The ***OFFICIAL*** Weekend Singles' Thread -- (June 23rd to 25th)

FreeRepublic | June 23, 2006 | Victoria Delsoul & Alberta's Child

[Alberta's Child]

As June draws to a close and we enjoy the first weekend of the Summer of 2006, let's go back and remember some of the marvelous places we've been in summers past -- especially those times from yesteryear that still evoke fond memories of sights, sounds, and smells from places all across this great land of ours.

Hope you can all find time to post some wonderful stories, photos, and music here on this weekend's thread! Victoria Delsoul and I will be serving as your hosts this weekend. Check out the descriptions and photos below from a few of my favorite corners of the world -- some beautiful places from the great American outdoors.

And thank God for summertime!

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Adirondack Mountains (upstate New York)

The Adirondack Mountains are part of the Appalachian Mountain chain in the eastern United States, covering a large region in upstate New York bordered by Lake Ontario on the west, Lake Champlain and the Hudson River valley on the east, and the Mohawk River valley to the south. Much of this region is currently incorporated in Adirondack Park, an area covering more than six million acres -- the largest state park in the U.S. outside Alaska, and larger than Yellowstone, Everglades, Glacier, and Grand Canyon National Parks combined. The park is unique in the U.S. in that it was originally created in 1892 through an act of the New York legislature, but was forever etched into the character of the state at the 1894 Constitutional Convention when the protection of the park was written into the new state constitution.

The park is dominated by dense forests, numerous lakes, and rugged mountain terrain -- particularly in its northernmost reaches in Essex County in an area known as the High Peaks region. The High Peaks are home to the tallest mountains in the Adirondacks, including Mount Marcy -- whose peak is the highest elevation in the state of New York at 5,344 feet. Three thousand lakes dot the landscape of the Adirondacks, and 36,000 miles of rivers and streams drain the region encompassed by the park boundaries.

One of the most popular destinations in the Adirondacks is the mountain resort village of Lake Placid, which hosted the 1932 and 1980 Winter Olympics and is currently the site of several U.S. Olympic training facilities. The village still retains much of its Olympic aura from 1980. The arena where the U.S. hockey team won the gold medal in its magical, improbable ten-day run still stands in the center of town, along with the outdoor speedskating oval where Eric Heiden won an unprecedented (and never equaled) five gold medals in a single Winter Olympics. The surrounding mountain terrain is home not only to Mount Marcy, but also the Olympic venues at Whiteface Mountain (alpine skiing) and Mount Van Hoevenberg (Nordic skiing). The pleasant summer climate makes for an ideal summer vacation, and the region’s elevation and location downwind of the Great Lakes provides heavy snowfall that has made it one of the top ski resorts in the eastern U.S.

Whiteface Mountain

Winter in the Adirondacks

Lake Placid Village

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Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (northern Minnesota)

Located within Lake Superior National Forest in northern Minnesota, the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) is a heavily forested region along the Canadian border. The wilderness covers more than one million acres and has 1,200 miles of canoe routes among its hundreds of lakes, rivers and streams. As with most of the designated wilderness areas managed by the U.S. Forest Service, the area can only be entered with a Forest Service permit and is governed by very stringent regulations that prohibit all motorized vehicle access and limit the impact of visitors on the pristine wilderness through restrictions on the type of camping equipment that can be brought into the area (no plastic or glass containers, for example).

The BWCA is one part of a larger region of protected public lands along the Minnesota-Ontario border, including Voyageurs National Park to the west and Quetico Provincial Park in Ontario to the north. This region, which stretches from International Falls in the west to the shore of Lake Superior in the east, covers almost half the length of Minnesota’s northern border and is often referred to in general as the Quetico-Superior region, or simply the Boundary Waters. The area is separated into two parts by the Laurentian Divide, which marks the border between the watersheds of the Atlantic (via the Great Lakes) and Arctic (via Hudson Bay) Oceans and is one of the defining geological features of North America. The famous Iron Range -- which is actually three distinct ridges that run across northern Minnesota in an east-west direction -- is often defined as the southern border of the Boundary Waters region. Summers in this area are usually pleasant, but the winters are often brutally cold. Towns like International Falls, Crane Lake, Tower, Ely, Embarrass, Babbitt and Isabella -- which lie along the southern edge of the Boundary Waters -- are usually among the coldest places in the lower 48 states in the winter months.

A typical foray into the Boundary Waters can be arranged through one of the many outfitters in these small towns along its perimeter, where a visitor can buy or rent just about anything one would need on a trip lasting anywhere from two days to two months. Canoes are the most popular means of travel, though backcountry hiking is also common. The summer months are busiest for these outfitters, but many of them operate throughout the year by outfitting snowshoe treks and even dogsled expeditions in the vast frozen wilderness during the winter. Visitors to this great wilderness can be sure to find plenty of the peaceful stillness that is typical of the North Country. Summer days are usually mild and nights can be cool. The lakes tend to be somewhat rougher in the daytime, but a long day of paddling is almost always rewarded in the evening by some of the most beautiful natural features in North America: calm, mirror-like lakes, the occasional howl of a wolf, and one of the most magnificent sounds of the natural world . . . the eerie, haunting cries and yodels of the common loon in the gathering dusk.

End of the Day

Twilight on the Lake

The Cry of the Loon

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Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness (Idaho/Montana)

The Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness is one of several large protected areas that straddle the Bitterroot Range of the Rocky Mountains along the Idaho-Montana border. At a size of about 1.3 million acres, the Selway-Bitterroot is one of the largest designated wilderness areas in the U.S. It includes parts of the Bitterroot, Clearwater, Nez Perce and Lolo National Forests, and is bordered to the south by the Frank Church/River of No Return Wilderness Area. The total size of the protected regions in this area of the Rocky Mountains exceeds five million acres.

The Bitterroot Range is part of a curious anomaly in American geography and history. The border between Idaho and Montana was originally defined as the length of the Continental Divide (which separates the Atlantic and Pacific watersheds in North America) through this area. However, early surveyors tasked with laying out this border mistakenly believed that the Divide was marked by the ridges and peaks of the Bitterroots. The Divide actually follows the Flathead and Anaconda Ranges further to the east. So the large section of western Montana that lies east of the Bitterroot Range and includes the small cities of Kalispell and Missoula should have been part of Idaho!

Perhaps this mistake by these surveyors is understandable, for the Bitterroots are often described as one of the more inhospitable mountain ranges in the U.S. outside of Alaska. Lewis and Clark made note of the difficulties they had crossing these mountains, and today they are marked by barren rock walls that drop from the jagged peaks to the pine forests in the valleys below. The headwaters of the Clearwater River are located in the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness, where it flows from the confluence of the Selway and Lochsa Rivers westward to the Snake River near Lewiston, Idaho. The Wilderness is home to large herds of elk and plenty of bighorn sheep, and is one of the areas where packs of the grey wolf are being reintroduced to the wilds of the West.

Sunrise in the Bitterroots

Trapper Peak

The Selway River

[darkangel82]

Nothing much here, just drinking soda, answering PMs and emails, and watching the news.

[pcottraux]

Well, I don't go out places very often. I just prefer FReeping.

[rzeznikj at stout]

Me? My old man is too busy...8^)

[Victoria Delsoul]

Freeping is good. So let's freep together.

There's a song... Freeping together, or is it, happy together?

[rzeznikj at stout]

Know the feeling--Watching the news, drinking lemonade, FReeping, and trying to track down an OS9 cd...8^)

[rzeznikj at stout]

What is So Happy Together?

[pcottraux]

Well, it was funny this morning;

All the relatives had to call to wish me a happy birthday, but I was asleep (I work swing shift so I get to sleep in), so Mom comes in there with a phone and wakes me up and says "Your Aunt wants to wish you a happy birthday!"

So I'm laying there in bed holding the phone, listening to my Aunt yak about all the usual stuff; My Grandparents are crazy, she hates her cats, my cousin's wasting all of her money, etc. etc.

And then I'm ready to go back to sleep, but a few minutes later it's time to talk to Granny. So there I am still laying in bed holding the phone, and it was the usual; my Aunt's crazy, she hates her cats, they used the bathroom all in her house. And then she put Grandfather on the phone, and that's always fun.

The best present they could have given me was to let me sleep. Couldn't they have waited till 6 when I get home?

[pcottraux]

There's a song... Freeping together, or is it, happy together?

It's both to me.

[Victoria Delsoul]

LOL!! I love that story.

Hey, it was great. Your relatives love you and care about you. You're lucky.

[Victoria Delsoul]

Yep.

[pcottraux]

That's just the tip of the iceberg with my family.

They're crazy, but I guess that's why I love 'em.

[pcottraux]

Hey, I found a song for us all to listen to. And it's brand new, too:

http://media.thechrispirilloshow.com/mp3/yourepitiful.mp3

[darkangel82]

Well, that sucks if he's always "too busy." But at least you haven't gone...well, I won't say how long it's been.

[Victoria Delsoul]

OMG, I'm laughing so hard. I'm gonna save that song.

[rzeznikj at stout]

It doesn't have as much of an effect on me as it does my younger siblings.

My 16 year old sister only gets attention when he takes her driving, and my 12 year old brother is in Scouts--where the old man devotes a lot of his time and energy (when he's not working)

[Alberta's Child]

Lake Superior

The largest of the five Great Lakes, Lake Superior has long been a place of majestic beauty as well as a sobering reminder of the powerful forces of nature. The lake is about 350 miles in length and 160 miles wide at its widest point – the largest freshwater lake in the world and a veritable inland sea. With a total surface area of 31,700 square miles Superior is larger than the land area of 12 different U.S. states, and with a maximum depth of 1,300 feet it is also the deepest of the Great Lakes.

Historically, Lake Superior has played an important role in the development of North America. It first served as part of the route taken by the early French-Canadian explorers and fur trappers into the interior of the continent, and to this day it remains a major route for large freighters and other commercial vessels carrying iron ore and other minerals from the mining regions of northern Wisconsin and Minnesota to the manufacturing centers of the U.S. Midwest and southern Ontario in Canada. Thunder Bay, Ontario also serves as one of the largest grain ports in the world, where grain from the Canadian prairies is shipped by rail and loaded onto ships for export through the Great Lakes and down the St. Lawrence River.

Lake Superior has a prominent place in American lore, first immortalized in The Song of Hiawatha, an 1855 poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow that was based on the folk tales and legends of the Ojibway tribe. The Ojibway named the massive lake “Gitche Gumee,” which translates to “shining big sea water” in English, and attributed the lake’s harsh, unpredictable weather on the great spirit Mishipizhiw. More recently, Lake Superior’s made headlines throughout North America when the ore carrier Edmund Fitzgerald sank suddenly in a massive November 1975 storm with all 29 crew members lost. The sad saga of the great ship – and the reputation of the great lake for its often-hostile weather conditions – was immortalized in Gordon Lightfoot’s famous folk song, “The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald.”

A road trip around Lake Superior is a marvelous summer trip, offering visitors an interesting look at some spectacular vistas along its shores as well as a great look at the bustling commercial operations in port cities such as Thunder Bay (Ontario), Duluth (Minnesota), and Superior (Wisconsin). The city of Sault Ste. Marie (Michigan and Ontario) lies at the easternmost point on the lake, and its busy lock system (known as the “Soo Locks”) connects Superior to Lake Huron via the St. Mary’s River. The Trans-Canada Highway runs from Sault Ste. Marie to Thunder Bay along the north shore of the lake – a distance of nearly 450 miles – one of the most scenic routes in North America.

Sunset on Lake Superior (CLICK ON PHOTO FOR MUSIC)

[Victoria Delsoul]

Hey, P, who sings that song? I need a name.

[pcottraux]

Well, I didn't know if anyone here was a Weird Al fan, so I didn't mention the artist's name.

My Aunt told me about it on the phone this morning. She was trying to tell me about "Crazy Al's newest song."

[darkangel82]

I know what that's like.
I was in Scouts for 4 years, back when my life was actually normal.

[scott7278]

Howdy, everyone -- just settled in to watch Napoleon Dynamite. How are you all doing?