What a great weekend this was! Hard to beat the great weather and the beautiful pines. I finally got a chance to make the Estivant Pines hike I've been planning for months now. Here are a few pics of the pines, many of which are over 400 years old... and some of the cool things you see along the way.
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| The Keweenaw Mountain Lodge was built in 1934-35 during the Great Depression - a wonderful throwback to a simpler time. It has large exposed log beams and vaulted ceilings. |
The "KML" is on the way to the tip of the Keweenaw Peninsula where the
Estivant Pines are located. I've been wanting to hike this area for months now, but weekends never seemed to work out. But this weekend was special as really good friend joined me and off we went.
Here's something you don't see too often... This is sort of a giant visual aid to show how much snow accumulates here each year. That's accumulated snowfall, so as more snow comes down the snow beneath it compresses, sometimes melts or evaporates... so what is on the ground at any one time is rarely over 4 or 5 feet...
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| The arrow on the side tracks last years total snowfall in feet. |
Here's a better shot of the plaque...
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| Think, copious amounts of snow... see my driveway post! |
Needless to say this part of the peninsula gets a bit of snow.
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| Em hmm, lots of snow... |
Copper Harbor is the nearest city to the Pines, here is a picture of the harbor from the Brockway Mountain Drive.
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| A beautiful day! |
Here are some of the pines...
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| Two giants mere feet apart, together for hundreds of years... |
A seedling around the year 1500...
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| This tree was standing and swaying in the wind when Leonardo da Vinci and Galileo Galilei were making history |
One of the more unusual trees...
I will return to the pines to make one more sortie to set eyes on this...
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| We hiked right up to the swamp... it's not for the faint of heart! |
When I get back to the pines and make this trek, I'll be sure to update the post. We'll see if I can talk her into crossing the swamp and then the river!
Hope you all enjoyed the little hike through this great old woods.
