High water, Locust Hills

My feet became soaked as I ventured off Highway 101 to photograph the high water in Locust Hills. The water levels appear to be high all around the Lake area, little ponds are brimming. But a quick look at the foliage shows a definite spring lag.

Sunday News: I will be taking photos at the Lake Minnetonka Half Marathon (13.1 mi.) for this blog. Yes, I will actually show people photos! Let’s hope for some sunny weather and you can watch for the running posts later Sunday.

Mystery Hotel

I was paging through “Picturesque Minnetonka” (a 1906 tourist booklet, reprinted in 1975) when I noticed the photo of the long gone Hotel Keeywaydin. A little mystery occured to me as I looked at the photo.


I believe that the name on the hotel has been either added or altered. Who would place the name of the hotel in such a position? Take a look, and then you be the judge. Traditionally the name would be centered over the entrance. The Hotel was located nearby my house and I have often wondered what tourist life was like in Cottagewood circa the 1890s.

IMHO - Long before photo shopped images, the airbrush was used to modify photos.

A Holiday Update

3.95

The Cheshire Bunny

My hare loss.

One Day Later. Gray's Bay in the morning sun.

Goin' to South Dakota

"He thought it said plankton" The whale is feelin blue.
I know, its not funny and my friends said so. But look at the weather. That's pretty sad too.

Thorpe Park in April

I met a man in a red winter coat. I tried to shoot a photo with him as we walked. Dead Batteries.

Fishing pier detail

This is a detail of a fishing pier, dedicated to the memory of Mayor "Vern" Haug. He was mayor from 1964-1967, and again in 1985-1988. The plaque does not mention the name of the town.

Note to self: I should carry "drops". Bright rubber ducks, little toy boats, props to enhance shots. Like the pros do when they carry baby dolls to drop at scenes of tornadoes, floods, and war scenes.

The sailing begins!

Even before the Official "Ice_out" pronouncement, the sailing lessons have commenced in Carson's Bay- Lake Minnetonka way.
And so I shout - "ICE OUT".

Note: My declaration is unofficial and generally quite inaccurate.

Wayzata in waiting

3.87 at the crossroads

Note that the sign also advertises an ATM machine.

Maple tapping on Minnetonka Boulevard

I have driven by the site many times. Minnetonka Boulevard in spring. Stands of Maple trees are being drained of sap. It looks like tree-torture; the plastic 5 gallon pails, the taps, the blue-white draining hoses. But of course it is not. It is Howard Bennis and his neighbors continuing an age-old tradition of tapping, boiling and making Maple syrup. Native Americans came to Lake Minnetonka, and Big Island for ages to create the precious syrup and sweetener.
If you see smoke curling out from his house "Howie" is boiling away at his industrial grade cooker, condensing the Maple sap. Some times it takes 40 gallons of sap to make one gallon of Maple Syrup.



Here a gracious neighbor displays the clear sap . It is flowing less freely now, the warm nights signal the end of production. Sometimes during the height of sapping (my term) the 5 gallon pails must be emptied twice or more a day.

Note: Things I learned along the way. Tapping for Maple syrup was encouraged during WWII to supplement a family's sugar supply, which was rationed (Until 1950). 90 percent of our sugar was imported at that time .Also Maple syrup production was made popular during the civil war (and before by abolitionists) when the Southern States were the main producers of sugar cane.

The Return of the Frog

I knew that frogs hibernated. They crawl into holes in winter and wait for a warm Spring day to come back out. No shadow watching like the ground hog, no occasional forages like the bear. Frogs come out and start croaking.
Well, the frogs have come out and created quite a chorus in the pond behind my house. You would be very generous in calling it a pond, it is really more of a “wetland”. It can get a little noisy. But I welcomed the sound of them as the temperatures rise and the sunshine has brought them out.

Pictured is a frog shaker set, not a real frog couple. But you get the idea...

This from the Minnesota DNR:
"Amidst the symphony of sounds emitted from a shallow pond on a spring or summer night, a listener may not realize the social interactions taking place at the water's edge. Male toads and frogs gather at breeding sites and announce their presence with what is known as advertisement calls. When one male calls, others soon call back in contest, creating a rising chorus that falls slowly silent."

Geese in the morning

It is mating season for these fowl characters. The were mugging at each other and sayin "You come here often then?" in Canadian.

You're a holiday, such a holiday - April 5.

March 31, 2011

Carson' Bay

The good news: The average ice-out date is April 15th. (Minnesota DNR)

A library in Contemporary times

I was struck by a quote in reference to the design of the new Excelsior Library by Mark Wentzell, Hennepin County's architectural consultant.
"The Number 1 thing for me was to do a building with real integrity. The form of the building generates from the library itself. It's a contemporary design because we live in contemporary times."
My father lived in contemporary times in the 1940s. the painter Piet Mondrian lived in contemporaty times in 1921 when he painted his "neo plastic" works. Walter Gropius lived in contemporay times in 1919 Germany.

Charlie Chaplan lived in contemporary times when he was in the movie "Modern Times".

My comment: The library design was early 20th Century Bauhaus.