Log Slide Snowshoe Hike

I have lived in Grand Marais since 1994, but have had relatives who have lived here for over 100 years. As far as I know, there was never before a winter that you could drive seven miles west to the Log Slide area on January 11th. Well I was able to do just that yesterday. The incredible lack of snow permitted the drive.   Since we may get eight inches of snow starting tonight, I decided to drive to the Log Slide area as long as it was possible.  Then I hiked the two miles to the lighthouse at Au Sable Point and back.

When I parked in the Log Slide parking lot, I had to document my car with a snowmobile parked near by.

The dune above the log slide....

As you can see, the warm temperatures resulted in fog.  Here is a shot looking west toward Au Sable Point.

Looking east toward the Grand Sable Banks.

Here is a picture looking straight down.  There is still warm water just off shore so no ice has yet formed.

The two mile hike takes you through several different types of forests.  Here is a photo of a section with white birches.

The closer I go to the lighthouse, the less snow there was. 

As I was snowshoeing west, the fog continued to get thicker.  Normally from this angle you can see the Grand Sable Banks.  Not yesterday.

As you can see, there was almost no snow at the lighthouse.

The fog became even thicker...

Facts about the World's Oceans

The other night I watched a program on the National Geographic channel called "Drain the Oceans." It was an amazing show. The fact is that we really don't know a lot about the bottom of our planet's oceans. There are a lot of things we do know:

1. The oceans occupy nearly 71% of our planet's surface
2. More than 97% of all our planet's water is contained in the ocean
3. The average depth of the ocean is more than 2.5 miles
4. Less than 10% of the oceans have been explored by humans
5. Mount Everest (the highest point on the Earth's surface 5.49 miles) is more than 1 mile shorter than the Challenger Deep (the deepest point in the ocean at 6.86 miles)
6. The longest continuous mountain chain known to exist in the Universe resides in the ocean at more than 40,000 miles long
7. The Monterey Bay Submarine Canyon is deeper and larger in volume than the Grand Canyon
8. The average temperature of the oceans is 2ºC, about 39ºF
9. Water pressure at the deepest point in the ocean is more than 8 tons per square inch, the equivalent of one person trying to hold 50 jumbo jets.
10. The Gulf Stream off the Atlantic seaboard of the United States flows at a rate nearly 300 times faster than the typical flow of the Amazon river, the world's largest river
11. A new form of life, based on chemical energy rather than light energy, resides in deep-sea hydrothermal vents along mid-ocean ridges
12. A swallow of seawater may contain millions of bacterial cells, hundreds of thousands of phytoplankton and tens of thousands of zooplankton
13. The blue whale, the largest animal on our planet ever (exceeding the size of the greatest dinosaurs) still lives in the ocean; it's heart is the size of a Volkswagen
14. The gray whale migrates more than 10,000 miles each year, the longest migration of any mammal
15. The Great Barrier Reef, measuring 1,243 miles, is the largest living structure on Earth. It can be seen from the Moon.
16. Over 80 per cent of people on earth will live within 60 miles of the coast.
17. Plastic waste kills up to 1 million sea birds, 100,000 sea mammals and countless fish each year. Plastic remains in our ecosystem for years harming thousands of sea creatures everyday.
18. Tropical coral reefs border the shores of 109 countries, the majority of which are among the world's least developed. Significant reef degradation has occurred in 93 countries.
19. Although coral reefs comprise less than 0.5 per cent of the ocean floor, it is estimated that more than 90 per cent of marine species are directly or indirectly dependent on them. Nearly 60 per cent of the world's remaining reefs are at significant risk of being lost in the next three decades.
20. Populations of commercially attractive large fish, such as tuna, cod, swordfish and marlin have declined by as much as 90 per cent in the past century.
21. Each year, illegal longline fishing, which involves lines up to 80 miles long, with thousands of baited hooks, kills over 300,000 seabirds, including 100,000 albatrosses.

Below are pictures I took from the TV program.  The first shows the mid-Atlantic ridge.

Scientists study the mid-Atlantic ridge in Iceland, where it splits through the country.  Below are a couple of examples of geysers that follow the ridge.

If the water was drained from the oceans, the mid-Atlantic ridge would be a long line of lava flow.

The ridge is not just linear, it is actually quite complex.

Along the ridge there are lots of black smokers. These hydrothermal vents are fissures in the planet's surface from which geothermally heated water flows upward. Hydrothermal vents are commonly found near where tectonic plates are moving apart, such as the mid-Atlantic ridge.  The first picture shows a black smoker.  The next two pictures show what they would look like if the oceans were drained.

Although scientists are still surprised how the areas around black smokers are choked with life, they have learned that the rich minerals coming from these vents chemically support the life.

Miscellaneous Snowshoe and Grand Marais Photos

Today I'll post a variety of pictures taken during the past couple of days.    Yesterday I snowshoed in the school forest again.  First a couple of pictures taken on the North Country trail.

When I arrived to the shore, I captured a picture of this big freighter that was steaming by.

There are two Lake Superior beaches that I like to go to that you access through the school forest. The other day on my snowshoe I went to the east most beach, which I call Pathway. My plan was to walk west on the beach to access Gobel, and head back down the road to the car. The two beaches are around a half mile apart. I never saw access to the second beach. So yesterday I snowshoed the road to Gobel Beach to see why I missed it.  Now I know why.  The fall storms eroded the bluff back to 70 foot escarpment like cliffs.  There is no longer any way to access the shoreline from Gobel Beach.  The pictures below were taken from the top of the bluff. 

I drove through Woodland Park in town to see what the shoreline looks like.  As you can see, there is no snow.

A couple of days ago friends and I snowshoed the Masse Homestead trail up into the dunes.

We had a few more snowmobiles in town over the weekend, but not as many as we have seen in the past.

Full Moon Snowshoe in the Grand Sable Dunes

Wow. We had a blast! Last night four of my friends and I decided to go for a full moon snowshoe in the dunes. There is so little snow that we were able to drive to Sable Falls. We then headed on foot west down the trail, over the foot bridge, and into the dunes.  We had seen the moon earlier, but as we entered the dunes there were a lot of clouds.  Then, all of a sudden the clouds passed by.

The previous shot I took from the top of a dune.  The photo below shows the result of getting down the frozen dune the safest way.  Notice the full moon in the background.

The picture below I took of one of my friends who was standing on the top of a dune.

I decided to play with my new version of Photoshop.  I combined the full frame moon shot with the previous picture.

Thanks to Dianna, Renee, Wendy, and Kim for a good time.

How to Identify a Meteorite

On one of my trips down state while visiting my friend, Steve, in Mount Pleasant, he had a gathering with some of his friends.   I ended up showing my "wowser" rocks to Matt and Helen Williams.   Matt is a science teacher and wanted to see the rocks. The next day we received a call from the Wiliams.  They wanted to meet with me to show me a rock.

The story about the rock is that several decades ago Helen's grandfather heard a loud noise outside his farm house. When he went out into his yard, there was a newly formed crater around ten feet deep with a small mound at the center.  Steam or smoke was coming out of that mound. They decided to dig in that mound where the found the rock pictured below.  The first shows shows Matt and Helen along with their daughter, Katey, and an exchange student staying with the family, Xlaashi Guo.

Here are some close ups of the rock.

Helen explained that the grandfather never had the rock examined because he was afraid that it would be taken away.  They asked me to verify that it is a meteorite.  I am an agate person and am not familiar with the details of meteorite identification.  So yesterday I decided to do some Internet research.  The best web page I found is:  http://www.aerolite.org/found-a-meteorite.htm.  In fact, from this web page there is an option to pay $10 to have them examine photographs of suspect rocks.  Some of the facts they listed to help identify whether a rock is a meteorite are:

WHAT IS A METEORITE?A meteorite is a piece of iron, stone, or stony-iron composite that has fallen to Earth from outer space. Most meteorites originated within the Asteroid Belt between Mars and Jupiter, and were once part of a planet or large asteroid. A few meteorites come from the Moon and Mars, and a few others may possibly be fragments of cometary material. Meteorites are valuable both to science and the collecting community. Identification and classification of a new meteorite is a fairly complicated process that can only be handled by a very small number of specialists.

SOME BASIC FACTS Meteorites are attracted to magnets Meteorites contain a great deal of extraterrestrial iron, even the ones that look like terrestrial rocks (stony meteorites). Just like a common nail or ball bearing, they will easily stick to a magnet.. Test your find with a good hardware store magnet, or a rare earth magnet .An extremely small percentage of meteorites (far less than one in a thousand) do not show strong attraction to a magnet. They are so rare that we usually discount anything that will not adhere to a magnet. Those meteorites look similar to volcanic rocks from Earth, and are not metallic in appearance. Meteorites are heavy Most meteorites are much denser than ordinary Earth rocks. The thing most people say when they hold a meteorite for the first time is, "Wow! It's so heavy!" The unusual weight is due to high iron content. Even stone meteorites will feel heavier in the hand than most Earth rocks. Meteorites are not radioactive Meteorites likely traveled in space for millions of years before visiting us here on Earth. They were bathed in cosmic rays, but are not dangerous or radioactive. Some meteorites, such as Canyon Diablo from Arizona, contain micro diamonds but those gems are nearly invisible to the naked eye and can only be seen after cutting a specimen. Meteorites do not contain emeralds, gold (except possibly as a trace element), fossilized aliens, or common earth minerals such as quartz. If your rock looks just like other earth rocks, it probably is one. Meteorites look and feel different from the ordinary rocks around them. Fusion crust Recently fallen meteorites will exhibit fusion crust. This is a thin black rind, sometimes shiny, sometimes matte black, which is acquired during burning in the atmosphere. A freshly fallen stone meteorite will look much like a charcoal briquette. Even stone meteorites that have been on the Earth for a long time usually retain some fusion crust and almost always appear much darker than ordinary rocks. Surface features Meteorites, especially irons, often acquire "regmaglypts" (thumbprints) caused when their surface melts during flight. Stone meteorites sometimes display regmaglypts too, but they are not as well defined as in irons. Meteorites, particularly irons, may also show angular features such as points and ridges, and also flow lines which are caused by melting. Many of the suspected meteor-wrongs we receive are common terrestrial volcanic rocks. Volcanic rocks (along with other types) often contain small, deep holes, as if they had been repeatedly punctured with a needle. These holes are called vesicles and are caused by gas escaping when lava cools.  Meteorites do not contain vesicles.  Below is a picture from the ID website that shows a rock that is not a meteorite. NOT A METEORITE This is a heavy rock which looks metallic but note the small holes caused by escaping gas. Meteorites do not have vesicles Metallic flakes Nearly all stone meteorites contain small, bright metallic flakes. These are tiny pieces of extra-terrestrial iron and nickel. You can usually see them after slicing off a small piece, or removing a corner with a bench grinder. Please note! We recommend that you do not cut up your suspected meteorite, or otherwise damage its appearance. A meteorite with a beautiful or interesting shape will be worth less to collectors if its end has been hacked off. Ask a meteorite professional or accredited lab to do your cutting and testing. Chondrules Small, colorful, grain-like spheres which occur in most stone meteorites, hence the name of these stone meteorites — chondrites. Chondrites are the most common type of meteorite. Chondrules Rust or patina Meteorites which have been on the Earth for a long time will likely start to rust, or — in dry desert environments — acquire a "patina" caused by oxidation. The natural patina of irons is often yellow/ochre, red, or orange. Temperature of recently fallen meteorite Despite what we see in Hollywood action movies meteorites are not burning, or even hot when they land upon the Earth. The glowing fireballs we see in the night sky are caused by atmospheric pressure and friction. Meteors stop ablating (burning) approximately seven miles above our planet's surface, then fall in what is known as "dark flight," according to the normal pull of gravity. It is very cold at an altitude of seven miles, so meteorites cool quickly as they plummet towards the Earth. There has never been a documented case of a burning, or even hot, meteorite landing upon the Earth. So despite the compelling story told by the Williams family, I am not sure if this is a meteorite.  The last paragraph above suggests that meteorites are not hot when they land. If this is true,  then there would not have been steam coming from the bottom of the crater. The web page also says that meteorites never have vesicle hole openings.  You can see from the pictures of the Williams family specimen that it does have vesicles.  But who knows -- maybe this specimen is an unusual rocky meteorite.  It does have some of the "thumbprint" depressions on the surface and does have the orange/red color.  We tried a magnet which didn't seem to stick to the rock, but we didn't use a high quality magnet sot his test was not conclusive. Through my friend, Steve, I sent a link to the meteorite ID website and suggested that they send photos of the specimen in for examination by experts. I would like to thank the Williams family for sharing their story.  For their sake I hope that the specimen is a meteorite.