7/22/2015 Duluth, Ely and the Boundary Waters of Northern Minnesota

Boundary Waters near Ely

One might ask, why the heck are they going to the Boundary Waters of Northern Minnesota.  John lived in Minnetonka, outside Minneapolis MN in high school and still has family there. Having never had the chance to visit this land of 10,000 lakes (there are actually many thousand more than that) along the Canadian boarder, now was the time. Looking on a map there is more water per square mile up here than there is land and much of it is connected. Ely became a destination when a fellow camper in Bar Harbor mentioned that the International Wolf Center was there.

Glensheen Estate Gardens on Lake Superior

After a long days drive, we stop in the large industrial city of Duluth for the night. In the morning we have a nice walk along the lake front sculpture garden and tour nearby Glensheen Estate.  This beautiful mansion was built in 1908 by the nouveau riche Congdon family.  Chester Congdon was a school teacher who taught himself law and while working for an iron ore company, make a couple of very good investments. These were wonderful people who treated their help almost like family and even put cork floors in the stables to protect their livestock's hooves!  

Bear, Dog, Wolf, Fox & Raccoon Are Close Relations

Two hours northwest is Ely where the remote national and state campgrounds take no reservations and have few if any spots for a 30 foot camper. With the truck acting up again we decide to pay the big bucks and make a reservation at HooDoo Point on Lake Vermilion so we don't have to drive all over this back country looking for a place to settle for a few days.  Visiting the International Wolf Center was worth the trip.  This modern education center has wonderful photos and interactive exhibits about wolves all over the world.  Four wolves live at the center and although viewed behind a large glass wall, they were pretty active exhibiting several different wolf behaviors. 

This is very different from our experience with the kids 5 or so years ago while visiting Zoe who was living in Denver. We rented an RV and drove SW to Mission Wolf, a mountain reserve housing 34 rescued wolves and wolf/dog breeds. In addition to observing them in their huge fenced in compounds, we also sat with about 6 of their "tamed" ones while they sniffed and licked us and tried to take our phones/cameras.  In the wild, they are as afraid of us as we are of them!  We even pet them as they ran around playing with each other.  SOOOOOO COOOOL.  We parked the RV at the Mission for the night and could hear them howling at dusk and dawn. The next day we  trucked further south and hiked around the 800 foot sand dunes (yes, you heard me right) in Colorado's Great Sand Dunes National Park pictured here against 14,000 foot mountains.  Another national treasure that is a must visit!  

Now back to our current trip.  Just down the road from the Wolf Center is the North American Bear Center.  This is another huge, modern education center filled with great exhibits and several live bears living there under pretty good conditions.

 Speaking of

Zoe & 3 Month Old Grizzly Cub

bears... Zoe's roommate is researching the nutrition of grizzly bears for her PhD at the WSU Grizzly Lab.  Part of her roommates work is to raise the newborn cubs in her house to get them used to humans so they will be easier to work with for future research. As you can see, Zoe loves the opportunity to get up close and personal with these now sweet little teddy bears.







Another interesting camper option was found at our Indian Point Campground in Duluth.  A group of 'our age' motorcyclists were there with this pretty neat pop-up style camper that they towed behind the bike.  

7/16/2015 Traverse City and Michigan's Upper Penninsula

Chateau Chantel Winery overlooking Lake Michigan

On July 7 we arrive in Traverse City Michigan to visit with friends Jane (from Fairfax) and Rob.  First time camping in Michigan so we add another state sticker to our map!  We camp for the week at Traverse City State Park along side Lake Michigan.  The sand is so soft and the water so clear, but try to swim in it (mid 50 degrees) and your 'parts' turn blue.  We are tucked under nice pine trees where the black squirrels scamper up the trees and over tents.  And there are no bugs! The sunny 70-80 degree days and 50-60 degree nights are absolutely wonderful, especially when much of the country swelters in the high  90's and 100's, have wild fires and record floods.  On the news we just saw big RV's floating away in Arizona flash floods where they haven't seen rain like this in 300 years. We get the truck in for service and the transmission diagnostic turns up nothing.

Jane has planned lots of fun things to do - we drive around Old Mission Peninsula where we see hops, grapes and cherries growing everywhere.  We enjoy a lovely view of the Lake on both sides of the peninsula from the Chateau Chantel Winery where I have to sample the sparkling cherry wine.  Sweet, but good in small amounts.  Since cherries are the main crop around here we also have sampled chocolate cherry coffee, cherry salsa, cherry BBQ sauce AND Rob made a delicious rhubarb cherry cobbler. All this and much more can be found at the local Cherry Republic Stores.   

People Hiking Up the Dune Climb

An afternoon at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Park Shoreline is a must.  We see the lighthouse, collect very cool rocks from the lake shore including petosky stones and rope coral fossils from this 300 million year old sea bottom.  The dunes are so steep at the "Dune Climb" you feel like you're going to fall off.  Many people (not us) of all ages are running 460 feet down to the lake shore but then have to make a 2 plus hour hike back up.  There is a large bull dozer sitting at the top of the dunes and signs on the dunes say be sure you can make the climb up because there is a large fee if someone has to go down to rescue you.  In Traverse City we biked, attended an outdoor concert, and kayaked in a nearby river.  

Mushroom Houses

Charlevoix, Michigan

After a great visit we head north to the Michigan Upper Peninsula (aka: the U. P.). On our way we stop at Charlevoix and enjoy walking around this quaint little harbor village.  Especially cool are the stone mushroom houses built by Earl Young beginning in the 1920's through the 1970's.  We cross over the bridge between Lake Michigan and Lake Huron and are officially on the U.P.  We almost drive past Wandering Wheel Campground outside of another cute village called Munising.  The U.P. is a pretty remote area and you CANNOT rely on your GPS as we found out. This area quickly gets high on our list of great stops with the natural beauty of Lake Superior combined with significant opportunities for great hiking, biking, kayaking, camping and eating at the Falling Rock Cafe. Again surprisingly no bugs!  We can't understand why this place isn't packed with people, it is so fantastic - not that we are complaining. 

Kayaking Pictured Rocks next to Bridal Falls

Pictured Rocks are beautifully colored and shaped cliffs, 50-200 feet high along the shores of Lake Superior.  We kayak along a few of the 40 miles of cliffs and hope to be able to camp on them on our next visit.  There are water falls all over this area and one day we make a very rough 5 mile drive down a dirt road to hike out to

Pictured Rocks

Chapel Falls.  Another day we take a small boat out to Grand Island where the only motorized transportation on the island is a 9 passenger van that takes tourists around the dirt roads a couple times a day. WARNING:  Read The Brochure Before You Go!  Our tandem bike did fine on the dirt roads but the bike trails were too rustic for us. By not reading the brochure until after we arrived on the island, in addition to not knowing the trails were for 'mountain' bikes, we missed the strong suggestion for bug spray and head nets. OMG did we

View of Lake Superior from Grand Island

regret this oversight.  We had an almost empty bottle of bug spray which we prayed would last till we got off the island. The hills and road conditions made this 3 hour, 10 mile route challenging enough but we could hardly stop to enjoy the views because we were either getting swarmed by mosquitoes or eaten alive by black flies.   We were able to stop at Mather Beach where Deb collected a couple of polished granite, quartz, jasper and basalt rocks for her future mushroom shaped rock garden.

7/14/15 Herkimer Diamond Mine, New York and London, Ontario

Herkimer KOA Camp Site

First day on the road of year two, we head to northern Michigan to visit friends via I-90 through Albany NY and Ontario. So glad we don't have to go down I-95 in Connecticut through New York City!  In New York the truck starts having problems as it jerks us around a bit going up long hills.  Can't tell if it is the transmission or the engine.  CRAP!  In Buffalo NY we hit a detour which brings us to a railroad bridge with a sign which says "11.5 Feet Right Lane".  Since we are 12.5 feet high it would be nice if the sign would also state the height of the left lane.  We pull over and as we contemplate an alternate route we watch a tractor trailer truck go under the left lane and happily follow.  Having had enough for one day we pull into

the Herkimer Diamond Mine KOA in Herkimer NY.  We camp on the banks of the extremely fast flowing West Canada Creek but arrive too late to tour the mines which are right across the street.   By the way, a Herkimer diamond is a very uniquely shaped diamond  best described as a rectangle with points at both ends. 

 Concerned about getting the truck in for repair the next day we leave early to be at the Utica Ford Dealer when it opens. Unfortunately it is Saturday and they have no time for us.  John decides "we will move on and take it easy".  What the heck does that mean when you are driving a 3 ton truck 65 miles an hour on interstate highways towing a 7 ton trailer?

Already biting my nails from the truck issue, we approach the Canadian Border at Niagara and decide to take a new tact when responding to the boarder guard's questions.  In past crossings on this journey, having gotten at a minimum the evil eye and twice searched, we skip the fact that we live in the camper and just say we are from South Dakota so it matches our drivers licenses. It works this time and we get right through without any question about our Montana plates :)    

Driving beside Lake Ontario, we admire the clear blue water as we again recognize that once outside of a city, Canada is very sparsely populated.  Debra, having grown up mostly in the densely  populated northeast, is always surprised at how sparsely populated most of our country is away from the coastlines.  We camp in London, Ontario and since it is our first time in this province, we get to put the Ontario sticker on our RV travel map. We are ready for bed and note that it is after 9:30 p.m. and the sun is still shining.  

7/4/2015 Fourth of July Weekend in Newport

Us, Mike, Julie and Dave at The Breaker's 

With family and friends in town we become Newport tourists for the 4th of July weekend.  We start with a morning stroll along Cliff Walk, named one of the "Top 50 Places of a Lifetime" by National Geographic.  The Atlantic surf is crashing on one side and the Gilded Age (late 1800's) summer "cottages" of the wealthy industrialists of the day are on the other. We tour the Breakers, the grandest of these mansions, which was built by the Vanderbilt's in 1893.  It

Breaker's Dining Room

only took two years to build this 70 room Italian Renaissance palazzo with everything being imported from Europe.  Hummm, it has been more than 2 years and we have another one to go before our 8 unit condo building in Westerly RI, will be finished and I assure you, the materials are local. The foundation for our building was finished last December but they are constructing the Club House and finishing up the first building before they begin framing our building. 

Zoe has her heart set on a childhood treat of Dell's frozen lemonade at Second Beach and we  find the Dell's truck in the same place it was 20 years ago. 

Cardines Field

We  have dinner at the Mudville Pub in downtown Newport and watch the Newport Gulls play on Cardines Field.  I love this quaint little stadium where Sachel Paige, the Babe and Yogi Berra played on this, the oldest continuously operating ball field in the country.  We love our baseball!
  
As if it could get any better, we celebrate the 4th of July on Rose Island in Newport Harbor.  We take a quick walk around Fort Adams, which is the largest coastal fortification in the U.S. built in the early 1800's.  It was active through WWII guarding the entrance to Narragansett Bay.  After taking a launch to Rose Island, we 

BBQ and Watching Fireworks at Rose Island Lighthouse

meet up with our Newport/Florida friends Geri and Bill for a fantastic BBQ and tour of the beautifully restored Lighthouse. Fortifications were built on this 18 acre island during the Civil War and in 1794 Fort Hamilton was constructed.  Upon this Fort's bastions,  a Lighthouse was built in 1870 and was operational for 100 years. You can see the stone barracks from Fort Hamilton which were used in WWI and WWII by the Navy to store weapons. Mike and our newly commissioned Ensign were asked to lower the colors at sunset.  This was already a magical experience and then.... there were the most wonderful fireworks over the Fort.

The four of us are struck by how fortunate our lives have been and that we are together in the town where the kids were born and attended The Pennfield School.  From here we moved to Hawaii then to Virginia.  It is deja vu as Jack starts his Naval career here and then moves to Hawaii.

A Family Portrait Was Taken Here 20 Years Ago

7/2/2015 Commissioning

Jack and David

0600  We meet up with Dave, Jack's prior boss from DC, to watch a tame version of the OCS morning exercise routine and Victory Run.  Jack's leadership in the Company earns him 
the privilege of carrying his Company's guide-on (flag).  

0830  Joined by Jack's friend Greg, Vicki and John;  Jack's dad (retired Navy Captain) administers the Officer's Oath commissioning Jack as a Navy Ensign. We are so proud and know that his grandfathers and great grandfather who served in the Navy before him are proud he is carrying on the tradition. We have an octant from John's mother's great-grandfather, a sea captain who sailed around the Horn in the 1800's from New Bedford, Massachusetts. On Deb's father's side, she had a grandfather who was a sea captain in Newfoundland in the 1700's. The salt is clearly in Jack's veins.

0930  Jack finally gets his orders and will report to a school in San Diego and in the fall to the Destroyer USS Chung Hoon in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. HE IS THRILLED!

1030  We take a tour of the Naval War College Museum.  Behind the scenes, Deb's family from Massachusetts and Connecticut are congregating at our campground, helping to prepare for the after-party.  

1300  Carrying the guide-on, Jack leads the Company onto the field. They all take the oath of office together and we listen to a moving speech about the special responsibilities of Naval Officers. Sherrie hands me the flag that flew on the ship the day our father was buried at sea in 2009 which Jack later holds during photos.  

1600  Family and friends join us at Melville Campground for a New England Clam Boil.  Included are Newport friends, Theo and Kalia; Deb's brother and sisters, nieces, nephews and Aunt. Dave gave a heartwarming speech about Jack and his family. John's brother gives Jack their father's WWII Ka-bar knife and we present Jack with a copy of MacArthur's prayer to his son entitled "Build Me A Son". We all had a great time celebrating and reminiscing.