Worldwide Photo Walk 2011 at Stone Arch Bridge in Minneapolis

Whitewater State Park, last weekend

I guess the last weekend part of the title is irrelevant because you could be looking at this post anytime...

..also, I will probably continue adding more pictures from this trip over a period of time. This afternoon I will be going on my first ever photo walk. I am not sure what  to expect. I was pointed there by Tomas Alvarez. I also hope to get some shots from the Twin Cities Marathon tomorrow which SteveO is running.

Obama at the Minnesota State Fair

The Great Minnesota Get-Together

Some Gratuitous Sunsets, Jimmy, and Beaver Town! Misc pictures from the Boundary Waters

This is Jimmy. He will be starting college at Cornell in less than a week. This was kind of his last-time-to-be-a-kid trip. 

 Above two are taken from our most excellent campsite on Little Saganaga. This is my second year in a row at Little Sag. Little Sag is awesome. I think I will try to plan future trips to intersect at Little Sag for years to come.

Beaver town on the Phoebe River.

This is another gratuitous sunset taken the last night of our trip from our campsite at Hazel Lake.

Along the Frost River

Above three pictures are just a pool of water at a tiny water falls where you enter Octopus Lake.

Here's the falls entering into Octopus Lake, not much of a falls, really.

..and here is Octopus Lake. I wouldn't recommend going out of your  way to be here  unless  you  are  intent on seeing no one. We went through this area after a mile or two down the Frost River from Frost Lake. Frost River is not really a river, at least, it is not a river in August, just a stream or brook. At places it is  not much wider than your canoe. In all, Jimmy and I spent about 10-12 hours to go just the 7-8 miles between Frost and Whipped Lakes. At one point it was so slow going that we were freaked out thinking that we were lost because we we were still heading south when the map showed that we should have been going west.What eventually made it worthwhile is shown in the next blog entry, namely, the bull moose that appeared for us in Whipped Lake. If you take the Frost River route, expect a lot of tugging, pulling, scrambling and leeches.

This is a wider spot in the Frost River at a portage just a bit south and east of Afton Lake. If you  can, try to get the campsite on Afton Lake. There's not much else to choose from. But Afton does have a nice site.

Moose Alert! ...or, Why does the moose cross the lake?

Jimmy and I came across this guy on Whipped Lake in the Boundary Waters last week.

This was our authentic moose experience seen after a long paddle down a short river. The river was the Frost. It's not really a river, at least not in August. The portion of our trip between Frost and Whipped Lakes could not have been more than 7 or 8 miles but it took us around 10 or 12 hours. Mostly tugging, pulling, and pushing. In many places, the river wasn't much wider than the canoe itself. For a while we thought we were lost because the map kept telling us that the river should be heading northwest while we were still travelling south. The issue was that we could not believe that our progress was so slow.
We chose this route because our guide book  (Beymer's Eastern Region) promised an authentic wilderness experience. However, this was an authentic experience that we were glad was over ... except, of  course, for the moose at the end.

The Iris Garden

The garlic are in

as are the raspberries