Sunday, 16 October 2016
I was so surprised to spot the Conestoga wagon (or whatever kind of covered wagon it is) in the side shed of this grain elevator yesterday. So surprised I forgot to post it, I guess. See it, the arched white canvas(?) top with a red-painted wooden box? For parades and the like?
Friday, 7 October 2016
Much of today became about images to me. Our day dawned without dawn, just a lightening that followed rain in darkness. That’s Lake Superior, our witness throughout most of today’s adventures.
This is today’s most image-y image. That’s my patella, upper right, and I am told I have loose knees. One has been ailing, got a shot, and I think at least temporary recovery is in sight.
Recently, I got my book club to read “Anatomy of a Murder” and see the movie. This is the tavern were the movie scenes were shot. It was a wing built onto the hotel for the shooting of the movie in 1959. The book is based on a real murder that happened in this town.
The stuffed peacock upper right is a nod to the present owners, the Peacock family. No peacock was on the menu.
You can stay at this lighthouse B&B. Prepare for a windy time.
The sun was out (briefly) as we toured by this stunning maple.
Then we found what we called mushroom beach. Mushrooms peppered the forest floor under the (planted pines) and we even found them among the (planted) beach grasses.
This is an active ore dock just north of Marquette proper, and quiet today. Last time we visited, there was an ore carrier docked but no loading happening.
We had a most excellent meal. The cheesecake with marinated cherries did not last….
And, then, appropriately in our rearview mirror, sunset….
Thursday, 6 October 2016
These are two outbuildings in Blaney Park. This alley is mostly ghost town, but some of the buildings on the main road remain in use. Blakey was quite the resort in its day, with a landing strip and swimming lake, golf course and dance hall. Now, the dance hall is mostly closed, almost no one swims in the lake, and the others are…archaeological.
Then I went industrial, and saw this hanger, larger than its denizens.
We ended the day at a loverly restaurant, all very yummy—beet salad! whitefish salad!—and more…. Even better was the company, of course.
Tuesday, 4 October 2016
I went to town today. This is downtown. Lake view…an empty tooth amidst a row of cottages.
Among the errands on my list was laundry. These are the facilities behind the “mat.” This may be proof that this community is really a village.
I recall posting a shot of this infestation when all was green. The PI is now assorted reds and oranges. The greens and yellows are milkweeds. Imagine how difficult a jigsaw puzzle with this mosaic would be to piece together.
It may not look like it from these photos, but the sun came out for long enough after my erranding that the sun porch warmed up nicely.
Sunday, 25 September 2016
We gambled with the weather and headed out to Fayette, an industrial ghost town. These two furnaces (rebuilt, I’m pretty sure) produced over 230K tons of charcoal-iron over 23 years, ending in 1890. This mean the surrounding area was dotted with charcoal kilns to provided fuel for the furnaces (over 80 within 10 miles). In a generation, the forests were gone and so was the operation.
This was the town’s hotel, later called Shelton House. Most of the rooms are on the second floor and the back of the structure has a two-story outhouse, so that roomers did not have to descend or use a chamber pot.
A new industry has come to the Garden Peninsula, just a few miles north of the ghost town—we counted about fifteen wind turbines, all generating on this windy day.
We detoured to the Big Spring on the way back, aka Kitch-iti-kipi. No fishing allowed so there are giant trout. One is that vertical black line at the bottom center of the photo.
Friday, 23 September 2016
We crossed this long flat stretch, marred by puddles crossing the road, knowing that the dribbles and currents they carried were waters of the Tahquamenon that evaded the culverts. We drove north, and it almost looks like it’s swamp all the way to Lake Superior; however, if you look closely, you can see the ground does ridge to the north. The swamp will end after maybe a dozen more big puddles.
Eagle’s Nest has changed a little over the years—and almost not at all, simultaneously. The bridge and cabins, yes, they come and go and are modified. The river—this is the Tahquamenon again—looks very much the same as in my oldest memories of this place.
On up in Grand Marais (perhaps a corruption of maré, meaning sea, and transformed into marais, meaning swamp—which there isn’t here on Lake Superior’s shore, at least not a huge one), we once again beheld the Pickle Barrel House (on the National Register, BTW). This was a two-story home with a kitchen in an extension behind, built for Chicago cartoonist William Donahey, who drew The Teenie Weenies. He and his wife used it for a decade at its original location on Sable Lake, then it was moved to town.
Of all things to find in Grand Marais, a food truck! With “burgers” and “taco’s,” I kid you not.
Turning homeward, we looped through the wildlife drive at the Refuge, and found this swan sleeping on one foot. We saw many swans feeding, often with a few ducks? (grebes? coots?) futzing around them. The latter didn’t seem to also be feeding, and we couldn’t figure out what the advantage was of hanging with the swans, close enough to sometimes annoy them.
Saturday, 3 September 2016
Her-mean* is long gone, northeast-bound, and we are headed back to highs in the 90s°F.
I marinated pork loin rounds in soy-garlic tempered with toasted sesame oil for tonight, and, yum.
That’s the pronunciation, although the spelling is Hermine. And if you were amidst it, it was a mean storm.
Friday, 26 August 2016
I find this way of using tile scraps appealing. Also, the many grout/mortar separations mean it won’t get as slippery as a mostly-tile surface.
On the same property, the lettering of the name of the apartment complex is more formal tile-work.
Friday, 12 August 2016
I saw this out of the corner of my eye and had to back up to make sure what I was seeing. Yup, contact paper that looks like a brick wall. I agree with the idea; this is better than a grey metal box, especially for a spot you see near-daily—plus this is a big utility box!
This stump is losing its battle with the fungi. Their function in the wild is as part of the army of living things that breaks down dead things. I’m no specialist, but I counted five visually different fungi in the process of turning this oak into dust.
Sunday, 3 July 2016
Square steel lighthouse…built in 1915, automated in 1968 (if I remember correctly). Seagulls love it.
And on the dunes on the way back, we saw these bladder campion blooms, incongruous on their skinny stems.