Up North Trip, 2000
(August 22 to Sept 4)
Grayling to St. Ignace
Well, we finally got under way a couple days later than planned. We stopped in Grayling on the way up and everyone but me chatted with an old lady in her yard for quite a while. She’d lived there 50 years and said there were 50,000 people in her front yard last week, honest: the canoe race. We had malteds and pressed on. I visited the canoe rac HQ and bought another book and saw lots of nice pics and met a couple organizers in their insurance office. We drove to St. Ignace the first night. Then we went to Mackinaw Island the next evening. We just had a slow day that day and went on a little family bike ride to town with Martha, Henry and me. Jan and Craig watched Lucy. I went on an hour-long paddle along the shore to town later on and then practiced wet re-entries when I got back. The water was lovely and crystalline. I found out that I could get back in easily if the water was only waist deep. It was impossible to empty the C1 of water if swamped out over my head. Thus it is absolutely necessary to carry a bailing bucket if canoeing on a lake. With only one person in a race boat, it’s also very hard to get back into the boat when in deep water. I finally did it. It hurts coz you get scraped. And my lightweight boat suffered some cracks of gunnels. You really have to heave over the stern and take care not to tumble in as you get reseated. What would really seem to help in self-rescue in deep water is a paddle float. So, bailer and float are must-haves, plus PFD. If in a C2, you could likely have the other paddler keep the boat steady from the other side. Be prepared for scrapes, however. Your body will be dragged over the gunnels no matter what. I’m not quite used to paddling a tippy race boat in deep water waves, but it would’ve been fun to work on such skills a lot more.
The St. Ignace state park campground suffered from lots of bridge freeway traffic noise. Also, all campers were cheek by jowl.
Jan gets her infected foot cleaned and dressed by Craig out in the campsite, with lots of cries and moans. Interesting to the neighbors, I’m sure.
We’ve had great meals in camp.
Trailer Maintenance
I’m finding out that we really have to have a prepared trailer to make camping fun. I really feel the lack of a proper sewer system. The present one needs rebuilding. I would like to try to do it someday on this trip. It shouldn’t be too hard. Just your usual PVC piping. The frig won’t light up either. Pilot worked at home, not up here. Too bad. Works with electric, though. Craig’s rig has no frig at all due to some glitch. But his sewer is fine. Also, my water tank needs to be able to hold pressure.
We had a question about the remote braking device on the way out of town at first. We were right near Gillette’s and they said to stop on in and they’d take a look. It turns out that it would be a half-hour wait and $30. They smilingly said they always help those who are on the road. No one could spare a moment to tell us how to adjust the remote braking dial, though. After I waited forever while a customer was served just to ask my question, I first had to give him my name, rank and serial number. Modern business jerks. As I was saying, after confering with family, that we’d figure it out ourselves, on principal, I heard the guy who’d been helping me get threatened by a lawsuit from another customer. What comes around goes around.
Craig said he knew how to adjust the remote, even though he couldn’t find the dial on it and didn’t know that the only moving part was a brake activator. A little scary! But we fiddled around, found the dial, then figured out what it did and finally got some braking to occur with it set to maximum.
Some semis on the road blew me around a bit, so I stopped and tightened my anti-sway device. It worked. We have a nice set-up.
“The Kitchen” and The Grand Hotel
So, Martha has been reading a book I bought her by the great mystery writer Nicholas Freeling called The Kitchen about his years working in great hotel kitchens. What a great way to prep for our big evening treat coming up. Late that day, we took a ferry over to the Island and found out that we had to be back for the last ferry in just a couple hours. One does what one can! We had our great instant babysitters ready for action. We were dressed up. We hit the beach and took off for dinner…at the Grand Hotel!
It was lovely and Martha really had a blast, starting out with a huge, shapely Rusty Nail served in a snifter.
We did have live music in the dining room and we did get a window seat even though someone was harping that there were none free. Our host snatched away a ‘Reserved’ card and started us on our way.
There was neat looking staff all around. We like the older people. But we got a couple sullen dullards who knew nothing and cared less. I didn’t come here for the race angle, buddy. Well, tradition, what can you do. I hope they reward quality more than diversity, since the staff is all Jamaican, it looks like they’re set up to be able to. Hmmm, our waiter had been there 10 seasons. Not optimistic. Well, in certain ways they were pro enough. He liked hearing that I used to work there. After dinner, we had some time before the ferry left, so we explored a bit. Too bad the ballroom had a special dinner going. It would’ve been splendid to have stayed for nice music.
Then I took Martha to my old guardhouse and I said Hi to the guard there and asked him if we could get a little tour of the kitchen. He said sure and called a flunky kid down to show us around. This youngster was very spiffy, uniformed and proud to be our guide. He snuck us into The Kitchen. Martha liked seeing it a lot. She noticed some amazing deserts being prepared that far outshone what we got, with no help from our waiter. It was huge. I think there was even more to than we saw. The kid said “There’s Mr. Dan. If anyone asks you’re very important guests.” Dan Musser is the owner. I recall when he was just a kid in a bow-tie at an ice cream social I got to attend years ago. It was neat to think he was in action hovering over the kitchen. I hope he’s upholding the Grand tradition.
The dinner fee thing is silly, though. I think we could’ve just walked by and snatched free tickets. No one checked any credentials. I’m sure that big conferences don’t pay full rate for each attendee. So we paid $75 each while they probably paid $30. Martha called ahead of time and found out that a room for two with meals is $450. Gulp! But if a conference is buying 100 rooms for a weekend, they’re only paying $200 each I bet.
Jan had the idea for her to call and ask about room rates based on a crazy idea of hers but fortunately Martha did call. She found out that she had to wear a dress. We knew I needed a coat and tie, but forgot to make the obvious corrolary that she’d have a rule as well. It turns out that we saw lots of slacks in the dining room. Even though the big sign leading up to the Hotel spelled out the prohibition. Oh well, if you’re there to spend, no sweat, I bet.
Anyway, then we rushed down to get back on the boat back. We had a few minutes so I took Lucy on a walk without anyone else and immediately bumped into Steve Sweet and I also noticed Jody Chambers. Just like last time! It’s nice to always see Steve. I guess. I mean, what kind of relationship is that, but it’s better than many others I have, really. I’ve seen him more than Gus, for instance! Well, whatever. One doesn’t have to see people to know them.
I wore my green and blue plaid jacket. Panama hat. Pitifully baggy navy Docker pants. And my dusty old black shoes, shined with hand lotion since that’s all we had in the trailer. Slate blue shirt with red and sky blue tie. What really capped it off for my outfit was my matching Upper and Lower Peninsula petoskey stone tie-clasps.
Martha looked fine in a beige jumper she borrowed from her mom after she found out she needed a dress. She almost started crying about that time. But we all pulled through.
Not many parents of two little kids could have got the evening alone at the Grand. (We saw some people with little kids at dinner, not a pretty sight and not near us, thankfully.) It’s great that J&C are along to watch their little favorites. We all get what we want! : )
Henry really just loved his ferry boat rides. He was stunned silent each way just watching it all, on my lap.
That night in camp, I finally got my first whiff of spicy pine scent fresh northwoods air. I looked forward to smelling more of the same soon. Gotta get away from the traffic, though.
Swimming in St. Ignace
The next day we visited St. Ignace again to buy a couple books and souvenirs and for me to go swimming in the crystal clear harbor water. Everyone expected me to be prohibited. I guess we’re well trained in our expectations these days. But I swam freely. The water made me burn at first, but then got comfy and I finally dove off the tall outer pier. Martha wanted no part of it all, but in the end all of us watched me swim. Henry got into the act as well and splashed in the shallows. We all had fun after all. If I wasn’t swimming *I* would like to watch someone swim in such lovely water as the next best thing, myself. You could see 15 feet down to the bottom easily.
There was a very lovely, special Bolger boat docked at the harbor, built by a local guy named Jerry Cronin who sails it every week. An amazing little square thing with the trademark square open bow with ladder, tall narrow, flat sides and other design rules broken for a fine popular DIY cruiser. Two unstayed masts, big one in tabernacle. Integral milkcrates for anchor stowage. Amazing. It’s almost cute in its own way, because it’s so darn sensible. I’d like to learn more about the darn things! Maybe I better reprint something on them from one of Bolger’s columns in MAIB. They are just so distinctive. Sweet said he’d eyed it as well.
Les Chenaux
We headed over to Cedarville and Hessel after hearing and reading neat things about it. I bought the Hunt’s guide to the U.P. in St. Ignace. The Hessel bakery that they glow about is trash. So much for standards. We just missed the famous annual Wooden Boat Show. Last week. Rats. All the wood boats are gone. Sheesh. A show should show the spirit of a place. Where’s the spirit?
In Cedarville we found a little old campground on the water (Loon Point). Naked to the winds, almost, but better than the totally nude place closer to town. That night the stars really came out. Too bad about the mercury kleig light at the office, wrecking the night sky.
Some lovely, big old wooden Chris Craft cruisers have come boiling past, though. Plowing, with their big deep bass engines growling away. Very nice compared with the loud zippy other things that go by out there. No sails or oars. Lots of nifty boathouses to see. I suspect that from shore we’re just getting the tip of the iceberg of this area.
There are tons of classic old islands right around here that have been traditional old resort spots for a long time. It’s not very developed. But what’s here is plenty tacky as usual. Some nasty shops. Some marine supplies. The oldest Chris Craft dealer. Ho-hum. It’s ALMOST a civilized place. No good restaurant or bar that one can detect. An oldtimer from one of the oldest area families, the Shobergs tells me they’re getting out. So there ya have it. However, there is a most lovely maritime small boat museum right out of Cedarville on Hwy 134. Lots of small boat restorations and projects going on in there. Good stuff! Great boat library, too, with a very helpful lady xeroxing articles for buffs who make requests. They have grea backstock of rare old yachting mags. Cool! I gave them a couple OYB8’s.
I feel funny about that issue, with its big swearword in the hitchhiking story. With the pierced girl artwork, people will be turned off. I did it on purpose, but it went too far. It’s cheerful and amazing, but too much. It’s a happy cuss. Of course everyone turns right to it. I really want the mag to be about modern folkways and cultural revival, and it is, but folkways just aren’t offputting like that. Folkways are conservative and religious. They might be wild, too, but…. Well, no more of that next time.
Well, we still haven’t found a nice place up north.
They say that there are nice primitive free campsites along the shore here at Search Bay and St. Martin’s Point. I’d like to check them out for future use.
We need to get this trailer dialed in for self-support. We’d love it much more.
Seeing the old fixerupper boat projects made me want to go find my old boat in L.A.
I’ve also thought about buying that old van and going out to California to visit uncle Tim and snatch his old West Wight Potter. But I could do that with the car, too. Cool old travel van, though. $1500. Mint green Ford Econoline, 1974, all original from Oregon. Stove, frig, bed, etc. Heavy hitch. V8 302. 9-bolt tranny. Hey. Too bad I’m no auto mechanic. I think I’ve only fixed cars a couple times.
Boat-itis
Man, paddling out in this wavey water makes me want to make my own boats, too. I’d like to whip up some plywood boats. Quickies. A superfast, low, long, narrow surf-ski. 20’x1′ with wave riser bow flap. A nice dory for rowing, a small motor and sails.
Then I get to thinking about saving time. Maybe there are some hulls already laying around that one could convert. Maybe turn a couple aluminum canoes into something. That old trimaran idea. Maybe it’s only for quiet rivers. Who knows. Worth messing with! Someday it would be neat to get near some water so I could add boat messing to bike messing again. My bikes are about dialed in, after all. Ha.
Then I think that there’s no point in fun or recreation. That this action needs to be converted to gainful livelihood, to doing something useful and necessary. Like maybe a water taxi, as Craig suggested. Or some kind of cargo hauling.
Ron Paquin: amazing Indian author and good guy
In St. Ignace, Martha had the serendipitous idea of visiting the old Ogibway museum. They were raffling a birch bark canoe. Cool. They had artifacts. In the back the canoe guy was working on making baskets for some kind of upcoming craft show. I’m really glad I got to meet him. He had a real twinkle in his eye. Ron Paquin. He was happy to chat with us and acted like a friend right away. No holding back. Chiseled Indian features. I bought some tickets. Next door at the bookshop, Craig finds a book by him about his life! It’s a cool, happening book about life as an Indian today, about poverty and trouble. He’s been an activist, fisherman, innate, patient, lots of things, mainly very poor like all his people. But he’s not beaten. It did end by saying that he’d just lost his wife and that he struggles terribly with this. I went back and gave him a copy of my mag.
RV Park Lifestyle
Well, who knows where we’re going next. Maybe to Detour Village to see the big boats go thru the channel, then thru Barbeau to see the old Neebish Island scene where Barb used to work. Then over to Munising. Martha reads in the dubious Hunts that there’s a famous huge used bookstore there! Never saw or heard of it before.
Today I checked out boat rentals. The nearby one is $40/day, $20/hr. I guess the 20 is the new 5. When I asked in town at the old man’s, his boats were for $25/day. He said he had no insurance on them, though and you take your own chances. They were nice and new, but he didn’t want to fuss with cornball new fangled stuff. You break you pay, for an engine that runs $2500. Well, that’s why it’s cheap. Just don’t hit a rock!
I think I’ll stick with paddling and using my own boats. Renting schmenting. How to set it up with these wingnuts anyway? I’d like to do a tour of the local shoreline, but getting these ducks in a row would take time. Maybe I’ll try it tomorrow if it’s less windy.
I took Henry out canoeing tonight in the quiet water. He sat in the bow of the C1. Martha said it was so cute and that everyone in all the campsites was watching and oo-ing and ah-ing about the cuteness.
Henry has been digging down by the beach in some nasty clay with his trucks. He tells himself stories. He’s having a great time. Every day, though, he does something naughty and gets a swat and has to sit in the Time Out chair for a few minutes. Throwing rocks and hitting people in the face. Biting hard and leaving a mark. That sort of thing. This is in addition to the screaming and running around that also happens a couple times a day. But the whole time his mood is cheerful.
Lucy is also having a fine time, going on stroller rides and looking at the sky and trees. She’s starting to eat more types of mushy gloppy foods, like stew sauce, ice cream and such.
I have to remember to put sunscreen on me and Henry. The Inertia People just blow it off around here and we end up burned. Well, everyone has their part to do.
Martha is hankering after Calumet, so I suppose that’s where we’re headed. I just want to get my projects done and do a little exploring every day. Let’s see how it goes!
Further East: on the way to DeTour Village: Cedar Campus
We visited DeTour Village and ended up adding a half-day to our drive to Calumet. We should’ve just gone straight to Calumet from Cedarville.
We visited Cedar Campus. Boy, is it tidy and it has really grown a lot. But it has the same perfect camp air to it. Really well run operation. Maybe a camp should be a little crustier.
As I looked at maps, I started to recall the camp that Barb Hintzen went and worked at on Neebish Island one summer. Then I recalled that we stopped by and I introduced her to the Campbell farmers. I wondered what they meant by their mention when we came by a couple years ago, and when they got to meet Martha and Henry, that I had a girl with me the last time they saw me. Now I figured it out. Anyway, Neebish was a real haphazard camp operation. A desperate operator relying on crazed teen counselors. Lots of mutiny. The world of camps must be quite a world! : ) Probably make a great book and movie. Just like my tree fort book! Well, really, any inside look at any profession would probably make a great book or movie. We don’t realize how wild real life is. All the facts get removed first from any writing about any of it. Well, I suppose you have the whole expose genre.
Anyway, it was nice to see Cedar Campus. A week session had just ended that morning and a bunch of yhoung staff was busy with housekeeping. I noticed how the first cabin on the beach had a big library in it, which I didn’t recall, although I do recall being attracted to that cabin. It’s pitch black picturesque.
Keith Hunt ran this operation. I wonder if he started it. I’ll have to ask the folks about him and Montagues.
I didn’t recall that you could see the shoreline road from the camp lodge. Too bad.
They had a GREAT gaff-rig sailing rowing dory on the beach. Just like I want someday. They only had thwart seats, though. I’d like sideseats as well. A place to sit on each tack. It was about 16’x5′.
We drove to Munising to see a bookstore mentioned in Hunt’s Guide. It was out of business. I recall it now. It was 3 stories. Small, with central staircase and maybe a cat and dog. Too bad.
We had dinner at the Brownstone Inn. Yuck and pricey. Too bad.
We camped at AuTrain, where Bardy, Craig and I camped back on our high school bike tour when we met the party girls. Nice campsite and lake. Quietest yet. But still too many resorts and too many fishing boats in the tiny inlet we were on. 5 boats in a 5 acres is not up north solitude. Still, the land around there had tons of two-tracks and primitive camping opportunity, it looked like. It had a real rich feel to it, really. Like Munising in general.
Then we went to see an old candy shop in Marquette: closed on Sunday. Snowbound books also closed.
Near L’Anse there was an art festival at the old Ford sawmill company town of…Auburn? It’s where they made all the wood parts for Fords and woodies. We saw a great video there on footage from the old logging days. Kelvin would love that. I should buy a copy for him on the way home.
We met a nice couple and family who had moved to Gladstone a few years back. They were on their way even further north for vacation. They used to live in Okemos, but when they got kids they wanted to flee the suburban mess.
Keweenaw, finally!
Then we whipped thru Houghton/Hancock and bought groceries at the fine Co-Op in Hancock.
Then we found out that the county fair was just wrapping up in Hancock. I was worried that the local state park would be crowded with crazies, but we went there and found that it was emptying out. McLain State Park. We found a great couple of spots right on the beach with a hill behind us and some trees. We made a compound. It was perfect except quite a few cars did drive by in front of us on the beach road. But that was fine. Fine enough for now anyway.
We ended up staying there a whole week!
We set up then went sightseeing in the RV and to go to Lindell’s but they were on vacation until 4 days from then. So we decided to stay up north until they opened up again. We would leave that morning after having breakfast there.
Every day the gang went sightseeing and I stayed behind and worked on finishing the editing for my HPV book. Whew, what a job that was. I’m still not done. It took days to just finish the editing of the MS, then it took another week to input those edits into the files on the laptop. Now I only have one file left, a very big one, but no printout for it so I’m editing directly into the file. Probably faster.
I had planned to do an issue of OYB plus finish my own two or three books (Okemos, Culture and Hunting) plus do the HPV book, but HA, I only got most of the HPV book done. Well, I guess I didn’t ever really stop to think what I could really get done.
Oh, every day I also spent an hour or two out rockhunting. The first couple days it was warm so I was wading and swimming a lot and using the swim mask to find rocks. Plus we’d just go swimming quite often for fun.
One day we took a side trip to a remote beach for rockhunting.
I found a ton of rocks. Quite a few agates. Lots of cool rocks, especially after our big days of storm.
Storm!
After a couple warm days, a big huge storm blew in. It about tore our awning off a couple times. We put it away. The next day it was only a little breezy so I put it back up again and added a staked-out strap to hold it down but a few hours later it starting really blowing again, so up it went. Man, the big stormy night had me nervous. I wondered how bad it would get. And if the park people were monitoring the weather. Our sites were the most exposed of them all! We would get hit the worst. Our trailer was rocking quite a lot. The wind was howling. I was also unnerved by the eery orange porchlight of Craig’s RV on all night. (I had them turn it off after that.) Also, I slept right at the front of our trialer. I felt exposed. I thought about how we would evacuate. It was hard to even stand up outside in that wind. It rained and thunder and lightninged too. Scary. But only for me. Martha slept fine. I even felt a little tight in the chest. A bit of a panic, I’d say. But I breathed my way through it and kept calm. Calm enough.
Rock City Heaven: a couple rock girls and a rock hound
They said the beaches were picked over good and not many rocks, but I figured after the HUGE waves of the storm that the rocks were all fresh. I found lots of great rocks. But also had many questions about what was what. Who to ask? Martha found no guidebooks on her shopping jaunts, even at a place called the ‘Agate Shop.’ I think a little pamphlet on Michigan beach stones would be great for the DNR to put out. I guess they did in the 1970’s.
One day I saw that the camp host had a table out front full of rocks! Another rock buff. I visited until I found them home. It turns out that their precocious granddaughter did most of the rock hunting. She was a real trip. Nicole. Ratty wild blonde hair. Lippy and loud. Big baggy clothes, leather jacket. 12 and a half. You know it. I told her were our site was and that I had rocks. She said ‘Does your trailer have animal stickers all over on it?’ Then she and her little pal rode down and visited. We had a great time. She was my rock girl. She kept coming around to help me ID my rocks. She had lunch with us and played with H and read with him. Her grampa said she was very rude and hyperactive. She was very wild. She said she was homeschooled and had been to four schools but that all the kids were too cocky at them. She said her homeschooling was nap and cartoons. She said I was a major annoyance to her because I was finding so many agates. She’d sort my bucket and say ‘Rock, rock, obvious agate, rock, rock…’ She had long tan hands and long tan feet. She was a gangly creature. Who knows what she’ll turn into. Jan said she was in big trouble. Craig said he liked that kind of student. She couldn’t read to H very well. Poor thing. She was given up by her mom and her dad was never married to her mom anyway. Her grandparents were raising her. I gave her an OYB.
On the beach I met a rock lady. The only other person actively rock hunting that I saw. She was a fire/rescue person. She was nice and knew a lot and was a rock club member. She smoked American Spirit or whatever those cigarettes are. She reminded me of Laurie Cohan a bit. Weathered, tan, outdoorsy. We compared rocks and had a nice visit.
I worked on my book all the rest of the time. People walking by would always peek into the trailer to see me typing and they’d wave. Maybe they’d seen me typing outside when it was sunny.
People seemed to look at our rig a lot.
A couple cityslicker families moved in behind our hill. With 3 kids and lots of toys. They had a big sand area. H went over there like a magnet a lot. He asked for food. Things worked out pretty good. But they were down on the guns and shooting ideas he had.
We tried to make sure that Martha rode her bike every day.
Jan’s foot was bad the whole time and she couldn’t do much. She’d moan when Craig changed her bandage.
We saw a Pileated Woodpecker as we were packing up and just leaving our campsite. He flew down low near us. A good luck bird? I guess so, coz we had no troubles all the way home.
