Another Bayfield Jaunt

We mentioned to my cousin Pat during our post-Thanksgiving breakfast that we were heading to Bayfield later that morning.

"What are you going to do there?" she asked, perhaps a little doubtful. Good question. The response must have sounded lame.

"Oh, take a few hikes, do some reading, maybe visit the Ashland bakery, fry up some fresh herring from Bodin's for dinner ...."

And that's basically what we did. The weather was very fine—mostly warm and sunny—and the countryside was largely deserted. Our drive north was punctuated by a stops on Highway 23 south of Jay Cooke State Park to harvest a few branches of winterberry, at the Brule River canoe landing, and the Michele Wheeler Wetland just west of Port Wing.

The Halverson fishery in Cornucopia was closed, as usual. Bodin's in Bayfield was open, but they were out of fresh fish. We contented ourselves with some smoked whitefish, and the young woman behind the counter promised she'd save us a few filets of herring the next day. "Stop by any time after two."

We checked into our little studio apartment—essentially a motel room with a kitchen—on the second floor of a small condo tucked into the woods behind the Superior Marina, and drove down to the nearby beach to enjoy the sunset.

We also wandered the marina itself, just to familiarize ourselves with the neighborhood, though the slips were empty. After a cold dinner in our room we went out to the parking lot to take a look at the stars, which were brilliant against the inky black. I was puzzled by the star cluster I could see just above the horizon through the naked trees, and made a mental note of the distance from Perseus and Cassiopeia.

A shooting star streaked by from left to right—the first I'd seen months. I struggled to spot the Andromeda Galaxy; I know where to find it but didn't dare look straight overhead with binoculars while standing on the faintly icy pavement. We could hear the sound of bongos coming from one of the units in the other building, which looked more prestigious than ours because all the doors were painted red.

The leather lace in one of my moccasins had come undone and insinuated itself between my toe and the side of the shoe, as if  a pebble had found its way in. This trivial distraction was undermining my full appreciation of the night sky--a scene which nevertheless I will remember for the rest of my life.

Back inside, I took a paperback of Horace's satires from the stack I'd brought along, and it occurred to me they resemble Montaigne's essays, but pithier, and with more of a lilt:

And so it happens that those who in having

A more than moderate share the floor-raging Aufidis

sweeps away with its crumbling bank, but he

who wants only what he needs neither drinks water

churned up with mud nor loses his life in the waves.

 

Obvious, but well-put just the same.

_____________________________________

Saturday morning, 6 a.m. Coffee brewing, still dark outside. I probably woke up the entire unit with the coffee grinder—though I'm not sure anyone else is staying in this building. Plans for the day? Maybe breakfast in Washburn, a hike to Houghton Falls, a stop at the Great Lakes Visitor Center on Highway 2, then on to the bakery in Ashland and the Black Cat coffee shop across the street. We might well stop at the huge used bookstore in Washburn on our way back to Bayfield to pick up our herring fillets at Bodin's.

Which is basically what we did, though not in that order. We picked up a brochure of local hiking trails at the visitors' center, and decided to hike up the gorge that cuts through the middle of Bayfield. But not before stopping at the Washburn community center where they were holding a Christmas Bazaar—herbal soap, spicy pickles, wicker baskets, hand-painted pottery.

The Bayfield Gorge

I chatted briefly with the man selling wicker baskets, asked him where he got his withies. "Anywhere and everywhere," he said. "Road construction sites are good, especially the second year after the work is done." That's good to know, I guess.

I liked the guy behind the counter at the bakery, and the guy behind the counter at the Black Cat, where, in the back-room used bookshop, we found (and bought) a copiously illustrated full-color history of jazz. (“Jazz is a music played by Americans to get rid of the blues.”) I liked the girl behind the counter there too, and also the young woman at Bodin's, who told us she'd never been out in the fishing boats, two of which were tied up outside the shop, but would like to go someday.

This litany of events does nothing to convey the nuances of light and shadow, vegetation and snow cover, that moved us repeatedly during the day. Nor the tenderness with which we viewed a flock of pine siskins feeding in a clump of alders in the swamp behind the visitors' center. Not to mention the tundra swans we spotted at Mikowski Beach in Ashland, Or the fifteen common goldeneye we flushed just beyond the mouth of Pike Creek along the Salmo Trail at dusk. 

Nor the underlying concern during our hikes that we might get shot by deer-hunters during the last weekend of the season.

On our way to the Houghton Falls trail just after daybreak that first morning, I spotted a bright orange bag in the ditch beside the road, pulled onto the shoulder, stopped the car, and retrieved it. Printed on the side were the words: "50 lb. kernel corn." When we reached the trailhead Hilary sliced it open with a pocket knife and cut a hole in the middle large enough for me to stick my head through. It looked a little odd, but it was bright, and not the kind of thing a deer would wear.