On The Mark: The North Shore is lake source cooling at its finest

The day after my 73rd birthday, my husband, Rod, and I headed up the North Shore. We fled exhaustion and duties, immersing ourselves in glorious summer. Lake Superior operates like a cooling chamber, cold water mating with sunshine to put zip in the air, disperse biting bugs, and lay a light tan on your shoulders. Daily swims are possible both inland and, if you are brave enough, in Superior.

First stop, Tettegouche State Park.

If you hike the trail and wooden stairs down to where the Baptism River meets the lake, you find a perfect rock-rimmed swimming pool. Upstream, North Country waters rush over sun-heated Precambrian rock, warming them to more than 10 degrees above Superior waters. Absent high winds and waves, a pebbly sandbar prevents the lake water from flowing in. Between 10- and 20-foot sheer-rock walls, I swam upstream, watching for the rare underwater boulder, glorying in the sheen and reflections on the water’s surface.

Second stop, just north of Grand Marais where we dropped in on Julie Collman and Bob Baker’s construction project. They took a break from erecting the roomy add-on to their home off the Gunflint Trail to detail for us how they’ve designed it, its structural strength, where the windows will be, and how they’ll be using the space. We made a dinner date for the following evening.

We headed for the Superior National Forest campground at Two Island Lake. We’d called the Grand Marais SNF offices ahead of time to inquire about likely space and received good advice. We found a lovely wooded spot out of sight and earshot of others. In the morning, black-throated green warblers and ovenbirds sang us awake.

Then up the Gunflint Trail to revisit the drop-dead gorgeous, deep cold lakes we’ve paddled for so many years. We rented a canoe on Poplar Lake and skimmed over quiet waters to the far North End. It was deserted, and we cast off our suits and swam, framed by blue flag iris and reeds backed by sky-reaching white and red pine and spruce.

We once launched a weeklong canoe trip from Poplar’s north end — south to Caribou, Vista, and Horseshoe Lakes, and the Misquah Hills. At a rock-aproned site on Caribou, we watched a family of magnolia warblers train their little ones to catch fishflies hatching out of the water, quite a performance! On day trips from Caribou, we each caught a big northern, the same northern! With each trying to haul in what we assumed were separate fish, our canoe lurched left then right as the fish streaked underneath us from one side to the other. I don’t remember how Rod managed, in the end, to get it into the canoe. Fried over a wood fire, it was delicious.

That evening we drove back to Devil Track Lake to meet up with Julie and Bob for dinner. I had the special — that day’s Lake Superior herring catch. We talked through many lively topics, from how to lose weight to the joys and challenges of retirement, sharing many funny stories of people we know and places we’ve been.

On Sunday, after hiking around Two Island Lake campground, we headed for Cascade River State Park, with its torrents cutting down through steep granite right to Superior’s edge. We landed the last campsite, an isolated one tucked far from any others, a blessing. We hiked down to Superior and clambered over its rocky coast to the water. We dared each other to swim. Rod went first — screaming and laughing — for a very short time. What a pioneer! It took me a while to dare it — immersing my toes was not encouraging. But, we had a commitment to swimming every day, so I talked myself into it. Once I recovered from the shock, I managed to breaststroke out 100 yards or so, yelping and babbling, before returning. Climbing back uphill helped our blood return to normal temperatures.

That evening, we’d made a date to meet my second cousin, Judy Peterson, and her husband, Gary, for dinner at the Cascade Lodge. We hiked there from our campsite, over the roaring gorge and through the woods on a vintage trail. I don’t know what the men talked about — probably building projects and lifetime highlights. Judy and I reviewed our family history. Both of us descended from the same great-grandparents who migrated from Ireland in the 1840s and created a dairy farm near Faribault, Minnesota. Judy brought me a beautiful photo of my mother, and I brought an album of my Aunt Helen’s, poised between dirty dishes, to share.

Returning refreshed on Monday, we stopped again at Tettegouche and had an even-more glorious swim. This time I swam up through the sheer-golden walls to where I could see the highway and almost to the falls. After Superior, it felt delightfully warm. We headed for Two Harbors, where we stopped for coffee and ice cream (maple nut for me and chocolate for Rod), stopping again at the Whole Foods Co-op in West Duluth for provisions.

The North Shore – highly recommended!

Ann Markusen is an economist and professor emerita at University of Minnesota. A Pine Knot board member, she lives in Red Clover Township north of Cromwell with her husband, Rod Walli.