Up and running!

Well, I have arrived at my cabin, and the internets is finally up and running, ergo so is this little blog of mine. I haven't spent a full summer here at my cabin since I was 14 or so, so I really wanted to document this experience, as I don't know if I'll have another one quite like it.

My cabin, located on Lake Vermilion, is located about 4.5 hours North of the Twin Cities and about 30 miles South of the Canadian border as the bird flies. About twenty minutes away is the closest town, Cook. At just over 600 people, Main St. looks like an image straight out of Northern Exposure. The cabin itself is something else. Located on 24 lakeside acres, the 1930s cottage was built by my Great Uncle and Great Aunt, who sold the place to my mom in 1992. Since attaining the 2 bedroom, kitchen, dining room and porch laden building, we have added electricity and internet, but maintain a plumbing-free and television-free lifestyle. It's a pretty amazing place, but not meant for mainstream America.

The trip itself was absolutely perfect this year. We finally hit the road at 5pm on Monday, and though my mom encountered a bit of rain on the Ohio Turnpike around 9 that evening, the drive was smooth. Fittingly, I took over the drive just after we entered Indiana at 3am, and took us as far as the Wisconsin Dells, where we stopped for breakfast at 9am Tuesday. We finally got to our cabin around 6pm Tuesday and as the van trampled over the overgrown drive way we saw - what is that?? - a dead tree, strewn across the drive. Well crap. So being the tough chicks that we fortunately are, my mom and I moved the whole damn tree so that it was parallel to the driveway. Fun. Finally, we cover the last 100 meters of our driveway, have our cabin in sight, and my mom gasps.

She doesn't have the keys.

I can't even make this stuff up. The worst part is, I absolutely knew she had forgotten them. I had thought to ask her sometime in the middle of Pennsylvania the night before, yet had avoided it because I was afraid the inevitable answer would be what ended up the case.

Well, no worries. My gramma, whose cabin is located half a mile down the road, has a spare key. So we drive over to her place, but when we arrive and explain the situation, she states that no, she doesn't have a key to Marvilion, (our cabin,) anymore. However, my Aunt Camille, who is staying with my gramma for a short vacation, is a handywoman if ever there was one, so she goes with us back to the cabin and is able to cut out a window pane so I can open a window, climb through it, and unlock us. I'm just glad that we arrived at our cabin at a reasonable hour, while there was still light in the sky.

I've been shooting some fun photos thus far, but my camera itself doesn't wanna connect to the computer, so as soon as I have luck with that I will have many, many, many photos of the summer's exploits! :)

-K