The last night before heading home.

We had a nice site on a small hill overlooking an arm of Bearskin Lake.

‘Twas a beautiful night, so beautiful in fact, it was one of the rare nights it was so beautiful that the fish were enjoying it with me and refused to bite.  But as a consolation we first heard, then saw a moose getting into the lake and sloshing around for a bit.

Aah, the campfire at the end of the day.  And look – bare legs so that means skeeters weren’t so bad.

One last stop on the big lake on the way home for lunch.

Superior pebbles.

Flat rocks, water, and a kid.  What else do you need?

Since Martin seemed captivated by the history of the quarry at Banning State Park, we decided to to some more history.  First stop today was the St. Louis County Historical Society’s exhibits in the old train depot in Duluth.  Among other exhibits was one room chronicling the immigrant experience.  It was interesting to me since both sides of my family immigrated in the turn-of-the-century timeframe. Perhaps in biggest contrast to today’s immigrants, there were huge dormitories built for incoming immigrants to have a safe place to stay for a few months until they earned enough to get a place of their own.

But the main attraction here is the collection of vintage local trains.  One of the most fascinating to me was this rail mail car. The attendant would reach out with a hook and grab a mail bag hung up at many locations along the route where the train did not stop.  The mail was sorted en route, and the cool part was if the mail was for a stop further down the track, the attendent would throw out the mail bag, which could have included mail picked up just hours ago!  Beat that Fed Ex!  Of course, if the mail was on a stop behind the train’s route, it wouldn’t get delivered that day.

How awesome is this snowplow train!

Here’s a fancy dining car from back in the day.

And here is the mother of all locomotives.  This coal-fired steam locomotive was 128 feet long!  Over half the length was the compartment to carry coal.  This monster burned one ton of coal every six minutes!  It could carry 28 tons of coal in its own coal bin.  It ran iron ore from the Iron Range down to Lake Superior and in its day was the most powerful locomotive in existence.  There were many other trains, including cranes, a rotary snowplow, and the first locomotive to arrive in Minnesota, via boat, of course, not rail.

Then it was off to Split Rock Lighthouse.

When the lighthouse was built in 1910, there were no roads, so all the building supplies were lifted up the cliff via a steam-powered hoist and derrick, including all the bricks necessary to built the lighthouse, foghouse, three keeper houses and barns, along with of course all the supplies and people for a number of years (if the lake was calm).  Five years after construction a tramway was built to make things a bit easier, but it was not until 1924 that a highway was built, allowing more reliable transport of goods.

Martin loved the new slogan of the Split Rock “Before GPS, there was a really big light.”  The lighthouse ceased operation in 1969.

Part of the lamp, with the reflecting glass engineered to produce a beam visible from the furthest distance from the kerosene lamp.

split rock lamp

Some of the mechanics of the apparatus used to spin the light.  On the very top of this photo you can see a green disk that contained 300 pounds of mercury to help keep the light level.

If you find yourself in the neighborhood – drop in.

The next day we headed over to Itasca State Park, Minnesota’s oldest and one of the biggest state parks.  An interesting story is about the nation’s first female park superintendent, Mary Gibbs. She was superintendent shortly after the park was formed, but before the lumber barons.  She had a showdown at gunpoint with the local logging boss regarding destruction of a dam at the headwaters, flooding the park, but making it easier to transport logs.  At the end of her life, she was just as fiesty, going on a hunger strike at the nursing home to protest being charged 75 cents extra to take her meal in her room instead of the dining hall.

The north park entrance.

Our cabin near the lake within the park.

The cabin is one of the gems built by the WPA in the 30’s. It had logs walls, wood floors, a sink, small fridge, sink, stove, but no oven, and bathroom without a shower.  But it was great timing to have the cabin over the 24 hours of rain on this segment of the trip.

One arm of Lake Itasca in the mist.

The light rain didn’t deter us from catching dinner.

A rainbow was one reward for the rain.

It was an all white/yellow meal.  Fried fresh fish, rice side dish, applesauce, and with the leftover “Shore Lunch” fish brading, we breaded some onions for onion rings.

After dinner, we toured the interpretive center and looked around the park.  This is the lodge for dining, with rooms on the 2nd floor, much like some of the classic park lodges in Yellowstone and the Grand Canyon.

This week is the 2nd annual Martin-Daddy explore the northwoods week in Northern Minnesota. We drag the canoe up for the girls to go on a BWCA trip and bum around waiting for them to come out. The first night we stayed at Banning State Park, which is about 60 miles south of Duluth on the Kettle River.

Martin along the Kettle River.

We stayed in a what they call a camping cabin – a cabin with a table and two bunk beds – no plumbing, no electricity. Good on rainy days or to keep bugs out and to have room to stretch around.

We made some foil dinners.

We took the trail that was not recommended for young children – although shortly after the beginning of the trail we saw a family retreating with a stroller! I guess the vertical climbs 20 feet up rock faces was a bit too much for the stroller.  This is the friendly portion of the trail.

The trail led to a rapids and we sat and watched a bunch of kayakers shoot through the rapids, most stayed head side up.

Martin points to a kettle – a geologic formation formed by rocks swirling in a hole until they drill down in the sandstone, making a pretty good cooking kettle in reverse.

A look up through the bottom of the kettle Martin pointed at in the previous picture. Most of the work was done about 10,000 years ago with the draining of glacial Lake Duluth.

The park was home to a turn-of-the-century quarry. Martin took us through the interpretive hike.

This shot is looking inside the power house. It was a rather apocalyptic scene to view the ruins with trees growing inside the ruins of the building.

Before the power house, the holes were created by hand and blasted with black powder.

The woods were full of blooming trillium.

Today was the last non-driving vacation day.  We arrived near Ely with some time to spare before picking up the kids, so Martin and I just hung out at the public landing on Snowbank Lake.

Lunch on a deep, blue northern lake can’t be beat!  After picking up the canoers, cooking them up a dinner, I took a couple hours of quiet time and went back to Snowbank for a couple of hours.

Once I found the pattern, the fish were easy to catch.  They weren’t falling for artificial spinners or plugs, they weren’t falling for leeches or crawlers suspended off the bottom in deeper water, they weren’t suspended over deeper water, but they were hanging out about 10-15 feet from shore, so I actually had to cast towards shore from the dock, not out into the lake.  The night was quiet, I only saw two boats go by, the same number of Bald Eagles that were screeching and circling nearby.

To top off our day, we spent some time near the St. Louis river south of Duluth.  Eventually the river drains into Lake Superior forming a large estuary and exits through the Duluth and Superior ship canals, and his held behind by Park Point (the beach from yesterday).  The Ojibwe call the river Gichigami-ziibi (the great lake-river).  It is the largest river to empty into Lake Superior.

There was 6-9 inches of rain the week before the arrived, so the river was near its peak flow.  There are the highest class rapids (class VI) at this point and below and ABOVE this picture is the take-out point for white-water rafters and more sedentary class IV rapids.

The root-beer colored water roars through this point in Jay Cooke State Park.

Further downstream, more ordinary standing waves and boils fill the channel.  The river was a loud, brash spectacle of water, rock and energy.

We stopped for dinner at Canal Park, and Martin worked up an appetite trying to pull the William A. Irvin, an ore boat anchored in the harbor.

After our visit to the river, we spent the night at Camp Miller in Sturgeon Lake, where I spent many summers as a counselor, naturalist, trip leader, and camp caretaker.  We stopped in and ended the day with a conversation long into the night with Bernie, a kindred spirit and fellow top-notch gardener and handyman.  The highlight was hearing about his maple sugaring and his first prize ribbon at the Minnesota State Fair for his syrup.

This was a day so wonderful you wish you could lock it up and throw away the key.  Martin and I bummed down from Ely to south of Duluth, stopping as we pleased.  In fact, it was so scenic, I’m splitting it into two days, since it can’t all fit in one post.  We even saw a moose near the road on the drive down to the lake.

It was a rare calm day on Lake Superior.  This is a view of Shovel Point, north of Silver Bay.

We stopped in for a look at Wolf Ridge Environmental Learning Center near Finland, MN, to see where Claire will be working this summer.  Here’s a sign taken just for Linda.

The hike up to Marshall Mountain was fun.

Here it is, up on the top of the ridge overlooking Lake Superior.

Raven Lake to the left and Wolf Lake, not visible in this photo, to the right.

A replica Voyageur canoe, capable of taking 24 people along.

From the shore of Wolf Lake, looking towards the south.

The buildings at Wolf Ridge have the seashorey kind of look – this is the science center.  I hope it’s a great place for Claire to live and work this summer.

A view looking down from Shovel Point towards Duluth.

A rare calm day – you can see Wisconsin on the horizon.

These are some underwater rocks on the shore.  Superior’s got stones!

Straight down from these rocks, we saw a giant fish – hard to tell how big it was, but from the only thing nearby to get an accurate measurement, it appeared to be about 2 loon lengths long.

We also stopped a ways down the road at Gooseberry Falls.

The last stop on this portion of the day was a different kind of Superior shore, this one, a very long sandy beach from Duluth to Superior.

Today was a day just to paddle out.  We had reservations at a bunk house, so we didn’t have to worry about finding a campsite or driving home 10 hours.

But first there were 6 portages to cross.  The 2nd and 3rd were a bit intimidating.  It might not look bad in this photo, but from the waters edge, it seemed like straight up – a challenge with an 18.5 long canoe on your back!

The portage trail itself was a bit bouldery and still wet from the night before.  Luckily, the only time I tripped was without the canoe on my back.

Here’s some extra fancy purple fungus on the trail.  Sometimes asparagus and some other things are purple when they are cold, but it had been warm, so I think purple was the normal color for this guy.

The day was mostly overcast, and we stopped for lunch at this campsite, which had the closest fire grate to the water I’ve ever seen at a BWCA site.

one year ago…”Children of the Corn”

The morning broke like all the rest on the trip – calm and warm.

That was welcome as we had about three miles of Winchell Lake left before we portaged to some smaller lakes that wind wouldn’t matter as much.

After a little more than a half day of paddling and some swimming and fishing, the skies finally unloaded on us.

I’m not sure you can call it a camping trip without rain.  Martin was eager to try out his new raingear, at least for a short time.

It was time to break out the tarp for a bit of protection around the kitchen.

Martin insisted that I take this photo for Claire, who had given Martin this freeze-dried ice cream for his birthday.  There you go Claire – this package traveled well – from DC to Iowa to BWCA.

one year ago…”Pesto!”

Our next night was on Winchell Lake.  Winchell is a long lake, about five miles long with steep elevation on the south side, fronting the Misquah Hills.

Martin was a trooper on the portages.  On the first portage he asked if he could take this backpack.  He hauled it all 14 portages on the trip over 700 rods, a bit over two miles.

Here, the boys are waiting for the fish to stop by on their lines.  In the background, a fire relatively recently passed through, thus all the dead trees.  The fire jumped the lake and kept going.

The fishing paid off – here Martin shows two of the fish he caught for a fresh dinner!

There’s not much that’s more relaxing than floating in the middle of a northern lake on a warm day.  The temps were in the mid-80’s which is a tad warm for this area, but the humidity was low, so it was still pleasant.

The boys getting ready to start a fire – always a popular past-time.

This site had a great bear tree.  The pack is hung up for the day, relatively safe from critters stealing the food at night.

one year ago…”Thingamajig Thursday #219″

We left Tettegouche and had final stops in Grand Marais for last minute groceries, permits, bait and the like and hit the water by about noon.  We took off from Poplar Lake, where the other duo rented a canoe.

Here we are, moments before we head out.

Here’s the route – we had no specific plan, but the white is the route we ended up taking – Poplar to Lizz to Caribou to Horseshoe for night one camp.  Then off to Gaskin to Winchell for 2nd night camp.  Then from Winchell to Omega to Henson to Gaskin for 3rd night camp.  Finally last day from Gaskin to Jump to Allen to Horseshoe to Caribou to Lizz to Poplar.

Lizz Lake, our official BWCA entry point.

Martin manning the bow.

James, my Dad partner on the trip enjoying a cup o’ morning on Horseshoe Lake.

Martin manning the breakfast griddle with a pancake almost ready to go!

one year ago…”Getting Ready for State Fair-Like Event”

Our campground was within easy walking distance of a number of waterfalls on the Baptism River.

Here’s Two Step Falls in the fading light of day.

A most popular past-time for 10 year-old boys is throwing rocks in water – here you can catch part of the splash of the latest rock to be launched.

Further upstream the boys found a large log that was stuck in the river and first tried to help it downstream, and then later, maneuvered to direct bubbles in the stream.

Martin thought that perhaps using a lever might help the project.  This is in front of the High Falls of the Baptism – the highest waterfall in Minnesota – a great place to play.

In the evening, I took a stroll down to the lake to take in the sunset over Lake Superior, and sprinted out to Shovel Point.

The view from Shovel Point, looking back down Lake Superior towards Palisade Head. It was an exceptionally calm and quiet night on the lake. As a native Duluthian who moved away as a toddler, but moved back for high school and undergrad, the lake exerts a pull on me, even after all these years.  I was happy to spend even this little bit of time alone on the cliffs overlooking the lake in a rather rare calm and pristine mood.

one year ago…”From the “Berries Like the Rain”

Today brought driving rain, strong winds and cold temperatures, so it was a good day to visit the underground mine in nearby Soudan.  It is now a state park and as part of the tour, you travel down the original mine elevators about a half-mile underground to the 27th level of the mine and then travel about 3/4 of a mile in a small train at the lowest level.

Here onlookers watch the drum and cable that hoist the elevator cars up and down the half-mile to the bottom.

Martin anxiously awaits the trip to the bottom during his last moments before heading underground.

Linda, a half-mile underground heading down even deeper in the mine.

 
Martin a bit more relaxed now that he is safely down to the 27th level.  The mine stopped operation in 1962 and produced very rich ore – 68%-72% iron. A 12 inch block of ore weighed 350 pounds.

There is now a physics lab at the bottom of the lab that is investigating the elementary nature of particles, shielded from the atmosphere by a half-mile of rock.

 

one year ago…