Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Vacation - Ridges & Cana Island

We've been on vacation - hence no recent posts. Boating. Hiking. Biking. Geocaching. In Door County, Wisconsin. You may remember our geocaching adventures in Door County last year.

This year, while Tiger Woods was completing a second-round comeback in the US Open, shooting an incredible back-nine score of 30 strokes, we were enjoying our second day in Door County.

A while after breakfast at the Blue Horse, the weather turned pleasant - if not a bit breezy - and wayfarer and I chose to explore the eastern side of the peninsula. It's referred to as Door County's "quite side", as the tourists like to browse the shops and bistros of the west side.

We started our adventure with lunch at the Blue Ox. (It's fun to make the claim, but we didn't get Oxidized.) Chris had the burger and I had an Italian beef sandwich. Yummy, but I didn't expect the beef to be so spicy. Then I added the jalapeno salsa. Then I added the Blue Ox horsey sauce. HooHaa! Hot sandwich!

The eastern shore of Door County was easily ten degrees cooler than the west. The wind was howling in off the lake, and we were forced to put on a wrap. Blustery Day 2

Prior to this, I thought Minnesota had the corner on big mosquitoes. Holy moley! Luckily because of their size, they were pretty slow - making it a fair fight. I scored several kills. But they eventually forced us back to the shoreline.

Blustery Day 3

The water level of Lake Michigan is up six inches from last year and we didn't know if the causeway to Cana Island would be open, but we decided to swing by and take a look.

Not only was the causeway open, but there were a lot of tourists on the island. This year we were allowed to climb the spiral staircase into the light tower. Wayfarer begged off the climb, but I made it to the top. Pretty scary stuff though! I could not imagine hauling buckets of lamp fuel up those stairs every day. Those must have been some tuff customers.

Cana Island Lighthouse

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The Spiral Staircase Inside the Tower

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The Light at the Top

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View of Lake Michigan from the Top. Just beyond the breakers lies what's left of the broken body of the M.J.Bartelme. She went aground on those very rocks in October of 1928. The corpse lay on the rocks for almost five years before finally being cut to pieces and hauled away. When the water is low, you can walk the rocks and see bit and pieces of wreckage.

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We were so excited just to be back in Door County, we forgot to check the PQ. We walked right past a geocache on Cana Island and didn't even know it! Loser!

More about geocaching tomorrow.

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