds containing mounds of blankets, which, from the hats sticking out of them, must have contained children. For the most part, it was too cold to talk, so we walked in silence – pilgrims on our way to see a natural wonder denied us for five years due to poor ice conditions.
Walking on the winter ice is the easiest way for most people to see the caves. In the summer, it requires kayaking or canoeing skills, or paying the price for a tour boat. A hiking trail runs along the top of the caves, but the view is nowhere near as spectacular as from the water.
I had seen the caves from water level, but never in winter. This year, the formations were more intricate and extensive than most, prompting widespread media coverage that piqued interest by the masses, including Charlotte and me.
Before you venture to the caves, it’s a good idea to check with the Lakeshore’s Facebook page and check the Sea Cave Watch website, a Wisconsin Sea Grant project. The site features real-time images of the ice conditions at the caves, although the wave sensor has been pulled for the season.
A frozen waterfall.
When we reached the start of the caves, the boys were quickly taken in by opportunities to explore. Icy nooks, frozen waterfalls, tunnels, slides, and hidden alcoves proved irresistible. When it came time to go due to a commitment back home, they protested, saying they wanted to stay longer. I couldn’t help but smile, noting their change in attitude. Nature had worked its subtle magic.
I hope the lesson is lasting and that next time, it will be easier to tear my son or his friend away from their comfortable couches and computers to experience real life.
One thing I want to mention if you go: please don’t break off the icicles from the caves. The conditions that formed them are not likely to happen again this winter, and it ruins the formations for those who will come after you. Take away memories, not icicles!
The view of Lake Superior when you turn away from the caves.
I took this shot one early morning last week when I was visiting Lake Michigan for a conference. All I had to do to get it was walk out the patio door of my room in Sheboygan. Actually, I ran — the sun was rising fast.
The Schooner Coaster JJ
I arrived at the Duluth Tall Ships Festival just when it was closing. Workers were pounding and pulling stakes out of parking lot asphalt once covered by tents, and festival T-shirts were being offered for half-off by a desperately vocal vendor.
But the nine tall ships were still in port and that’s what I was after. I was looking forward to a close-up view of the tall ships via a short, regular sailboat berthed in the ship canal in downtown Duluth. However, the craft was neither short nor regular but a gorgeous 42-foot Beneteau with cabin floors varnished so thickly it was like walking on water, and a nimbleness of handling that belied its more than adequate size. Named the Makena, the craft was one of two in the Moon Shadow Sailing fleet, which offers tours of Lake Superior and the harbor.
Joining me were a couple from Rochester, Minn., and a couple from Duluth who were friends of the captain. The sun finally smiled upon the festival, a light breeze blew; it was a perfect night for sailing. With a warning ring, the Canal Park pedestrian bridge raised and we were off.
Pictures will probably do more justice to the experience than words. Let me just say that the company was outstanding and it was an experience I won’t soon forget. Happy Sailing!
A sailor out on a (sailing) limb.
The Privateer Lynx and the Aerial Lift Bridge
Captain Marie (and friend)
The Aerial Lift Bridge welcomes us back.
I wanted to share some photos I took this weekend at the “Lark O’ the Lake” Festival, which was held in Duluth. The Lark is a replica of a seaplane that was first flown in Duluth 100 years ago. It was called a flying boat back then. During the winter the original Lark was transported to Florida where it served as the world’s first airliner – transporting passengers between St. Petersburg and Tampa.
Several of my friends were involved in rebuilding the Lark, a labor of love and ingenuity. The builders worked from photos, written descriptions and studying other similar seaplanes. Last weekend’s festival was held to remind Duluthians of their place in aviation history and to show off the flying boat. I attended the opening ceremony of the three-day event, which was complete with skydivers (including the intrepid Mayor of Duluth), spectators in vintage clothing, a band, and carriage rides. The skydivers in my pictures all landed safely, however, later in the weekend, a couple of them ended up landing in Lake Superior. Only in Duluth!
Mr. Gardonio and Mr. Betts were among the builders of the Lark.
Duluth Mayor Don Ness in a tandem sky dive for the opening ceremonies of the Lark O’the Lake Festival.
Duluth Mayor Don Ness, glad to be alive after his skydive. His family is behind him.
Huge chunks of ice piled atop eachother off of Wisconsin Point, Superior WI in April.
No deep thoughts for this week; just wanted to show you some photos I’ve taken recently at and near my office on an island in the Duluth-Superior Harbor. I feel so fortunate to work in such a cool place and I never take it for granted. Ice can still be found in the bays and along the shore, but the spring break-up is finally here and it’s as if a bottleneck of birds has been unleashed upon the waters. I haven’t taken any bird photos, but I did manage to catch a fox kit out the office back door, an instant before it got scared away by someone approaching outside.
A fox kit investigates a stick as seen out the back door of my office last week.
Yesterday I accompanied some researchers out on the St. Louis River Estuary. They were taking water samples for an ongoing project about seasonal water quality variation in the river. Because it was a calm day, we went out on Lake Superior just for kicks, through the Superior Entry. I got a good shot of the lighthouse despite the chilling wind that stole my cap later on and dunked it into the river. The researchers were nice enough to turn the boat around so I could retrieve it. My cap is now christened in the estuary, so I guess I’ll have to wear it out there all the time now. Anyway, I love the reflection in this photo!
The lighthouse that guards the Superior Entry into Lake Superior.
On the other side of the breakwall was the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers dredger and some tugboats. The Army Corps dredges the harbor (digs out the muck) to ensure that the harbor is deep enough for the boats that ply its waters. The dredge is resting here. I thought this photo looks like a little mechanical family; papa dredge, mama tug and baby tug. Enjoy!
Dredge and tugs, Superior WI Entry to Lake Superior
Marie's Meanderings 