Road biking with the McCarthy family. . . .

by Olwe

Amanda (foreground) and sister Kate McCarthy (behind Amanda), friends Nick (back left) and Brendan (back right) just finished a road tour up and east of Grand Marais on 61. They're riding Trek road bikes. The McCarthy family, of St. Paul, is staying in their cabin on Devil's Track. This reporter informed them of the many opportunities for mountain and cross biking, too.

Sawtooth Challenge 2011

Hey, before we say anything, maybe check out the photo album here and here. Then take a look at the race results here.

This year's Sawtooth Challenge happened on a wonderful day. August 27, 2011 was sunny and not too hot.

Glowingly beautiful August North Shore morning!

The race got underway at 10:00 a.m. Tim was the pace rider out of town until the snow mobile trail just north of the new Gunflint Trail road. From then on the riders raced up the hill to the Pincushion parking lot, then on to the stadium area. Once there, they broke out into the three classes Expert, Sport, and Citizen. The Sport Class included two loops of the main outer Pincushion Trail for a total of 15 miles, the Expert three loops for 21 miles.

Colin Pendziwol, of the Black Sheep Mountain Bike Club, Thunder Bay was our Expert Class winner.

Colin after his winning 2:04:21 effort.

Doug Osborn of Decorah, Iowa won the Sport Class with a time of 1:41:15.

Times were comparable to last year's.

Bike Rack Dilemma

By Jerry Hiniker

Bicycle racks! Wow!, finally. . . .

A couple of weeks back I ran into Dave Tersteeg at the recycling center (you meet everyone there) when he told me the bike racks were actually on there way. It was exciting after all the work we had done on the Active Living committee, and holding our breath for the grant approval. Then a few days ago I got an e-mail confirming the arrival and installation including the locations where they had been installed.

I decided to take a look, and maybe a couple of pictures and headed out to Harbor Park across from the Trading Post first. I was speechless, I couldn’t describe it right away, but when the words did come my reaction was that someone had placed the rib cage from a whale just off the street. I searched around to see if I might have been looking at the wrong object but saw nothing else to rest a bike against other than the usual lamp post and park benches.  Hmm, I wondered, would anyone actually think to use it for their bikes?  Well, maybe I should look for the others first, maybe I would have a different impression in a different location.

Headed over to the Joyne’s parking lot where I found rack #2 inconspicuously behind the sign on the corner with 4 bikes attached to it, but surmised that the bikers might not have recognized it for its actual purpose but rather as an accidental convenience. Even haphazardly in their arrangement with the rack it was in use with bikes attached to one of the ribs. Ok, let’s take a stroll over to Drury Lane Bookstore and the Historical society. These two racks were smaller and quite visible, I was able to shake the whale rib image but now replaced by that of a 1958 Buick grill without the 177 little diamond dots between the bars. I cancelled my plans to visit the last three, fearful of what new image I might conjur. Even when visible the racks are sort of innocuous, and perhaps that’s what the designer at Dero racks intended, but we are Grand Marais, an arts community, something “artier” should have been recommended.

It’s not as if better designs were not available, scanning Dero and Saris catalogues I found some basic but appealing designs that invited artistic embellishment, and that fit the budget we had available. They had nice names like “City rack” and “Campus Rack”, not a bland ‘hoop rack”, and they were designed to compliment public spaces. All is not lost though, and certainly this not a failure but an opportunity: what can we do to enhance  both the appearance and utility; to make them more inviting? Paint schemes? Added sculpture or other artifacts? Maybe permanently parking a bike at some of them to attract usage? Help me out here with suggestions, if we don’t get usage I fear they may eventually be displaced, and I really want them to work.

Berry picking on the North Shore

by Olwe

Last week was pretty much it for blueberry picking at the top of the Gunflint Trail . . . and this year was not as good as last. As you may know, way up on the Gunflint are many acres of wilds recovering from forest fire -- prime country for blueberries.

Here's a peculiar 'shroom we found at one of our patches:

Notice the "Eye of Sauron" at the top. Somebody said this might be a lobster mushroom. I believe lobster mushrooms are edible. But if in fact Sauron the Deceiver has occupied this poor fungus, it might not be a lobster mushroom after all.

We also have been loading up on domestic raspberries from various garden sources. They're doing quite well. In addition, the thimbleberries are coming in. They're my all-time favorite, but they are not a prolific berry producer. A big, bushy plant may only produce a hand-full. I've even seen a few cloudberries, but they're somewhat rare this far south.

Report from the garden

Last week I quickly mentioned the unknown demise of the lettuce crop; grasshoppers, slugs???? This is the continuation of the story. I transplanted the next crop of lettuce the following day (we try to
have plants in line for succession planting through the season). 5 years back Mark had gotten us 2 young garden kittens, Spring and Diesel to guard the sweet produce that the rodents always demolished.
We had tried a trap line but couldn't keep up with emptying them or finding them when they were drug off and still had devastated crops. I didn't want cats with birds around but we mitigated that by not letting them out for the day till later in morning and they were worth their keep when finally we got full crops of  beets, carrots and melons. Cats also like to be in the garden and "help" when we're working and they also love fresh worked soil to play in. The day after the transplanting, I found freshly turned out lettuce and soil and loudly grumbled to Mark about the sanity of keeping cats while I replanted the lettuce, only lost one plant. Upon marching out of the garden, continuing to gripe to Mark, I spied sweet Spring with a furry object sticking out of her mouth as she crouched on a path. How could I scold her for one deed when she obviously was also doing her job. Upon closer exam (by Mark) the furry object turned out to be a rabbit foot (feet actually) and we believe the original culprit has been excised. So the beasts are at work protecting the crops and the rabbit hole was found.

Enjoy your greens,
Melinda & Mark

Going for a Sunday ride.

South Brule Road

Last Sunday afternoon I rode from my house on Co Rd 60 to a friends cabin on Poplar Lake north of my house about 25 miles. The plan was for a late afternoon swim followed by a barbecue with several other friends, a great opportunity to fit in a gravel road ride while my wife went to check on the blueberry crop.  As with many destinations in this county there is the fast direct route and an indirect longer route which is many times a gravel road  ride. I rode south on county gravel and paved roads till the south end of the Pine Mountain Road and the start of the interesting and quiet part of my ride. Quiet only for few other humans, I saw only one car on the forest road portion of my ride, as the fauna in the form of dear flies were out in force demanding my attention. The wet summer has created perfect insect breeding conditions. Many insect problems on a bicycle can be dealt with just keeping moving but the dear flies are another story as they can fly very fast, have painful bites and can take full advantage of slow moving cyclists when climbing hills. Enough of the bugs though, the day was sunny and mild with pretty clouds and there is great scenery along the route. There are some big pines on the Pine Mountain Road and views across the river on the South Brule Road. I continued north on the Lima Grade till just south of Poplar Lake seeing a grouse, small hawk and great water lillies on Bow Lake. I made it to my friends house in time for a cooling swim, a few handfuls of fresh blue berries thanks to my wife, and hanging out on the dock before the barbecue. A great day of riding on just a small taste of the countless miles of gravel road routes we are lucky to have out our back door.

View over Brule River valley.












                                                                                                  Which road would you take?

What we're listening to; July 21, 2011

We're starting a regular feature on the blog where we'll give reviews of notable music we've been following. This week Jerry and Olwe will talk about their finds.


Judy Garland - The Golden Years at MGM (Vinyl LP)

The other night I settled in for one of my "listening sessions" and decided to unwrap one I had never heard. I pulled the sealed vinyl of Judy Garland, removed the cellophane and opened the box, did not expect any surprises, just maybe a treat. A bit of the history, I collect vinyl and I bought this on eBay a few years ago and just set it aside for just this nights type of occasion. The album was released in 1969, the year Judy died of an accidental overdose of prescription drugs (she did not commit suicide), and it reprised her career with MGM, it contained songs from all of her movie releases. It is not an especially valuable album, they cut a lot of copies, and they can still be had for very reasonable prices, but it has never been released on digital format, so it would be a unique listening session.

And so I warmed up my Jolida tube amp, turned on the phono preamp, and placed the virgin record on my SOTA Sapphire turntable, a ritual we vinylphiles relish, and carefully lowered the tonearm with my favorite Yamaha cartridge, settled down into my listening chair, and . . . I got my surprise. The MGM release was perfectly cut from the studio masters, pristine in sound and full of of what one might expect in a good theater. Wow, what a voice, what a talent, Judy was in my room that night with all the magic that made her a legend. A prodigy at 13 when she released her first recording with MGM "Zing! Went the Strings of My Heart," unfortunately not among the gems on this release, but memorable and amazing performances such as "Danny Boy", "Singing in the Rain", "You Made Me Love You", and of course "Over the Rainbow" from the "Wizard of Oz" a film so complete no one has attempted to offer a newer version.

We seem to be overwhelmed with "prodigies" today with shows like "America's got talent" and "American Idol", and I have been impressed by some of them, but the full talent of Judy Garland and the way she grew with that talent over years is not yet rivaled by any of them. A rich, versatile and skilled voice, she touches her audience in ways even Barbara Streisand should envy. In short, it's a keeper, one that will get periodic rotation in my listening sessions for years to come. While many of the songs on this release have been released in CD format, the total album has not, and that's a good thing: I cannot imagine the sound matching the magic produced on these vinyl discs. The bonus was the the 28-page 12x12 accompanying booklet with pictures from her performances and co performers - wow, look at Mickey Rooney and Frank Sinatra as kids.

Till my next audio awakening,
Jerry

Estampie - Crusaders (CD)

I'm sure you've seen those esoteric ethnic or "off on the margins" classical music CDs at the Big City Library, you know, the ones with the textbook-looking jacket and the textbook-sized booklet in three languages. You might have checked out Lute Music of John Dowland, or Mongolian Throat Music, or The Bulgarian State Radio Womens' Chorus, but they didn't really have very many catchy tunes; instead, they were more a faithful rendering of something only a musicologist in that field would appreciate. This is definitely not the style of medieval music you'll encounter with the ensemble Estampie's Crusaders, a CD which came out in 1996.

Why I find a CD this old to be "of current interest" is how big and vibrant the Middle Ages revival movement has become throughout Europe in the ensuing years, especially in Germany, a country that has been very silent musically since the days of Brecht and Weil and the Berlin cabaret scene. Besides the classical repertoire, journeyman participation in modern classical and jazz, rock and pop, Germany has been largely silent musically since WWII. This is also true for much of Continental Europe, the British Isles leading the Great White Diaspora with mass-appeal rock, followed by Ireland with Celtic folk. But in the 1990s Europe Proper began doing roots folk in a big way. The Scandinavian roots folk wave began then, and in that same time frame, Germany's Estampie came along with their unique take on medieval music.

Today there are hundreds of medieval-renaissance acts playing the European folk festivals and RenFaire circuit. And like Fairport Convention a generation earlier, they're largely blowing off North America. Imagine that! One of the biggest names, Germany's Faun, has exactly two CDs available through Amazon. The Scandi folk wave made some inroads here. For years there was the annual Nordic Roots Festival in Minneapolis, sponsored in part by Northside Records. However, the Euro-medieval revolution has gone all but unknown and ignored here. American participation has also been minimal. I only know of two bands, Unto Ashes and In Gowan Ring, who have toured Europe. Of course there is Loreena McKennitt of Canada, but she seems to split her sound between Celtic and medieval. Another surprise entrant is filmmaker David Lynch who produced a Hildegard von Bingen project. Lux Vivens included the wonderful vocalist Jocelyn Montgomery.

So what exactly have Estampie and the other bands done to this 500-plus-year-old music to pull it out of academic obscurity? To put it simply, it's now got a bite to it; now it rocks -- just a bit. Yet for all the bite and rock, it comes across all the more evocative and sensuous. Of course they've changed it, interpreted it, put it though filters, and even eclectrified it. But you can feel love, sincerity, and excitement, often missing or lessened from the scripted, standardized, purist academic fare. I guess this is why I chose Crusaders to introduce you to this phenomenon. With Crusaders you hear what the medieval academes have roundly rejected (some rather snottily), but the Euro public (especially the youth) have responded to with enthusiasm. Maybe listen to Estampie's Chanterai por mon corage and then listen to an academically purer version here done by the tweedy Early Music Consort of London. After listening to Estampie's version, you with your 21st century ears will "get it" when you here the Consort's version. Likewise the CD's version of Walther von der Vogelweide's Song of Palestine, considered by many to be the battle song of the Crusades, is both modern and timeless. I got Crusaders from MnLink. It is also available at Amazon.

Estampie occasionally tours, but there's not been much from them for a while. The principals, Sigrid Hausen and Michael Popp are most active in their parallel group Qntal, as well as other medieval music ensembles. In the meantime, the movement they help start is roaring, and I, an American, have been lucky enough to find it.

Olwe

Space Age ends with a whimper

On July 20, the space shuttle Atlantis will land with its crew, as well as all the crew of the International Space Station. This means that for the first time in over a decade no human will be in space, and for the first time since the Mercury mission back in the 1960s the U.S. will not have a way of putting a human in space. This is a rather strange and almost depressing ending to the so-called "Space Age."

It's clear to me the Space Age ended some time in the late 1980s, early 1990s when it was obvious the space shuttle mission was on a treadmill, NASA's budget was losing altitude, and no new big push into space would occur. The so-called "Information Age" may be roaring along with new whiz-bang computer stuff coming out all the time, but it's hard to get excited or romantic about computers, which are basically a composite TV, phonograph, filing cabinet, and typewriter. Sure, Ages have been named after basic trends, tools, or inventions (Bronze, Iron, Industrial Age), but after the heady romance of space with heroes like John Glenn, Werner von Braun, Spock the Vulcan, and Albert Einstein with his relativity theories, it's hard to come back to something called the Information Age.

Science fiction bailed on the Space Age sometime in the 80s, too. Instead of big adventures in space, you saw authors like William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, Bruce Sterling, and Rudy Rucker turn back to the home planet where, in a near-future timespace, they wrote about very depressing, unpleasant dystopian scenarios. Today it's very hard to find a good old-fashion space-based sci-fi book or movie. Yes, the new Transformers film will pack 'em in this summer, but it, too, is far more apocalyptic cyberpunk than real space adventuring. And as soon as the final Harry Potter film comes out this Friday, Transformers will have been forgotten.

I grew up with the Jetsons and Star Trek. My boys are growing up with Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter. What does it tell you when I see the neighborhood boys using sticks as swords rather than as pretend guns? Indeed. At this point you're probably wondering what my point is in all this. Actually, it's rather simple. If there's anything left in this whole millennia-long science and technology progress campaign, would it please, please, please come up with some alternative energy solutions? Like real quick. If this whole science and technology juggernaut can give us anything we really, really need, yes, it would be renewable energy sources.

We humans have doubled our population in just my lifetime. Very soon we will number 7 billion humans. And this massive blob of humanity is consuming circa 14 tera-joules of energy per year - most of it in the form of dirty fossil fuels. But our science gurus tell us we've hit a brick wall with fossil fuels: Fossil fuels are destroying the planet and they're running out. No surprises, though. My 8th grade teacher told us oil is a finite and non-renewable energy source - just like yours did, too. We all knew there was no real future in fossil fuels. Oil, for example, will not be around as a serious base resource for even another 50 years. Many argue that its production has already peaked and will now dwindle, the price rising accordingly. And of course coal is our main worry with global climate change. Dead end there, too. Natural gas is supposedly still plentiful (this is debated, however), but plentiful or not, it, too, creates greenhouse gases. The clock is ticking. . . .

I guess I'm not too sad about the end of the Space Age. Space is, well, very spacious, and it's not easy to overcome its spaciousness and actually do anything worthwhile out there in it. The dull realization of this basic fact has finally caught up with us. Other pieces of the high-tech pie are impressive, but seem to be a bit of the cart before the horse, seeing how we don't have our basic energy house in order. Sure, we've seen great strides in medicine and especially great things come on with computer technology. But the real challenge is to get ourselves off of fossil fuel and onto things like solar and wind. Because soon it won't matter if we've cured cancer, figured out how to not pass your ugly genes to your kids, or whether we all get iPad 5.0, 6.0, 7.0s. . . because if we can't get off risky, dwindling fossil fuel, it will be game over very soon!

Again, for someone who grew up in the Space Age, it's a rather odd feeling to see its end. I mean, who would have guessed that it would simply die one day in the early 21st century due to lack of interest? And it's also a rather odd thing to see the end of nuclear energy, another one of those "miracles of science" that came up parallel to the Space and Information Ages. Sure, there's still hundreds of nuclear reactors worldwide, but Germany's recent decision to bail on nukes and replace them 100% with renewable energy inside of ten years is really the death knell for this orphaned technology. Technically, the "Atomic Age" will go on with nuclear weapons, but that's a whole other can of worms. I'll wrap this post up by reiterating, We need to get to a new energy base and off of fossil fuels very soon. We've been riding this progress mule now since the ancient Egyptians, and unless we want to see 7 billion people in serious disarray (if not collapse), we'd better get moving!

Boy Scouts, MCC, IMBA, Forest Service team up on North Shore trail building

Beginning Saturday, June 18th and finishing with a banquet and ceremony this last Saturday, June 25th, two hundred "Order of the Arrow" Boy Scouts from a five-state region, helped USFS, Minnesota Conservation Corps, and International Mountain Biking Association teams build trails in the Tofte Sugarbush and Grand Marais Pincushion trail systems. In total, sixteen miles of "single-track" trails meant primarily for mountain biking were begun by the scouts and will be finished by the Forest Service, volunteers, as well as the Conservation Corps. (Read our original report: Cook County Single-track 2011)

Spiffy Subaru/IMBA vehicles come to town.

Saturday saw the arrival of the IMBA (International Mountain Biking Association) officials, experts at mountain bike trail planning and building in ecologically-sensitive areas. Headed up by regional rep Hansi Johnson (See his pages here and his blog entry on the Cook County project here.), they held a one-day seminar on trail building at our Grand Marais Recreation Park hall attended by SNOC/Velomarais, CMM, Scouts, and the USFS. (See their site: http://www.imba.com/tcc/host-toolkit/TBS)

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IMBA's Morgan Lammele gives a lecture on trail building.

As SNOC/Velomarais' Mark Spinler synopsized, trails should not become channels for rain runoff. Soil should be removed down to mineral soil in order to avoid compaction, as humus tends to sag inward after use, forming erosion- and muck-prone water troughs. Optimally, runoff should cross a trail and never follow it. Additionally, in areas that are boggy or often seepage, wooden bridges and planks should be built.

Morgan giving last-minute tips.

On-site IMBA instruction. 

USFSers Cory Mensen and Tom Yankovick after a hard day's work on the Pincushion trails. Cory and Tom helped supervise and plan much of the trail-building effort.

Order of the Arrow leaders Kurt Fuhrman and Daniel Schmit debrief the troops during a dry spell on Thursday.

Mark talks with Gabriel Wanderley, a Brazilian mountain bike enthusiast from Belo Horizonte, Brazil. Gabriel had heard of the IMBA/Cook County project and came especially to help and learn. He tells us he and friends have also built trails in his home region. He is currently an engineering student.

Scouts describe the size and number of the black and deer flies and mosquitoes.

Tofte USFSer Cory Berg discusses the Pincushion single-track with Mark. Cory is an avid mountain biker himself.

Once the work started, the Scouts - some two-hundred strong - did the lion's share of the hacking, digging, and clearing. Again, these Scouts were all members of the BSA's Order of the Arrow, a voluntary service wing of the Scouts for older boys and young men. (See their ArrowPower2011 page.) We visited their jamboree-style "tent city" on the CCHS soccer field and had to admire their fortitude, as it rained for the better part of the week, the sun and warmer temps coming only on Friday and Saturday.

Back at the SNOC/Velomarais shop we all marveled at this wonderful project. In times of very loud public budget noises, a bunch of people, money and an uncommonly great amount of good karma came together to do something really great for North Shore cycling!

Happy winner of the youth bike from May's Get Active Cook County Week, Caleb Benedix! This very successful promotion we did in partnership with Sawtooth Mountain Clinic, Cook County Hospital, and Cook County Schools had over 250 participants.

Move It!

By Jerry Hiniker   Just coming off the second successful annual Bike to Work Week, I want to reflect on what I am feeling is a renaissance in the culture of the bicycle. When I was a kid getting your first bike was a rite of passage, it was the first real expansion of one’s world, the ability to move in short time, to see beyond your backyard and even beyond your neighborhood. It was the equivalent of a teenager getting a drivers license. We could bike to school, bike to neighborhood stores, bike to the playground to play a game of baseball; such mobility was never imagined before the bike. MOVE IT, our new local name for Bike to Work and Bike Month, included a number of activities and events for both biking and walking, and the participation level increased this year beyond the amazing participation in the first year. The bicycle safety rodeo had over 110 elementary kids run through the safety course and learn safe riding skills, and the value of wearing a helmet. That’s almost half of all the elementary kids in Grand Marais schools. Also impressive was the condition of the kids bikes, most were in quite good operating condition, safe to ride, and clearly being used with enthusiasm. With studies just a couple years back showing increasing obesity, and a growing trend of lack of physical activity, the number of participants is a stunning reversal, one that has broad implications for the community. While the bike rodeo of my youth has progressed from a trip to the fire station to get a bicycle license to the licensed instructor programs we use today, twos element seem stuck in the past:  first, the streets and pathways these kids, and we adults, use to get around are ill suited to provide safe passage for our journey. Having safe streets, streets designed to accommodate an increased use by bicycle and foot, should be a priority for our community. And, second, increased driver education and awareness is essential. The roads and streets were not built just for cars, they were built for transportation, routes to access the stores, businesses, parks and neighborhoods, they were built for people to move around from point to point. We need to reclaim those roads for our everyday use. I hope to explore these issues in this blog, and invite comments, thoughts and suggestions, and I intend to share what I have learned is happening in other communities around the country.

Bike Rodeo 2011!

Pics from our annual Bike Rodeo safety program:
We had 112 kids, almost 45% of the all the kid's enrolled in the elementary school. Some kids rode the skills course several times. The blender bike smoothies were a hit, we ran out of food!

Velo Marias is blogging!

April has been busy, after a long winter people want to ride bikes. Cyclecross, mountain bike,  bmx, and commuter bikes are all going out the door. Jerry and Adam have been working hard taking up the slack while Melinda and I finish up the maple syrup season. Baby chicks to rebuild our egg laying flock at home arrived this morning. Spring in the north land is always over the top busy.