Joe & Wilma's Excellent Adventures

 Wednesday, May 29, 2024

Back up to the Falls

I need to correct some information from my last blog.  I stated that we had traveled 625 miles across the top of Lake Superior.  It was actually 507 miles.  I started my calculation from the wrong date.  I'm changing it on the original page, but I didn't want mis-information out there.

Before we left the campground this morning, there was a young girl that drove up on the shore of the lake right in front of us, and took a swim.  Just in her swimsuit.  The lake temperature here at Two Harbors is 38.3 degrees.  She didn't swim long, then got back in her car in her wet swim suit and drove off.

Today was laundry day again, so that was our first order of business.  When we finished that, Joe dropped me off at the "General "Store," a big gift shop, and he went to find a car wash.  I didn't buy anything but I thought these chairs on the porch would be cute at Tiffany's house.  I sat in one while I waited for Joe and when I got up, the arm came off.  They are plastic, not wood.  So maybe not.

We got our laundry put away, then drove back up the road to find those falls we passed yesterday.  This road is the North Shore Scenic Drive, and it certainly is.  

We went about 40 miles back, skipped the first falls for the return, and then couldn't find the second one.  We drove right past, all the way past where we ate yesterday because we couldn't see it from the Jeep.  I had a better view from the RV.  So we turned around and got our bearings, and started back.  Joe pulled into this one marina at Silver Bay.

and we drove down to the boat ramp, then to the marina.  They had some pretty good-sized boats harbored here.

Joe was really impressed with this cleaning station.  It's right as you leave, free, and has vacuum, air hose, washer, a full service cleaning station.  He told John that what he needs in Florida.

He also told John this should be his next truck, to tow his boat.

We found the falls we missed, Beaver Bay.  It was a little bit of a walk back from the parking lot, and a little chilly, but worth it.

Our next little diversion was driving into the Split Rock Lighthouse State Park, but we couldn't get back to the lighthouse without paying a fee, and it looked to be quite a hike.  We could see it from the highway because it is out on a point, but it would have been interesting to check it out.

The second falls was at the Gooseberry Falls State Park.  This one we could walk down to without paying the state park fee.  It was quite impressive, and they had a very nice visitor center.

There was the high falls, middle falls, and lower falls.  We did not walk down to the lower falls but got the other two.  Joe even hiked down to the rock.  We spent some time here, enjoying the beauty.

The bridge after the lower falls is in the foreground.  We are very close to Lake Superior, and all these rivers and creeks feed the big lake.

This other guy in the blue shirt would not get out of Joe's way.  The guy was videoing the falls, and Joe wanted to take a photo of me with the falls in the background.  I was afraid he was going to poke him with his walking stick.   Joe finally had me move over a little and took the picture, but he was getting aggravated at that guy hogging the photo op spot.

This was probably the most walking/hiking we have done on this trip, and it was good to have our walking sticks.  There were several sets of stairs too. 

We had scoped out Betty's Pies yesterday, a little restaurant just out of town, so after this trip we stopped there for dinner and pie.  The pie was really good.  They had the flavors on a rolling marquee that kept flashing through, and if they ran out of one kind, it got posted on the marquee.  The first one they ran out of was pecan.  There was probably 10-12 different choices, some gluten-free. 

Back at the RV, we were looking out the front window of the RV and this big ship came by, pretty close to shore.

We guessed it is heading for Cliffs North Shore Ore Mining at Silver Bay, just up the road a ways, that processes ore pellets.  ,It was the first taconite processing facility in North America when it opened in 1956 as Reserve Mining Company.  North Shore Mining operates an open pit taconite mine in Babbitt and a processing plant in Silver Bay.  Northshore makes high quality DR-grade pellets for electric steel furnaces. It's right on the highway, in fact it is on both sides of the highway just outside of Silver Bay.

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Tomorrow we wait for the phone call about the tires.  We can't make any plans until we finish that mission.  So maybe we will just take a day off.