The day after our return!

August 26, 2006 (5:28am)
67º F, Cloudy with fog, E wind 1 mph.

Good morning,

So it is the day after our return. It rained off and on all day yesterday for an accumulation of a little less than an inch in the previous 24 hours. Nice rain, but not nice to do much outside. Didn’t really want to take a shower while tromping in the mud.

Margriet managed to do a load of wash and to bake a couple of Irish soda breads for the rummage sale at church today. Then breads looked very good, but since the did, I couldn’t test their quality! They will arrive at church this morning and hopefully sell to add some money to the coffers. The money being raised is to help a member family. Ron has terminal cancer through almost every part of his body. He will be leaving a wife and teenage son. We don’t expect him to live much longer, but the bills continue to pile up. The youth group has also had a couple of brat fries in a couple of area grocery stores to add to the total collected too. Ron and his family were very good to me during the divorce process.

The first picture (including rain drops on the camera lens) is of the company hotel in Fayette, Michigan ( www.michigan.gov/fayettetownsite and http://www.sos.state.mi.us/history/museum/musefaye/kidsatfa.html ). The hotel is in the process of some reconstruction and preservation. The interior has several of the areas restored and are rather elegant. At least more elegant than I expected in a company iron town. Even in the 1800's. Not only the interior has been worked on, but also the structure. Much of the work is visible and probably will stay that way for folks to see how the "old-time" construction differs from today’s. Of course it is interesting to me.

The second picture shows the back of the hotel. There are two additions to the original hotel. I suspect the left wing was added before the right, as it has a porch on it facing a wall of the right wing about six feet away. We didn’t go into them or upstairs. These old legs of mine have trouble going down the steep stairways. There was not such thing as handicapped accommodations at that time.

The real reason I took the picture was the two doors on the back of the additions. At one time the opened to a covered bridge to two-story outhouses! I don’t know if there are plans to rebuild them or not, but I really think they should. Would be interesting and I don’t know of any others, but suspect there were. Bet it was an experience (maybe adventure would be a better word) in the wintertime to use them. No indication what the "downstairs" guests used. There were many outhouses through out the area close to each house. Didn’t see any indications of them near the work or business sections of the town.

Walking around the residential area (now heavily wooded and overgrown) we did see some wildlife, but not really much. Most people today would have a dog, or possibly an attack parakeet, to protect their property from intrusion. But we found one old house that had a snake in the doorway! Not too sure if it works or not, but if it is seen, should give some folks a start for sure. The sun had come out by the time we saw it and it was totally relaxed, sleeping in the sun, not acting wild at all. We also saw a doe with her fawn. At first I could not figure out why it didn’t bolt, but finally saw the fawn, that she was keeping herself in front of. It was a neat sight and they walked with us for some distance, very observant of us and rather slowly, until she found a spot to go up the steep bank behind the houses. Cool!

We have been searching the web for the Fayette State Park and it’s history. There is a lot! We missed a bunch of stuff and need to go back again some day. There also is another museum, not too far away, relating to the iron industry and mining in the U.P. That will have to wait for another trip up there, but it is on our "list" of things to see.

Our kit is pretty well cleaned up, organized, re-supplied, and put away ready for our next adventure. Probably next year from the looks of it. Have some maintenance to do on the van and around here. Then it will be time to get serious about finding some sharp instruments and beat on some dead trees. Hopefully it will result in enough firewood for the winter. There are a lot of other things to do before winter comes here too. Seems te 2-DO list continues to get longer!

Kewaunee has a new gas station under construction. Actually it is an E-85 station. Wonder how it will be received, other than the price being about a dollar less than gasoline in other areas of the state. The price of gasoline when we returned was 5¢/gallon higher than when we left. but since has dropped again and one station has dropped an additional 5¢/gallon yesterday. Wonder if the rest will follow suit. Hope so. Then just another $2.00/gallon to make me a bit less grumpy. Not!

Time to get the day a-going.

In Christ My Saviour,

Chris <><