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Vacation but not. I truly had a wonderful time in Minnesota. I love it there. I'm sure that I would eventually grow tired of the beautiful landscape and serene, slow paced lifestyle... yeah, surely I would. Heh. EL and I flew into the twin cities and picked up a rental. We didn't realize it at the time, but we were to put 1500 miles on the car in the next week. I spent the next few days playing 45 holes of golf on three courses and visiting with family for the holiday weekend. When EL and I set out on the morning of the 5th for our little adventure up the shore, we first headed to Wisconsin. A back country detour, a juvenile bald eagle sighting, and a flat tire later, we were in Bayfield were I went on a boat tour of 19 of the 22 Apostle Isles. When we finished our brief stop on the south shore, we continued around the Duluth anchored corner of Lake Superior for the north shore and beyond. We made our way up the shore with our usual coffee stop in Two Harbors. On the other side of Beaver Bay, we stopped for the night in Silver Bay so I could photograph Split Rock Lighthouse (seen below), Palasaide Head, Gooseberry Falls, and Tetegouche. We made our way to Grand Marais, where we had a private cabin, for the rest of the trip. If you are ever in Grand Marais, eat at The Pie Place. Trust me. We spent the entire next day exploring the Gunflint Trail bordering the B.W.C.A. (Boundary Waters Canoe Area). Copious quantities of deer, a couple of fox, beaver, and lots of birds were a neat treat to see, but nothing like the thrill of seeing an adult black bear in the wild. I think the highlight of the wildlife sightings was the few moose we saw near the Canadian border at the far end of Gunflint. I shot (photographically) a cow and her calf... which looks oddly like a kangaroo seen from straight ahead. Later, we saw a young bull wading and eating along a plush forest bank. Lastly, we saw another cow feasting in the swampland. I took photos of all of them, but due to a business trip, I won't be able to develop any of the shots until next week. We had a fabulous time and our trip went well overall. We did have a flight delay getting us back to Houston, but everything worked out. We're both extremely tired. Her more so from being a pinball from one family event to another and me because of my race with the sun. Up north, where we were at, the days are so long in the summer that first light starts peeking over the horizon around 4:15 in the morning and it doesn't get dark until almost 10:00 at night. I had to rise at 4:00 to get sunrise shots like this Split Rock sunrise. Tired.