Twelve Feet, Six Continents, One Year

On the same day in 2002 that Elise read Dan Brown's Davinci Code (in one day, of course), I learned about the Brule River. It's the kind of river you can miss easily as you drive east from Duluth on US-2 toward Washburn, Ashland and Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Just a little green roadside sign near a crossroads town. I remember that Elise mentioned something about a former president loving the Brule and it being a favorite for paddling and fishing. (This is a nontrivial aside. Calvin Coolidge had a summer White House on the Brule and, as we learned , converted a local high school into a base of political operations.). But as soon as we booked this cabin, just east in the town of Iron River, it became apparent that a canoeing adventure on the Brule was in my future. With help from the good folks at Brule River Canoe Rental , we were delivered to the Stone Bridge Canoe Ramp at about 1:45pm. One adult, one twin and one big in each canoe. We had a nice breeze at our bac...

Dear Reader, Having successfully broken the streak of consecutive daily posts, my attention turned to the looming milestone: one month on the road. I'm writing on Sunday, July 21. We left Portland on Sunday, June 23. In case you've forgotten, that was spent approximately one week on Whidney Island, one week driving to Minnesota and the last two weeks with Elise's parents in Duluth. This past week was camp for all four kids. Lily and Henry went to an overnight camp on Sturgeon Lake, about an hour's drive south the city. Ali and Cate went to day camp, also offered by the Duluth YMCA. Among other things, this meant that Elise and I got to disappear for 24 hours up the North Shore of Lake Superior. For a moment, I need to tell a story from almost two years ago in order to explain why we're doing what we're doing this summer. First of all, we have been talking about doing this trip for several years. In the fall of 2017 we (the two of us) went to Italy for two ...

The last 24 hours have just been summer on an epic scale. Yesterday, after a long morning of water play, we drove into Duluth for a backyard BBQ with a group of Elise's friends from high school. I didn't count but there were a handful of couples, so a dozen adults or so, and innumerable kids between 1 and 11. We spent the night in Duluth (a disappointingly sleepless night for too many of us) and drove back this morning. The children of the high school friends. Lily, the oldest among them, is in yellow. Swimming, lunch, more swimming, even more swimming, then some swimming off the pontoon boat then a break to watch some shows, eat some dinner and then a bit more bedtime swimming. Hopefully they'll sleep all night. My favorite moment came after dinner during a short canoe outing with Lily and Cate. Our lake appears to be home to one pair of loons. On a still, glassy lake, we slowly paddled toward them. I'm sorry to have caused them distress but they swam in oppos...

Another postcard today. Step 1: Feed kids silver dollar pancakes while they watch, first, their favorite fishing show (Chasing Monsters) and, second, the first half of Pocohontas. Step 2: Drive to picturesque Bayfield "Gateway to the Apostle Islands" Wisconsin and eat lunch overlooking Lake Superior while waiting for... Step 3: Take 3 hour cruise (covering about 60 miles) around the Apostles on the theme of "Lighthouses and Caves." Watch as kids nap in every possible position and/or make friends with strangers of all ages. Step 4: Take kids to awesome lakeside playground and watch them immediately befriend other kids. Step 5: Go to flamingo-themed restaurant and eat second fresh trout meal of the day. Step 6: Drive home while making two stops. First, discover gravestone of great-grandparents. Second, go to A&W for dessert even though kids barely deserve it. Step 7: Let kids prepare themselves for bed, once again in the tent village of the living ro...

Dear Reader, The last time we talked, our family had recently arrived in Duluth, Minnesota. I'll have another post for you soon about how these past two weeks have gone but today offers a good snapshot of a happy summer day. In fact, today is the kind of day Elise hoped for when we decided the first phase of this adventure would be a summer from her childhood. This was our first (of about a dozen) full days staying in a cabin on Spider Lake near Iron River, Wisconsin. The cabin is exceptional and perfectly suited to our family. There are three bedrooms, each with a queen-sized bed. You wouldn't know that from tonight's sleeping arrangements, though, since there are four kids "camping" in "tents" of their own construction in the living/dining room. There wasn't much time for the kids to enjoy it, though, because they collapsed onto their pillows after this terrific day. 37% of their energy went into fishing. On one hand, we started off catching ...

Sometimes things just go the way they were always meant to. I don't know all of the things that Elise has on a list of childhood memories but today we hit a couple of the highlights. We had a mellow morning and then an afternoon adventure. To understand the adventure, you have to know something about Duluth's topography. Much like our hometown of Portland, there is a large ridge above the downtown and, in this case, the lake. Naturally, there is a significant number of rivers and creeks running down the ridge to feed the lake and many of these offer all kinds of fun. Today it was Amity Creek, which I learned today becomes Lester River, which I had heard of before many times. As Amity Creek works its way down the hill, there are innumerable "waterfalls" and pools. We parked at some mid-point and the clambered and slid our way up and down. The kids would never have left if we hadn't offered them ice cream, which we got from the coincidenta...