Lake Superior: Marquette, Michigan to Ontonagon, Wisconsin
June 18, 2024
In May of 2022, after a family reunion in Hazelhurst, Wisconsin, I headed north toward the Upper Peninsula (UP) of Michigan planning to sketch some lighthouses. It was late afternoon by the time I got to Marquette on the shores of Lake Superior. The Marquette Harbor Lighthouse was easy to find, but I arrived too late for a tour. I set to sketching and then drove down to the Marquette Breakwater Light.
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Lake Huron: St Ignace, Michigan, to Detroit, Michigan
October 25, 2023
I must admit to some trepidation as I planned this trip. Although my daughter Kathi and I had done long haul traveling together, and she accompanied me on a short sortie to the Apostle Islands, this would be a ten day lighthouse focused trip on the backside of Lake Huron all the way to Detroit where Taylor, Kathi’s son and my grandson lived. My lighthouse roadtrips were much like a mission, time imperative, which foreclosed on leisurely sightseeing. How would Kathi like serving as copilot and relief driver on such an undertaking?
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Sweden
August 7, 2023
My son Mark and I went to Sweden in June of 2023 to celebrate Midsomar with our cousins. We all traveled to Gotland beforehand, and Mark and I traveled down the coast to Kalmar, Karlskrona, Helmsjo—there we found the house where my grandmother was born—and finally to Malmö.
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Lake Huron: Old Mackinac Point to Fort Gratiot, Michigan.
August 2, 2023
My trip down the west shore of Lake Huron began when I finished sketching on Lake Michigan—McGulpin Point Lighthouse. Driving past the Straits of Mackinac I was now in a new domain. Lake Huron was a fresh chance for more sketching. In late afternoon, I arrived in Mackinaw City, sat in Alexander Henry Park, and sketched the Old Mackinac Point Lighthouse, first the tower and then the whole package. The soft light of the setting sun made the edifice even more attractive.
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The Great Pacific Northwest Ice Storm
May 9, 2023
Maelstrom surged—dozens of people milling about, all on cell phones. Of the 11 scheduled departures from Eugene Airport, all save the one to Dallas had been cancelled. Too icy for airplanes, taxis, Ubers or Lyfts. The 2022 Pacific Northwest ice storm was the culprit. I’d flown down from Seattle to visit my sailing buddy Mike Burke and wife Mary. Here I was stuck in Eugene, Oregon.I sidled up to three people who had cars and were talking about taking on the ice and driving into Town. I suggested the Hyatt might be a good place. I’d heard they had vacancies. Sara, my new friend, was smart enough to have a snow brush/scraper in her car and we attacked the ice. I navigated with her iPhone while she white knuckled. After sliding past the first turn, she kept saying, “I couldn’t do this without you.”
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Night Train to Leningrad
March 19, 2021
We’re stopped on a siding now and I hear the blaring screech of a steam whistle as a train passes us going the opposite direction. Our sleeping car is shaking. As the train starts to move again I swing my legs over the side of the bunk and rotate so my feet find the ladder. Stepping into my shoes I quietly open the compartment door and slip into the companionway. There are no sounds except the clacking of the wheels on the track. At the end of the car a great bronze samovar sits over a charcoal fire, glass cups in pewter holders and small spoons stacked on a ledged shelf.
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Lost
February 15, 2021
Lost I’m on a street called Medhat Basha. I’ve walked the three quarters of a mile from Baba ash-Sharqi to Bab Al-Jabiye two times. The exotic sights and smells of this historic thoroughfare no longer entice me. I can’t find the shop with the striped awning which signals the hotel turn.
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Haiti
January 10, 2017
Ayiti I went to Haiti in April of 2017 as a supernumerary on a nursing mission trip in conjunction with the Episcopal University Nursing School in Leogane. My interest was the usual curiosity of a seasoned traveler, but also, as a healthcare architect, I had prepared preliminary drawings for a surgery center in Canaan
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