End of Summer

It was the end of summer vacation and school was about to start. So Sunday evening we went to the beach. Unluckily for bloggish photogenicity, I didn't think about the camera until I saw the red sun sinking into the lake. The water was about 69 degrees F., and the lake level noticeably lower than our first visit.

All my husband's week off seemed to have been spent on work-around-the-house stuff. He doesn't fix things, but he does paint, and among other things, he mowed around the fire pit and a big section of grass for parking at our September get-together.

So Monday (the Labor Day holiday in the US) we spent on end-of-summer fun.

First thing in the morning, we walked the bridge.

If you're a Michigander, you will recognize that this is not Big Mac, aka the Mackinac Bridge, nor is this the 50th Annual Mackinac Bridge Walk.


Instead, this is a little local bridge. Can you read the sign in the distance?

I'll zoom in.

Sorry about this gentleman's head in the picture. We were walking into the sun and it was hard to see my camera's preview pane. The sign says, "The Weak Should Turn Back Here!"

We decided to press on.

A little further on, we were met with this sign.

Could we make it? It was a whole 0.6 miles! (That's total . . . not the halfway point.) I know, quite a distance.

Yes! We made it. And here we are turning around to walk back across the bridge to our van to head home.

But the fun was only beginning: my husband called up Old Allegan Canoe and found out the times they were starting canoes. After a quick lunch, we drove up and rented a canoe for a three-hour trip down the Kalamazoo river.

This time, I left my camera home on purpose, although I knew I would miss many pretty photo possibilities. I like my Fuji too much to want to drop it in the brown river water.

This section of the river is pretty flat and easy to canoe. Like Lake Michigan, the Kalamazoo river was low, too. We saw lots of turtles sunning themselves on fallen trees, scads of cardinal flowers on the river banks, several kingfishers, cedar waxwings catching bugs (I thought they stuck with fruit, but these were snapping flies out of the air), and the real highlight for a bird watcher, a bald eagle!

We are pretty fast canoeists, I guess, since it took us about 2-1/2 hours instead of three.

Today school started again, so I don't have to share my computer in the morning. That means I'll probably be back on a more regular posting schedule, and should hit the fabled 500 in a little over a week.