Marlowe, Dmitri, and Bill, and Lake Superior

Dwight Peck's personal website

Scenes from the old country, summer 2018

More annual lakeside fun in the Northwoods

You may not find this terribly rewarding unless you're included here, so this is a good time for casual and random browsers to turn back before they get too caught up in the sweep and majesty of the proceedings and can't let go.

Marlowe, Dmitri, and Bill, and Lake Superior

Melvin the Doge stretching his legs at the roadside on the way up to Lake Superior -- we're turning onto the South Boundary Road at the western edge of the Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park, Upper Michigan.

And that's the Presque Isle River below the bridge, just a mile from the Lake Superior shoreline. (Here's one of many hikes down that river to the lake.)

But now we bundle up our cat and carry on to Ontonagon.

The family's cottage near Four Mile Rock, just east of Ontonagon in the Upper Peninsula (UP).

The main cabin

And the overflow accommodations

Melvin does not invariably respond well to new circumstances. Sometimes (like many of us) he just hides.

He thinks he's being so clever and resourceful.

Down to the beach

Of which (the beach) there is much, much less this year than last.

Dima and Marlowe and their bundle of joy, called Billie (or William, by some)

Lots of random driftwood, and Kristin

Billie's from Canada -- 'over that way'

A short walk along the shoreline in the late afternoon

It must have been a fair-size wave that heaved that thing up on the bank.

Waiting for the show to begin

Now for dinner at Foxey's in Ontonagon, and contemplations of tomorrow's agenda (depending upon the weather)

The cosy cabin, with water carried up from the lake (and, for human consumption, bought in jugs in the supermarket)

Night-night.

Awkward weather today -- another walk along the beach will have to suffice.

-- A curse upon your shoreline.

It's that sort of day.

Waves and driftwood playing tricks on one another

Nature's diversity

We're on a semi-chilly walk eastward up the shore to the mouth of the Flintsteel River, 4km up and the same back, tiring for the feet.

Bill delights in tempting the waves, some of which aren't fooling around.

And romping in the tidal pools

The eagles' nest

It was moments after this shot that the guy with the camera plonked off wet wood into the water, and scrambled up in less than a second, but was unable to save his Sony Cybershot point-and-shoot camera from an ignominious, sodden end of its useful life.

Leaving Lake Superior (photo taken before the Sony Cybershot took a brief bath and packed it in)

Another grim and rainy day (photo taken by a new little Canon PowerShot, similarly 'not water-resistant')

We need the weather to clear off just enough for at least a last pontoon boat ride around the lake.

A chillyish excursion on the old Grumman floatboat, 2 August 2018

Dima and Marlowe trading snide remarks

Young Bill at the helm

Threading his way amongst the islands

And the next day, hanging out at the pool in the Quality Inn CWA in Mosinee, down the street from the CWA airport . . .

. . . looking forward to a 5 a.m. start to the next day at the airport, where a United flight might or might not decide to set out on its scheduled service to Chicago O'Hare. (The record is spotty.)

Billie in his element