Bragg Family South

Let's see, where did I leave off...Oh yes, now I remember!  After a first week of staying mostly around my hometown of Rhinelander visiting various family and friends, we ventured even further northward for a day.  Lunch consisted of pasties and was eaten along a remote shore of Lake Superior: This beach wasn't as isolated as it usually is, given that a Boy Scout event was happening at a nearby park, but we had this stretch mostly to ourselves.  After a tasty lunch, we strolled down along the shore and collected some pretty wave-washed cobbles: Our destination for the day was our former home in the former mining center (and now college town) of Houghton, Michigan, home of our alma mater Michigan Technological University.  We visited a number of our favorite stops, including a local market to buy smoked salmon, a quick drive through campus, a stop at the really cool Seamen Mineral Museum (http://www.museum.mtu.edu/, a must stop the next time you visit the Mi...

Things have finally quieted down enough since our return from our annual summer pilgrimage to northern Wisconsin that I finally decided to sit down and write a blog post...  Our first day took us to southern Illinois for a little recreating... Those of you familiar with the state of Illinois probably know it best for two things:  the big city of Chicago and endless if rather uninspiring vistas of corn and soybean fields only periodically punctuated by some of the now extensive wind farms...Our favorite part of the state is actually the southern tip, which has different topography and vegetation than the rest.  Our first real stop of this trip was Giant City State Park (http://dnr.state.il.us/lands/landmgt/parks/r5/gc.htm) not too far out of the college town of Carbondale: Giant City is known for its rock formations, including bluffs and rock shelters (pictured above) and large boulders and rocky passageways (pictured below): Giant City also has an extensive hu...