Day 13 (July 5): Summer Fun

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 coincidentally-named Portland Malt Shop. We obtained about twice as much ice cream as we needed and enjoyed that on the stairs above Duluth's Lake Walk.

In hindsight, it was inevitable that water-loving kids would notice the huge body of water and be undeterred by the fact that the water is possibly 60 degrees. And if they notice water, these kids can't be stopped. They left their ice cream and returned to splashing. It was a great afternoon.