#summer in duluth

Back to Hartley! We left even earlier after noticing a class on break outside everyday. So this time we did our kid ride with time for Jr. to get in on a game of catch befor his class started.

Lieblings had to work so I hit the trails solo. In just a few days I’ve gotten a lot faster and better at them and I’ve been adding up the miles from the map and doing just over four on challenging terrain. It’s not that much, I used to ride 7 miles through the city when we lived in town, but that was also on streets and flat paved bike trails. I was carrying my satchel across my body and getting tired of it banging around and creating a hot patch of sweat on my side/back so I took an old Duluth Pack shell bag that had the strap removed and cliped it to my waist carabiners. It makes a sweet chaos bag and is big enough to hold my sketchbook, writing tools, and various odds and ends. I keep my metal waterbottle on my key clip on the other side. It was hilarious to take a break and watch the spandex-wearing bro dudes go by on expensive bikes and giving me weird looks, but I’m managing the same trails as them in Doc Martens and cut-off workpants on my old Rock Hopper. :P

I’m REALLY liking mountain biking, it’s a ton of fun and feels like a full-body workout. My favourite part of the trails is the Root Canal (lots of turns and rocks) and then it opens into a beautiful swampy meadow with a boardwalk through. It’s absolutely elating to glide out into this beautful sunny open area and catch your breath as you gaze around after bombing down the shaded trails.

July 27, 2017

Hitting the trails again at Hartley! Small Friend likes going over the damn bridge.

We kept going while he was in day camp. Liebling’s fat bike is really sweet, I can see why they’ve gotten so popular around here. I’m riding his old mountain bike he gave me years ago (I love it and switched back to it after trying a fancy new one) and it’s pretty capable, but I find myself worried about bending rims on the jutting rocks and other obstacles if I beat too hard on the trails.

The Hartley trails are a BLAST. I used to ride in this park when I was a kid (either here or Lester, depending on whih relative I was with) but I think they’ve done a lot more with them since then and now everything is mapped and rated for diffuclty like the ski trails. The whole Nature Center and related school and acitvities is very new. It’s a pretty sweet place. I brought Jr. here for a parent/child reading group for a while before we took the plunge with day camp.

July 26, 2017

Judas Jr. started a week of summer day camp at Hartley Nature Center yesterday. He had a blast and that night we grilled venison and hotdogs and had a fire in the yard with smores. Since we homeschool this was a good way for him to have time with oher kids but without the drawbacks (including massive time sink) of traditional school. Everything is nature-based and interactive with a lot of outside time.

He’s never been away from both of us before and I felt extremely anxious about leaving him with what is essentially a stranger. He’s never even had a babysitter, instead we’ve coordinated work schedules so he always had one of us and I stayed home with him for the first several years. So rather than drop him and go, we busied ourselves on the bike trails for the duration of his class. That way we were on the grounds if he needed us. It was really nice and fun for all of us and we even crossing paths a few times while his group did outdoor activities.

We brought his little balance bike/kickbike along and arrived early so he could ride with us beforehand. I can’t praise this style of bike enough. The whole training wheels method is rediculous because kids just learn how to ride a bike with extra wheels. Once those go off they then have to learn balancing from scratch and it makes no sense. On a kickbike it’s a regular two-wheeled bike but without peddles. Kids use their feet to run and push the bike, they glide with their feet up and put them down instinctively when they need to and end up learning how to ride intutively. The also seem a lot more agile and capable racing around dirt, grass, and mud.

July 25, 2017

Failed at getting a good video on the Alpine Coaster but you get the idea. My phone was in a weird video mode so this is way slowed down.

EDIT: Lots of cool videos of the ride on Youtube.

July 23, 2017

Family outting off the homestead! We road the alpine coaster at Spirit Mountain and it was super fun! It goes up to 26mph (you control the speed with hand breaks) and zips through the trees and overlooks Lake Superior. This is the ski hill that in recent years have expanded to summer activities with their “Adenture Park”, including adding really sweet downhill bike trails.

We had dinner at Clyde Iron Works. It was out first time there and REALLY good. A number of local places we once enjoyed have been overpriced letdowns in recent years, but we’ll defnitely go back there.

Finally a stop at Lester Park. We went to the old swimming hole I used to bike two miles to all summer as a kid. It’s been called “Keep Smiling” since before I was born and attempts to cover it’s namesake grafitti always prove futile. We’ve had a lot of rain this summer so the falls looked like they do during spring melt. Some summers this section slows to a trickle. The basin warms up and makes it nicer to swim in then Lake Superior (which stays cold all summer and is where it empties into) but the water flows through enough that it doesn’t get gross, either. Watch out for snapping turtles downstream.

July 23, 2017