Coop's Corner: Early August South Shore

Wednesday, August 19, 2020

Early August South Shore

My 2 week early August vacation got a lazy (for me) start on Friday morning, typically something that may have started already Thursday afternoon before.

Back to my stop along the fire road #XXX in the Chequamegon Nicolet National Forest, roughly 15 miles as seagulls seldom fly from Lake Superior.

Camp setup and time to get out and explore...

My 'street'...

I found this meadow and marked it....may come in handy some day.

A challenge!!

Almost....almost made the entire loop and the road is up ahead about 75 yards. My skid plate isn't tough enough, the Himalayan doesn't have enough clearance, the surrounding woods too thick. I'm too old for log crossing jumps.

I haven't been carrying a (big enough) saw.

I was so close to making the full loop!!

It was a surprise and a disappointment to see that Ehler's was closed. When I asked around town about its future I was told that nobody knew. I did see signs about Take Out Pizza...

The Ehler's warehouse building on the right and this new construction made me wonder if a new store was being built. Consensus was that the new building was for the "fishery smokehouse". I'm assuming they meant Halvorson's??

The artesian spring, every flowing. I filled my bottles numerous times here and so do others from all over.

Peg's grandfather's boat isn't going to be lake-worthy for much longer. I always stop for a bike boat photo.

Something new, a shop I'd not seen before. I went in for coffee but didn't find any and went to the gas station across the road instead.

Stopped at the Herbster Campground, the Self-Contained sites 100% full, the rule for using the campground your rig must have a bathroom. The on-site bathrooms locked. In other words, no tenting. The tenting area adjacent to the lake are growing tall grass.

The raised, leveled and tuned-up shelter was completed before COVID grabbed us from the look of things.

The Gym, locked and pandemic safe...

The north boundary of the National Forest and the North Boundary road that runs east-west. I believe that the area to the north is Bayfield County Forest.

Looking west....the first time I rode this road how many ever years ago the area was freshly 'clear cut'.

Someone named it Cully's Corner....

Back to camp for dinner after a very fine riding day....

The spot that I'm parked at was I'm guessing access for an old timber cut. There's a berm behind the trailer that I'm literally backed against. Over that berm a trail that only later did I discover its purpose. Lots of small trees were bulldozed, Skidded over and loosely buried resulting in these colorful specimens. I've learned a lot about birds this season, seems it's time to start brushing up on my lichens.

For comparison next to my wallet....

Friday dinner w/o mushrooms....

These turned into something quite good...3 for $5 at my favorite convenience store. The next day when I met Paul and Michelle for lunch in Seeley, I learned that we had both dined on $5 steaks the night before. I finished 2 of them Friday evening and the 3rd one supplemented oatmeal the next morning.

I've been watching a lot of 'Tube cooking over fire....over fire...That's how you burn, not how you cook. I'm a Coal Cooker and was once quite good at it; my skills are returning.

Turning the GPS on the next morning, the satellite resolution must not have been as tight the day before. I've seen this in the past but don't remember it ever being so different. While GPS Accuracy can be 200', normally I'm seeing 30'.

In Drummond, Wisconsin. A great destination the way it sounds on Presidents Day

Michelle and Paul in Seeley for lunch...

A very nice city park in Drummond, hadn't seen it before.

I expect to be sharing more photos from here in late September.

Coals....not fire!

More wildlife to learn about....bugs!

Anyone know why all of the highway signs are losing their 3M coating....all up on top?

Five corners....

Big dog tracks compared to my size 13 boots....

Minor Stops involve brakes and no throttle. Major Stops involve abundant throttle and no brakes, of which this was one. Not officially a tip over, it was a rapid arrest of motion in relatively shallow sand. Later that day, I went down hard, a real down in sand that was not shallow and it hurt...3rd gear, should have been in 2nd. No photo was taken, my shoulder and ribs hurt too much to pull out either of the cameras.

A nice walk to the falls but I felt every step in my chest.....Eric told me that his rib Owie lasted 6 weeks, something I'm having no trouble believing.

Port Wing harbor and beach....

"In Memory of Terry Berg"

Cornucopia harbor and gift shops...

Well that's enough. I've got a lot more, helmet cam footage, photos, more trees, there was more sand, audio of the whipoorwils at night, etc. but you're already dozing off.

It was fun, 3 1/2 days worth. I'll be up there at least once more this season, maybe more.

1 comment:

motormikeAugust 20, 2020 at 8:38 AM
..... " rapid arrest of motion ... " :)
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Others say....

"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

When you get those rare moments of clarity, those flashes when the universe makes sense, you try desperately to hold onto them. They are the lifeboats for the darker times, when the vastness of it all, the incomprehensible nature of life is completely elusive. So the question becomes or should have been all along, what would you do if you knew you only had one day, or one week, or one month to live. What lifeboat would you grab onto? What secret would you tell? What band would you see? What person would you declare your love to? What wish would you fulfill? What exotic locale would you fly to for coffee? What book would you write? ------- Ben Tyler

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

"Steamboats are like wedding cakes without the complications...." ----Mark Twain

"It's not about having lots of money, it's about having lots of options......." -----Chris Rock

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

"I tell the guy's girlfriend that the only difference between the book's main character Phaedrus and myself is that I am neither brilliant, tortured or insane, she looks at my bike and there is an uncomfortable silence." --------ahendepe (a.k.a. Vermin)