AT FAWN ISLAND on Rainy Lake, it has been a bit of a rainy, drizzly, cold and windy day. But things are clearing up a bit this evening. (And the rain is GOOD for moistening the woods and suppressing North Woods forest fires). Meanwhile the 7 year old granddaughter has been practicing casting off the dock. And petting Koda the
AS READERS may have gathered, we are at Fawn Island on Rainy Lake this week. One of the small pleasures of living in this old island cabin is being surrounded by old stuff. Family stuff. When I was 12 or so I gave my Grandmother this hot pad for a Christmas present. I thought the corny inscription was the cleverest
NEPHEW MICHAEL ARRIVED at Rainy Lake yesterday with his lovely partner Lisa. Within an hour they helped me land this monster Northern Pike, which Michael skillfully netted after a long battle. Broke my pole, tore a hole in the net, and wore me out. Quickly untangled and successfully released. About an 18 pounder! Perhaps the largest our family has caught
FOR ALL YOU friends and admirers of little Paddy the cat, our St. Patrick’s Day waif, what a change. And what adaptions he has made! You will recall that Paddy was terrified of the world, and wouldn’t let us approach, let alone touch him. Now, here is Paddy on Fawn Island, having done beautifully with the 250 mile car-ride. And
TODAY WE MADE the drive up from Pine Point to Rainy Lake, a trip we’ve made many, many times. Fawn Island was calling, but nature was calling too, if you get my drift. So we stopped at a lttle gas station on a country corner in west-central Minnesota, about 35 miles from anywhere. Except the next-door bar. Never stopped there
ON THE WATERFRONT, there are favorite sights and sounds and smells and feelings. Reminders and remembrances. A stout old chain that moors the dock is a relic from logging days a century ago. Floating ‘spacer’ logs are the remnants of once-tall white pines. A gangplank I constructed 25 years ago with Bryan’s help when he was just a boy, facilitating
THE MORNING cuppacoffee view from the cottage screen porch down the historic ‘voyageurs’ highway’ is worth the trip up to Rainy Lake all by itself. Rained all day yesterday, supposed to rain the next few days. But this morning, with song sparrows and yellow warblers singing, with the ghostly echoes of old voyageurs’ chansons and with sunlight glinting off the
HOME FROM RAINY LAKE, it is good to be back to the little cabin in the woods we call the Church o’ the Pines. Good to see and hear the humble congregation, hooved, feathered, finned, furred, rooted, and blooming. All seem to acknowledge the changing of the season. The first colors touch the maples and ashes. The squirrels seem even
A BEAUTIFUL DAY for a boat ride, I said to Kathy. Let’s go and see the mermaid on the Canadian side. And so we set out, through the little wild islands and narrows past an eagle on its rocky perch, toward Copenhagen Island and the lady of the lake, created in the 1930’s. It had been years since we’d been
ON THIS BEAUTIFUL DAY on Rainy Lake, we had the joy of spending almost the whole day with Voyageurs National Park Supervising Ranger Mark Miller and his lovely wife,Tammie. On an earlier boat cruise to Kettle Falls with one of my Road Scholar groups, I had the unexpected pleasure of meeting Mark, and we discovered a remarkable collection of similar