This week, Clara and I and two friends of ours went on a two-day trip to Minnesota’s North Shore, on Lake Superior. The town where we stayed is epically named “Castle Danger,” despite its lack of castles or (apparent) danger, and, according to Wikipedia,
The exact origin of the name is unknown, although it might have come from the cliffs on the shore resembling a castle; from a boat named Castle that grounded here; or from the Walter Scott novel Castle Dangerous (1831).
Shortly after arriving, we managed to get our feet wet in Lake Superior, which is cold at this time of year (and maybe always?).
Our first real adventure was visiting Palisade Head, an area of coastline with dramatically plunging cliffs that are a startling orange against the green trees and blue water:
The pathways take you right along the edge of the cliffs, which I found quite frightening, but it made for fantastic views.
A few miles down the coast is Split Rock Lighthouse and an adjoining national park. At the foot of the cliff on which the lighthouse stands, people have assembled small piles of stones in miniature towers, which I found delightful:
The stone itself forming this part of the coastline was also pretty wild—I’ve never seen anything quite like it!
We spent the entire second day (today, in fact) at Gooseberry Falls national park, which contains several impressive waterfalls like these:
One of the things most delightful about this park is how much of the river is (at least, as of this writing) accessible for clambering on!
It was a really incredible experience to be allowed to use our own judgement to get close to the falls and see the power of the moving water.
Thanks for reading! I’ll be back to my regular philosophical musings on probability and habits and whatnot next week. See you then!
Owen Biesel 