Cabin Fever

We had a wonderful 4th of July weekend in Bemidji, MN! Art and I hadn't been up there in a few years and we were ready for a nice vacation.

About a hundred years ago or so my great-grandfather built a log cabin on the island for his gun club. After they disbanded he, my great-grandmother and their kids (my grandfather and his two sisters) still used it and built a few other small buildings; the bunk-house, which has two single beds (made from birch logs) and Three Bears which is a smaller, one room cabin. The old ice house is still there but, unfortunately, is beginning to fall in on itself and there is also an outhouse- only Art, my uncle John and my grandfather use the outhouse. It's a two seater, but why I'm not really sure. The island itself is about six acres but 60% of it is poison ivy. There are northern pines, birch, and cedar trees that, in the spring and summer, makes everything so green and dense. They didn't get electricity or running water until the sixties or seventies; before that there was the lake for bathing, the outhouse for doing your business, a wood stove in the kitchen for cooking and oil lamps for light. My mom, her siblings, and cousins would go up every summer when they were growing up. While most of the Twin Cities heads that direction on the weekends, when you have your own island you don't have to worry about congestion or tourists.

Art and I arrived Thursday afternoon (it's about a 10 hour drive). My parents had been up there for about a week already and my aunt, uncle, two cousins and their kids and dogs came up on Friday. We had a wonderful time tubing, wake boarding, BBQing and just relaxing. We love it because it's so quiet and you can sit on the front porch, watch the sunset and listen to the loons- we haven't relaxed this much in forever, it seems. We did take 2 1/2 hours one morning to do some work: there are paths all over the island and over the last year some trees had fallen, blocking the paths. Art, my mom, and I went around the paths cutting up the trees, loading them in the wagon and taking them back up to the cabin to eventually be used as firewood. I wish I could say we did more, but we really didn't (and I don't even feel bad about that!)

We also took one morning to go into town- the boys went garage-saleing and the girls took our traditional trip to see the statues of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox and to stop at "the Moccasin Store", aka "Morrels" which is just a touristy shop that we have gone to every year since I was little (and my mom before me).

We arrived home Monday late afternoon, glad to be home but also wishing we could have stayed longer. We've already decided to take more time next year and to bring the dogs. We debated bringing them, Buddy would have been fine in the car and would have had a great time with the other three, but Linda is old and crotchety and doesn't do too well with other dogs that want to play with her (plus she's a spaz in the car). We didn't want to take Buddy and have Linda get lonely, so they both stayed home. Maybe next year!

I came home tanned, with a few bug bites but without poison ivy (as yet, sometimes it takes a few days...) and it's back to the grindstone tomorrow! I'll post pictures later this week.