Minnesota, Tower Part 2 Aug. 16 - Aug. 29

Minnesota, Tower Part 2 August 16 - 29
This is the second part of the Tower, MN blog.

Tower, Minnesota

A day trip to the Soudan Mine.  There are two tours here at the mine.  The first one we took was to see the Soudan Underground Laboratory.  The second tour took us back down the mine elevator to level 27 again.

Kay ready for the tour, with her hardhat on.

I also had to wear one of the yellow hats.

 We are standing on level 27 of the mine.  This is the level where the laboratories are. And where the train will take us to the last mining section of the mine, which was closed in 1962. It is 2500 feet below the surface. 

The Soudan Underground Laboratory, is operated by the University of Minnesota in partnership The US Dept. of Energy as well as the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. It is designed to explore fundamental questions about the structure of our universe.

For more information (http://www.soudan.umn.edu)

The mural pictured here was created by Joseph Giannetti in order to convey one artist’s impression of neutrino physics and the Soudan Mine.

This is the little train that took us to the end of the mine, about ¾ of a mile.  The temperature in the mine was only 51 degrees, which made it a bit chilly riding the train.

This is the big cable drum for the elevators of the mine.

Found this deer alongside of the road as we were leaving the mine.

Kay and I found this spot called Swedetown Bay one day as we were touring around the lake.  We came back a few days later so I could kayak and fish in this bay.  The unique thing about this place is all the old boat houses.  Years ago, the mine provided them for the people that worked at the mine to store their boats.

I have no idea what this smoke stack was used for.  Kay and the dogs took a hike while I was fishing.

Years ago, the owner of the mine built these boat houses for their employees to use.  From what I can find out, they were built in the early 30's.

A view of the boat houses from my kayak

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Kay also took a bunch of pictures of the flowers and turning leaves while waiting for me to get back from fishing.

This picture really fascinates me.  Look behind the bee, and see the wasp also coming in for a landing.

Kay got this flower when it was all covered with rain drops.

Our friend from Colorado, Margie Hanson's sister Georgia Loe lives here in the Tower area.  Margie said she makes the best pies you have ever eaten.  We went out to her home on Breezy Point to visit her.  This is her home that looks out at the lake.

Standing in Georgia's yard looking out at the lake, you see this little island.  What a beautiful spot to live.  The house next door was for sale and sure seemed tempting.  It would have been even more so if it was just a little closer to home.

Georgia made us an apple pie.

Now that was the best apple pie that I have ever eaten.  She makes the crust the old fashioned way with real lard.  YUMMM

This little chipmunk drove the dogs crazy.  He lived in the trees behind the camper.

There was a very nice bike path that lead from the campground into Tower.

I had to stop and smell the flowers

This map is of the Boundary Waters of northern Minnesota.

An Ariel view of the Boundary Waters.

Unloading the kayaks so we can kayak Farm Lake, which is located in the Boundary Waters.

The inlet waters to Farm Lake.  This is the spot Kay and I found a week ago.

Kay headed up to Farm Lake.

This picture is a bit fuzzy, but am putting it in anyway.  The Northern Pike on the other end of my line was about 33 inches long.  It was so big, I could not get my little fishing net on it to bring it into the kayak.  I was holding it with my jaw pliers waiting for Kay to get back to take a picture of it, but it was too big to hold on to.  Sure wish I could have gotten a pix of that one.

I did get another little Northern Pike later on, but it was only about 13 inches long.

Kay looks so good in her little blue kayak.

Yellow water lily flower with a strange looking bug in it.

The wind was blowing very hard the day I took the picture of this wind surfer.

This is another one of the critters that drove the dogs nuts looking out the window of the camper.

Kay waiting for me to start playing games.  An interesting note about this picture, the big class A motor home in the picture was from SD.  There were 6 of the traveling together, and they were all from near my home town near Aberdeen, SD.

I went fishing one evening here at Hoo Doo Point.  I did not catch any fish, but what I did catch was a beautiful sunset sitting in my kayak on Lake Vermilion.  

This is our last kayak trip in the Tower area.  We chose Eagle Nest Lake because it was in a quit and remote place where there should be few boats.  This is the dock we launched the kayaks from.

I looked on Google Earth and found this big island just off the launch point.  It was about 3 miles around.  This is it in front of us.

I headed for the rock cliff hoping there should be some fish near it.  

I was wrong, there were not any fish here.

We love all the lakes here in Northern Minnesota.

There is not much more I can say about the next two pictures.  Other than Kay and I love to kayak.

There were so many turtles in this lake, that Kay went crazy taking pictures of them.

We have never seen a red dragonfly before.

There were a lot of turtles sitting on lily pads, I guess they like sitting on them.

This is a beautiful white water lily flower.

Now here is something I have never seen before.  I did not know that turtles molt their shells.

More of Eagle Nest Lake.

As we were ending our kayak trip on Eagle Nest, we came across this family of Loons.  We watched this one dive and come up with this little fish.  Then took it over and fed it to one of the baby Loons.

The baby Loons

The Mom and Dad Loon and their family of two babies.