Kayaks, Weddings, and more!!!

Here are some photos from our trip to the Apostle Islands. We arrived in Bayfield and the weather was less than spectacular. We camped out in a very nice city campground just outside the city limits and woke up to a thick blanket of fog everywhere. I wasn't too excited about paddeling off into the wilds of lake superior not being able to see anything. So we checked in at the ranger station in Bayfield and talked to them about the weather for a while. It was not looking good for the rest of the day or the rest of the week. The people at the ranger station were very helpful and friendly, they suggested that if we didn't go out on the water we take advantage of free ferry day. That sounded like a good idea and how is one supposed to pass up free ferry day? The ferry goes out to Madeline Island, one of the Apostle Islands. In fact it is the only one that has any sort of population on it. If you have ever been out to Vashon Island in the Seattle area you might have an idea of what Madeline is like. Very nice, little island town with just a touch of a hippie feel. Anyway, we had lunch on the island and as we were walking around the fog started to lift and the sun came out. We decided to take advantage of this break in the weather and went back to our kayaks. We put in at Bayfield and kayaked out to Basswood Island. It's not too far off the coast but it is about a 4 mile paddle to island from Bayfield. It didn't take too long before we were unloading at the dock.

We stayed on Basswood for two nights and did some day trips hiking and kayaking off the island. A lot of our time was spent in our beautiful new tent, waiting out the rain. It did a great job keeping us dry, but is not the most exciting place to be for extended periods of time. We had a great time out there, but did get tired of waiting out the rain and trying to dry out all the time. The weather was not looking to get any better and when we called in for a weather report we found that it was only to get worse.

(We did find time to do some yoga on the dock!)
We thought about it for a moment and decided it would not be fun to be stuck on the island or try to paddle in a thunder storm. And we were a little tired of all the rain. So we cut our camping two nights short and went back into bayfield while the weather was fairly nice. We had a great time just wandering around in town and taking in the sights on the lake.
(This photo is a little Holga-esque, I modified a lens from a Holga camera and mounted it on my Nikon D50. It captures some of those wonderfully terrible holga effects.)
After our day in Bayfield we decided to go up to Grand Maraie in Northern Minnesota. We discovered this little town on our honeymoon last year and really had a great time there. We had the time, so why not. It was fun to go back up there and spend the day in town and just cruise around. After our day there, we went back to Wisconson to Scott and Stef's wedding! It was great to see everyone again and have some time to be with really good friends for a while. The service was very nice, everyone said "I do" and all went well.

Three of the greatest friends a guy could have.
And isn't that a great looking group of pastors! That's right folks, the church is in good hands...