The Hungry Lake

Twelve-mile Beach,
Lake Superior

Waves tugging at the sand beside the broad blue of Superior, with great effort she lifted herself-- each labored step, dragging her clumsy body a bit further, beyond their reach onto the otherwise empty, windblown edge of Michigan’s Twelve-mile Beach.
Knocked off the breeze carrying her in carefree flight above its lapping waters by a long, curling tongue of this hungry lake, she’d escaped a watery death.
But, wings now heavy with droplets, she could not rise from the smooth, wet sand.

Green Darner dragonfly, female

As the grains dissolved from beneath each tiny, clawed foot, I stooped and lifted her onto my finger and walked with her, while the wind dried her transparent wings.
I left her to rest on a strand of beach grass beside the great lake, which boasts of many victories--having devoured so many, so great.
While her insatiable hunger goes on, I stole this dragonfly from her plate.

windswept sand

(click to enlarge)

Twelve-mile Beach

See more Skywatch here.

Going to the Chapel...

I still pore through piles of photographs, captured, now months ago, when we took just one day to travel north and spend the week walking a great lakeshore. With each, reviving an impression so great upon our reaching daylight, after passing down a dim and winding trail from within the dense, north woods--of a broad beach and open water which, at first, lay calm and still.
In mounting wind and change of sky, I wrapped my head with an extra shirt, tying the sleeves beneath my chin. And, sat, backed into a great dune, the wall of woods behind me.
As, under piles of clouds, waves rose and tore at the shore, reaching higher and higher with each cast upon the beach--rolling colorful stones, as the marbles of a child.
Days from now, I will not recall the name of this grand place on Superior’s southern shore.
But, I will not forget the little ladybug that walked a path, around and around, on one smooth stone--just out of the water's reach.

the trail to Chapel Beach

Bicknell's Cranesbill

woods filled with Yellow Birch

small waterfalls

a slug has found a mushroom

Chapel Beach,
Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, Michigan

Chapel Rock

Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore

The pictures worth a thousand words...

northern shore of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan,
Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore

View more ABC Wednesdays here!

An Ocean of a Lake

American Marram grass on the dunes of Lake Superior

I pause, wandering the dimly lit aisles of a small, densely packed general store coupled with one of the few gas stations sparsely scattered across the northernmost shore of the U.P. of Michigan. Bread and milk, canned goods, a few frozen confections and assorted toiletries share shelf space beside a broad selection of fishing lures, beef jerky and t-shirts.

Sea Rocket, Cakile edentula,
on the beach at Grand Marais

We arrived here the day before, after several hours’ drive along the dusty, unpaved roads connecting the small communities along the northern shore of Lake Michigan with the more remote villages bordering the larger lake to the north—Lake Superior, Gitche Gumee, Big Water.



We walked at sunset along the shore of this cleanest of the Great Lakes, 160 miles across and 350 miles from side to side. Gentle waves washed smooth colorful stones in the shallow water beneath our feet. While, just out of the lapping waves’ reach, piles of larger stones left higher on the sand suggested this calm is sometimes otherwise.

A gull at sunset

As we approached, gulls flew up from where they’d been standing, facing the wide water, in a long trail of white to float and bob on the still, evening surface.

This is Grand Marais.
Beyond its bold beauty is its space apart from all else.


A t-shirt on the rack says it quite plainly.

End of the earth…2
Grand Marais…4

tracks on the beach

View more ABC Wednesdays here!

The Slow Road North

We paused with uncertainty as the paved road abruptly ended.
Our journey north across the Upper Peninsula of Michigan would continue now across a sand drive, plowed and left in loose piles on either shoulder.
Well-worn and rutted—top speed 20 mph.

The dark, deciduous woods

were punctuated by bright stands of birch,

and gradually yielded

to pine woods,

where bushy bracken fern

grew elbow to elbow between them.

Until a glimpse of sky hinted of the approaching shore,

where the line of trees stepped down to a grassy dune.

And the blue of Superior met the blue of the sky.

See more Skywatch here.