Date: 5 August 2001 (Sunday)

Start: Duluth Tent & Trailer Camp

End: Summer Breeze CG, Iron Mountain MI (0 miles)

Humid. Hot and humid. The temperature was 67f when we arose, and hazy with the high humidity. Through the day, it just got worse.

We ate and departed. As we pulled out onto Scenic 61, we couldn’t distinguish between the lake and the horizon due to the haze.

We went into Duluth on US-61 and I-35, then over to Superior, Wisconsin, on US-2 and continued our trip east on 2. We went through Ashland (ore dock, but nothing being shipped), Ironwood, Watersmeet, Iron River, Crystal Falls, and the outskirts of Iron Mountain.

Iron ore is not a big player in this country anymore – it’s on its last legs. The steel situation (low overseas prices due to low labor costs and other factors) has taken the iron ore mining and transportation with it. There were once hundreds of mines in upper Michigan; now there are two, I believe.

The campground is nice, very clean, with a good little pool. We tried the pool to cool off, since its temperature was only 82f (air was 92f at that point, and almost as liquid). Then we came back to eat an early dinner of chicken, potatoes, salad, with a Washington State chardonnay.

There are few TV channels up here to distract us, but sufficient to give us the weather forecast for the next few days – hot, humid, hazy.

We called Mom in Holland to advise her of our arrival plans there. She said it’s been terribly hot there all year, as well. The more I here this, the happier I am that we went to Alaska, BC, and the Yukon.

We’ll go over to the meeting room shortly, and get the e-mail. In the process, we’ll send these notes.