Munising Waterfalls

Friend Wendy Lynn and I went to Marquette the other day. She had never seen some of the waterfalls in the Munising area with winter ice build up. First we stopped by the Michigan Nature Association property in Munising to see Memorial Falls. As reported a month or so ago, this property actually has two waterfalls in side-by-side grottoes. The ice on the first falls has already fallen and broken.






To get to the second falls, you have to climb through the hole in the rock.




The ice on the second falls has detached at top, but it is still standing.




To get around the second waterfalls to get some photos, we crawled behind the curtin of ice. That was quite spiritual.




It was steep and slippery climbing out of the area.



Then we went across the street to Munising Falls.







The fourth water falls of the day was Scott Falls, located west of Munising.




On the way to Marquette we noticed how much ice is still hugging shore in the area. The shore ice in Grand Marais is pretty much gone. It must be because the stretch of beach between Munising and Marquette is more protected from the waves.



I am leaving in a little while to go to Kentucky agate hunting. Therefore, there won't be another blog update until I get back. I am going with friends Gerald and Jill. They have been in contact with a guy who is letting us camp on his property and hunt in his river. We are also going to do some fossil hunting in Ohio. The weather looks like it is going to be summer-like.

Huricane River

On Sunday I decided to see how far west we can drive. A week or so there was still a lot of snow on the road past Sable Lake. That is no longer true. The road commission must have punched the road through since there were snow banks in places along the road. I was able to drive all the way to the Hurricane River!

There is now open water along the edges of Sable Lake. The remaining ice is very thin. It won't be long before Sable Lake is ice free.



On the way driving out to the Hurricane, there is still some snow on the south side of the road. I like the patterns it makes when melting in the woods.



Here are the shots I took at the Hurricane River.

Miscellaneous Photos

I am going to Marquette in a few minutes so I don't have time to download the photos from my camera. Here are a few extra shots I've recently taken.

The first two show some of the first green vegetation. Actually, the first photo of the ferns show the green left over from last fall. This species of fern lays down in the fall and survives under the snow to give the plant a head start in the spring. The second photo is of some grass coming up along the side of Sable River.




Here is another beach shot showing the spring rocks. This photo was taken at the mouth of Sable River.



When we were bushwhacking along Sable River the other day, I took this shot of the foot bridge.

Sable River --Part 2

The photos today will feature those documenting beaver activity on and along Sable River. I must admit that evidence of beaver was everywhere. There were several dams that we saw along our walk.



Here are a couple of shots of domed beaver houses. We saw several -- all of which were built along the side of the river.




Blogspot turned this photo vertical, but you can still see where the beaver exit their home directly into the river.



Sometimes the beaver are a little to ambitious.





But most of the time they get their log.

Sable River -- Part 1

The other day friend Wendy Lynn and I decided to take an usual hike and circumnavigate the Sable River. We started at Sable Lake and walked on the west side of the river. We stayed as close to the river as we could, bushwhacking all the way to Lake Superior. There were a few spots that we were able to follow deer trails, but for the most part we pushed through brush or bent over and "played deer." The hike certainly gave us an appreciation for the river and for Sable Falls. There are a lot of photos so I will include them in two parts.











At places the brush was much thicker than what is shown in this photo.



From the top of the high dune on the west side of the river shown below, I took the picture of Sable Falls.




We hiked back to the car using the path on the east side of the river.