Coop's Corner: Halloween Day Trip to Bayfield

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Halloween Day Trip to Bayfield

My 2nd annual version in 2007, typically a very nice 475-500 mile trip at the end of October.

A very quiet Bayfield, the Apple Festival tourists long gone.....

Emil Road on the Red Cliff Reservation.....

Halvorson's in Cornucopia, Wisconsin. There will very soon be smoked White Fish in my saddlebag. The ST2 parked in front of Peg's grandfather's 'moored' fishing boat.

The Twin Sisters, named for Peg's twin Aunts.....

Chimney Road, Solon Springs....

7 comments:

Martha March 26, 2013 at 8:42 PM
I was in Bayfield for a couple days, saw Cornucopia only once, but recognized it in your photo right away.

That would be an AWESOME ride up there. Wow. But I have to say the depth of silence and my awareness of wolves and bears scared me stupid.
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Coop a.k.a. CoopdwayMarch 26, 2013 at 9:03 PM
Martha, my Halloween trips are one day of pretty intense riding; not always fast since I've done it on the slow bikes as well. There isn't much time available to stop and enjoy....mostly a Go day. The big animals don't get much of a chance to get a bearing on me, though the rides always end with an hour of darkness. A bad time to be on the roads in our neighborhood with the deer so active.
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SonjaMMarch 26, 2013 at 9:11 PM
It must have been a good season if you still could be out there riding on Halloween.
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TrobairitzMarch 27, 2013 at 10:40 AM
That looks like a nice area to ride. Whether it be Halloween or earlier in the year. Although it is always nice not to have to dodge tourists.
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UnknownMarch 28, 2013 at 1:47 PM
Coop:

By the time Halloween rolls around it is very cold here. I know we can freeze our ears off if we don't wear head protection. 500 miles on backroads is indeed a long ride, no wonder you didn't have time to stop for photos

bob
Riding the Wet Coast
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"it was auspicious to approach any situation from a deferential, inquisitive place. Conceding that there is much to learn is the best blueprint for discovering something new." ----B. Fuller

The Man straightened stiffly above the block of salt fixed to the stake and looked at the young cattle ringed about him. The pasture was holding out well and the stock was looking good. This bunch would be ready to sell in another month, maybe sooner if the market was right.

A stir among the cattle down near the river brought him round to face the swinging bridge he'd built years before. Someone was coming toward him from the bridge. Someone in breeches, but it didn't look like a man, somehow. What was a woman doing in his pasture this time of night?

He bent over the salt again; maybe if he paid her no heed she'd go on past and let him mind his own business. He heard her footsteps come nearer and stop. "Good evening," she said.

Her voice was smooth with book learning but friendlier than most, and somehow almost shy. When he made no answer she went on, "I've been sitting on your swinging bridge....I thought I'd like to say thank-you...." Her voice stumbled a little, then she tried once more.

"You are Mr. ____". His name sounded strange in her voice, but she went on to tell her own.

"That's what they've called me the last sixty-eight years," he said, looking past her face to the hills fast darkening under a single star. "I reckon the woods are free for those that like to walk there."

The unfamiliar voice laughed a little. "That's what Emerson said: the grove belongs to the man who walks in it with an open heart....On that basis I guess I've owned part of your woods for a good many years.....". She made a final effort. "I've always wanted to thank you....."

Something deeply hidden stirred in him. "There's a stump up there, in the notch of the woods", he said slowly, "that before the timber grew so tall you could stand on it and see all over this country."

He kept still a minute, remembering, then, "I used to stand up there an' look at things, an' wonder how they come to be like they was, an' how the hills was created, an' all the things in Nature.... I told my wife I guessed all the religion I ever had I got standin' on that old stump, a-wonderin'..." He turned his face away from her.

She helped him out. "I know about that, a little. This afternoon I saw......." Her account of a thing she had really taken time to look at eased him, and he answered with telling of the badger den at the foot of the swinging bridge.

When she had gone, he turned to watch her. After a moment she stood clear and unmoving against the sky. You could hear the sounds of the river where she stood. She was one that could stand still long enough, he thought, really to hear what a body was saying, or a river.

Then she walked down the farther side of the slope and was gone. ------Margaret Snyder from A Chosen Valley

Fall was the end of harvest, end of the growing season, a burst of color and sun-warmth before killing frost turned the land gray and cold. Fall was a moody time, full of both life and death, a time when we were reminded of the power outside of us, reminded that the seasons happen to us. We do not invite the change to come.-------Ben Logan, from The Land Remembers

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We were also cautioned about journeying far from home. As an example of the dangers, the town had a badly crippled lady named Lucy, who as a girl had traveled to New York City. As she traveled along a sidewalk, sightseeing, she was struck by the outstretched hand of a suicide who had leapt from high above. Her spine had been shattered and for the rest of her life, she was to walk bent forward at the waist, tapping the sidewalk with two black canes. Whenever the subject of travel to a big city was raised, someone would say, "Just remember what happened to Miss Tripp." ---- Ted Kooser, from Local Wonders

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As the very proud father of three former ponytail wearers, hopefully I can get away with this....."For the past few years it's been fashionable for young women to wear ball caps and to snap the strap on the back under their ponytails. I like the looks of that, their shiny ponytails jauntily swinging, but it's hard not to think of the rear ends of horses. There's a piece of harness called the crupper that goes just under a horse's tail to keep its nose down. If the horse lifts its head to look for a way out of whatever predicament it's in, the crupper tightens and hurts the horse. But it's foolish for parents to think that a ball cap might keep a young woman from running away. Anybody can see they're made for running." ------Ted Kooser, Local Wonders

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