Friday - Fourth of July

Dusk up here in the Upper Peninsula goes on until 10:00 p.m. and dawn begins around 5:30 - we're much closer to the north pole and days are longer right now. So we had a short night and then Danny and I began the new day with a chilly run with Lake Huron in our sights. We even ran on the runway for the small airport near our hotel - if we had gotten in trouble our alibi was going to be - it's a RUNway...
By 10:00 a.m. we were at Whitefish Point on the U.P. north shore on Lake Superior where we began with some rock skipping.  The Edmund Fitzgerald ship went down with 29 men in 1975 that prompted the song by Gordon Lightfoot. Hundreds of other ships sank to their watery graves before the Edmund, which gives the Whitefish Point area the name of The Graveyard of the Great Lakes. While there we met a tour guide who was very difficult to understand with her Yooper dialect, but we could understand enough to know that she was a little partial to Jimmy.
There are about 1500 residents in the area now but it dwindles to 300 in the winter months - the winters are just too harsh for non-Yoopers.
A little before noon we were at the lower Tahquamenon Water Falls and 30 minutes later we were at the upper falls of the same name. The lower falls were just a little more than some large rapids on major rivers, but the upper falls were majestic. Today was good because we saw more of God's creation - the sunrise photo taken by Jimmy, views of the Great Lakes, waterfalls, etc. Up to now we've had a great time but most of what we've seen has been manmade.
I bought a Yooper baseball hat with "You Betcha" on it, but will probably only wear it back home. These Yooper people are a very proud people and are a little different - I think most of them don't even include themselves as part of Michigan. You would think that they would be Detroit Lion fans, but they are all huge Green Bay Packer fans. The U.P. is connected to Wisconsin and is not connected to lower Michigan. We stopped at "Da Yooper Tourist Trap" in Ishpeming, Michigan and they even had an exhibit paying homage to St. Vincent of Lombardi with a small area of turf from Lambeau Field. The tourist trap has some bizarre exhibits - I'll add one to show what I mean.
Danny and I were together today and Pee Wee and Jimmy rode together. We've pretty much driven together for most of the trip - our original plan of separating went out the window when we saw we were having much more fun staying together. But we got separated today and that was a good thing for the Jimmy and Pee Wee car. They stumbled on a July 4th treat in Munising, Michigan - hundreds of people came out for the Fire Department water fights. They turn on their hoses full blast and try to knock each other over. Then they turn the hoses on the crowd. Jimmy and Pee Wee noticed that the trash cans were overflowing so the good deed doers found empty trash bags and with the help of some children went around and did a Georgia good deed clean up. They met a lot of people and received a lot of thanks.
We're not done looking for good deeds today - I'm writing this early because we're driving 15 miles to Marquette, Michigan for a fireworks display over Lake Superior. This is going to be a very late night - they have to wait for total darkness like anywhere else but that won't happen here until close to 11:30! So the finish to this day's blog will have to come sometime tomorrow.
 But "you betcha" I'll finish it.