Beltane\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Waxing Last Frost Moon<\/p>\n
Have you ever had a love affair that ebbed and flowed like embers in a fire wavering between bursting into flame and dying out?\u00a0 I have.\u00a0 Today I visited that other lover in my life, Lake Superior.\u00a0 A bookshelf full of books rest in a room not ten feet from here, each one of them related to Lake Superior in some way.\u00a0 An entire file drawer of a vertical file drawer contains carefully organized files, each an eco-region in the area around Lake Superior and its watershed.\u00a0 In another spot sit the maps, some USGS, some others representing the land around the Lake.\u00a0 There are, too, files of notes from two circle route trips I took, each time stopping in various county historical societies:\u00a0 Ontanogon, Marquette, Thunder Bay to pursue research about this phenomenon less than 2 and half\u00a0 hours from my front door.<\/p>\n
My brother Mark and I drove up there.\u00a0 He wandered Park Point and hiked all the way up Lake Street to the top, turning then for a magnificent view of the lake.\u00a0 While he discovered Duluth, I attended a conference on Sulfide Mining on the Mesabi Range.\u00a0 This was a large group, 70 plus folks, gathered to hear experts discuss various aspects of sulfide mining’s impact on the waters of three watersheds and the communities of people, trees and wildlife that would share the land with this toxic producing form of mining.<\/p>\n
It was one of those clear northern spring days.\u00a0 The sun flashed off the lake, bouncing off the crests of waves made by lakers going in and out of the Duluth Harbor.\u00a0 The temperature was cool by the lake, warmer up the slope of the hillside where St. Scholastica sits; it’s fortress like main building dominating the surrounding the area.<\/p>\n
The drive was long and the stay short, a combination I try to avoid, though this is my second time recently.\u00a0 The drive out to Lincoln, Nebraska to get the dogs was also a long drive, short stay, quick turn around.<\/p>\n
Not sure where Lake Superior and I stand.\u00a0 The old spark was there as we crested the hill and looked out over the St. Louis River toward Superior, Wisconsin and the lake spread out below us.\u00a0 My research, though, sits unused, as it has for several years.\u00a0 What’s the status of this relationship?\u00a0 Not sure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Beltane\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Waxing Last Frost Moon Have you ever had a love affair that ebbed and flowed like embers in a fire wavering between bursting into flame and dying out?\u00a0 I have.\u00a0 Today I visited that other lover in my life, Lake Superior.\u00a0 A bookshelf full of books rest in a room not ten feet from … Continue reading The Great Lake<\/span>