North Shore Camping - Day 1

Kieran, Luke and I left home last Monday (June 25th) for our annual week-long camping trip on the North Shore area.  Our first stop of the trip was just north of Duluth at Kitchi Gammi Park.  Massive rain amounts (over 10 inches) five days before we drove through washed out roads, flooded homes, and killed animals at the zoo.  I wanted to see if you could see the effects of this amount of rain from near Duluth.  As the picture shows, the water was very brown/red in color, the result of large amounts of sand, silt and especially clay being washed into the lake from the St. Louis River and other streams.

After showing and explaining what had happened to the area, the boys preferred to throw rocks into Lake Superior (it won't be the first time).

After an early lunch, we stopped at Agate Bay in Two Harbors.  It's easier see the ore docks from Two Harbors here than it is in Duluth.  You can also see the old tug Edna G. while watching trains from the Iron Range unload almost in front of you.

While looking at the ore docks and Edna G., the boys realized a 'laker' was leaving port (of course the loud horn blasts helped them to this conclusion).  We had to jump in the van to see the ship leaving from a different angle.

After a 1/4 drive we got to the lighthouse and boat access for Two Harbors which gave us the point of view that we wanted.  The comment that the boys kept repeating was 'these ships are big'.  And after being in Canal Park numerous times, this was not their first time seeing these ships.

Had to take this picture, in the foreground should be the first loon that we saw on the trip (you might have to look close and ignore the seagull).  We had a lot of discussions about loons throughout the trip, after seeing them on numerous occassions.

While watching the loon, Kieran and Luke realized that the second ship in the harbor was switching positions with the ship that had just left.  Let's just say that we spent a large amount of time in Two Harbors....

After leaving the harbor area, the boys reminded me that they had never been able to walk around the trains that are permanently parked near there.  We had to fix that of course, so we explored the trains and equipment that helped bring the iron ore to the docks in years prior.

After leaving Two Harbors, we were finally on our way to Gooseberry Falls State Park, where we would spend the first two nights of our trip.  Of course we didn't go straight to the campground, we had to see the falls first, especially since the area had received so much rain five days earlier.  It wasn't flowing like I though it would be, apparently the high flow last approximately 30 hours before decreasing.  The two pictures below were taken in front of the Lower Falls.

Of course, stopping here gave the boys an opportunity to throw more rocks into water....

Finally we were able to set up camp and get settled, but the boys immediately wanted to go on a hike.  They wanted to go to the picnic lava flow area near Lake Superior, which is a basalt flow that formed 1,100 million years ago during the Mid-Continent Rift event that effected areas from Michigan through Minnesota, all the way to Kansas.  Of course, the boys we're looking for areas where water was pooled in depressions in the basalt.

Their target was tadpoles....they know from experience that frogs/toads lay eggs in these pools and they can be easily caught when we camp at Gooseberry (this is the third year in a row that we've camped at the same site, at the same time of year).  They are going to be upset if we ever camp at Gooseberry in September....

I tend to look at the landscape around these particular lava flows while the boys search for tadpoles, especially the areas where the lake is weathering and eroding large blocks of basalt.  The boys do not get to come close to this particular area.....

After spending almost an hour and a half chasing tadpoles, we could hike the 1/2 mile or so back to camp to eat dinner.  Along the way, like most of our hikes, the boys played Transformers.  Kieran was Optimus Prime of course and Luke was Bumblebee, sticks were swung and blasters fired, I'm sure Megatron was defeated....

After dinner, we had to walk to Agate Beach at the confluence of the Gooseberry River and Lake Superior.  The goal was strictly to 'throw rocks' into water, it didn't matter if it was a river or the lake.

After the sun was low enough it was time to leave, but not before the boys got one last look at the lake for the day.  We had to get back to camp to get a fire started and make sure we were settled.

While camping, the boys have a goal of seeing 'the first star' of the night (or planet), they definitely did not this night, they were in bed early.  This worked out well as Day 2 led us to Split Rock Lighthouse, Beaver Bay and several long hikes around Gooseberry State Park.

To Be Continued.....