Scone-da-monium

About this time of year, my friend Kerry Sims and I bake up some batches of scones and find a few neighborhood folks to invite over to indulge in a few too many fat grams and to talk about the neighborhood. Last year was the first time we did this, and it was intended to be more of a competition between Kerry and me. But the people who attended didn't want to start a neighborhood feud, so they declared all the scones excellent.

This year, our friend Anne Bachle-Fifer is hosting. She and her husband Mark just got done remodeling their kitchen, so they have some nice space.

This year, I once again made my toasted oatmeal cinnamon chip scones, which are in the bottom of the top picture. This is a more involved recipe, but still not all that tough to get right. The recipe I start with is the oatmeal scone from America's Test Kitchen. The only augmentation I make is to bake my scones on a preheated baking stone and to add a scant cup of cinnamon chips. I also make sure to cook them plenty long. Nothing is more disappointing than a mushy scone.

The cinnamon scones are rather sweet and crispy, while the other recipe I typically use is more bready and lean (although they are basted with butter before baking). This second recipe was shared by Kerry, and is good for getting creative with the "goodies." This year I made dark chocolate chip with a raspberry stuffing. I've never done these before, so we'll see how they go over. In the past, I've done dark chocolate ginger, dark chocolate orange, cranberry almond, butterscotch chip, and probably some other assortments.

Kerry is reportedly going to try lemon pistachio for tomorrow. He's pretty daring. But he'll be making he espresso, so we won't be too hard on him if they taste strange.

More Positive Friction

Just a quick, shameless plug for a cool new website I tripped across tonight. This one is full of positive energy thinking about how to make the situation in this world better... rather than using up brain cells vetting all that is wrong.

Grab a cup of organic, fair trade coffee and take a look.

51 Lantern

I'm really stoked! I just re-assembled a 1951 single-mantle Coleman 220A lantern that my brother Bill had collecting dust in his garage. First try and she fired up!

This lantern is a pretty little gem, with a forest green fountain and a red ventilator. The globe is rounded and has the Coleman logo etched into the glass.

The inside of the fountain was pretty rusty, so I'm not sure how long I'll be able to run it before the valve gums up. I washed it out with gasoline pretty good, but it only takes a little rust to stop up the works.

I replaced the generator and the filler cap, the latter for safety reasons. The old filler caps can be rebuilt, but they have been known to blow gas if loosened; something that you don't really want to do around an open flame.

The only part of the lantern I painted was the frame. Tonight, I oiled the pump, cleaned up the rest, reassembled, then took her out on the back porch to see if it would burn. I pumped her up, placed her in the snow, and she fired right up.

I'll proudly be adding this one to my growing collection. I have a 1962 double-mantle 228E in green that still needs the valve packing replaced. That lantern went on many family camping trips to Montauk Point and Cape Hatteras, and even traveled all the way up to Prince Edward Island in the back of a VW micro bus hauling a 14' day sailer and four happy kids.

The other workhorse lantern in my collection is a green, double-mantle 1977 220F. It's the only one younger than me. It has an amber globe, has been rebuilt, and works very reliably.

Now if you have an old nickle plated Coleman in your attic, just let me know.

Gas Pressure Lanterns, Lamps, Stoves and Irons
International Coleman Collector's Club
Old Town Coleman Center and Museum

First Ski of the Year

Right on cue, December brought the first good snow to west Michigan. The cold air that moved in today brought a few more inches and lots of gracefully floating flakes in the air. Feeling the need for some exercise, I called my friend Chuck to see if he would be interested in a quick ski in the Rogue River State Game Area in northern Kent County.

As luck would have it, Chuck was home and he had the spare time on his hands.

There was just enough snow on the ground for skiing, although the snow closest to the ground was still plenty moist from last week's heavy rains and temperatures in the 60s. But more on that later.

After skiing for about twenty minutes, we came to one of my favorite bluffs over the Rogue River, a place that I jokingly refer to as the "Judy Tree." Since it was quite a while since I had last visited this section of trail, I was surprised to find that the Judy Tree had been toppled in a storm.

As she fell, she split into pieces. The big trunk of this 100 year-old beech fell towards the river, another branch fell to the north, and a twisted mess of branches fell across the trail.

Why do I call her the "Judy Tree?"

Many years ago, when she was still standing and healthy, plenty a jack knife plied her trunk to claim that various unthoughtful souls had passed her way. One particular person that apparently passed her way more than once was Judy. By the evidence on the trunk, Judy had a number of male suitors that felt in necessary to proclaim their love in the smooth bark of this beautiful beech. On the tree could be read "Dave + Judy"... and Mike, and Ron, and Joe...

While Judy was certainly loved, the lack of affection that many a passer by had for the tree eventually lead to its ill health and demise.

The ironic thing was that while it lived, the Judy Tree tightly embraced a neighboring hemlock, leaving a huge scar that can be seen to this day.

Chuck and I skied north for a bit more than two miles before turning around. At the turn-around point, we shared a power bar and Chuck dug out a few shelled chestnuts he had purchased from a farmer in Newaygo County.

During our break, we talked about how we hoped that our tracks would cause the snow to freeze a little more firmly.

That was not to be the case. Instead, the wet snow underneath continued to stick to our skis, causing us to have to stop and scrape off the frozen slush.

The stuff got so dreadful at times that we could hardly push our skis along. It caused us to wobble and strain.

To the right is a picture of the frozen mass found underneath one of my skis, pine needles and all.

The friction made the skiing hard work. I thought it odd how we were now basically walking through the woods with six foot long and two inch wide snowshoes shaped like elves' booties.

Yet all the work still didn't keep us from enjoying the wonderful beauty of the newly fallen snow and the flakes drifting around us. Whether we skied past beeches, birch, oaks or hemlocks, the whiteness of the new snow was refreshing.

The beauty and the work made for a nice afternoon, and as we skied back to the Jeep shortly after 5:00pm, the clouds thinned enough to give us a glimpse of the rising full moon.

And the moonlight allowed me to snap one quick last picture of this little troll snatching at my ski! And all along I thought it was the wet snow.

Leaving Footprints

Among those who walk, the day after Thanksgiving is typically reserved for a "Turkey Trot." Ideally, this should be a brisk walk in cold weather to help the body burn off all the fat grams consumed the preceding day. In our case this year, it was a slow meander on a warm November afternoon.

I'm also ashamed to say that the walk was followed by a pint of beer and some Mexican food. So much for the good intentions.

As we did two years ago, we met our friend Dick Bolton and about a dozen others up at Deerfield Nature Park in Isabella County. This scenic park is laced with twisty trails, some of which follow or catch glimpses of the Chippewa River.

I don't think Julie and I were the only one's feeling a little lazy after the previous day's holiday feast, as most of the hiking boots in our group shuffled and plodded rather slowly down the trail.

With such a big crowd and the leaves all off the trees, there wasn't much for wildlife watching. Instead, we enjoyed some low-impact exercise in the company of good friends.

At the end of the hike, we came upon two curiosities. First was the bridge pictured here. It is a wire suspension bridge, so it bounces actively with every footstep and sways a bit in the breeze. Abbey had a great deal of fun trip-tropping across this bridge again and again.

The second curiosity is the burnished steel sculpture of a hiker that implores visitors to take only memories and leave only footprints. It was nice to see this ethic promoted in a fun, non-preachy way in a rather urbane park that introduces a fairly large number of people each year to the natural mid-Michigan landscape.

We followed the advice of the burnished hiker and took home some memories of good friends, warm November skies, and a lazy walk in the woods.

Hoist Lakes

On November 3, a friend and I went up to the Hoist Lakes Foot Travel Area for a three day hike. The Hoist Lakes are located in the Huron National Forest in the northeast corner of Michigan's lower peninsula. A cold snap had rolled through the day before, so there were traces of snow and the temps throughout our hike stayed in the 20s and 30s.

We found the area to be devoid of any wildlife, except squirrels and assorted birds. Likewise, we also found the area lacking in other hikers. In all, we only saw five other hikers. All five were in two different groups, and were spotted in the same location 24 hours apart (walking in to South Hoist Lake from the east).

The first day we walked the south perimeter of the foot travel area, starting at the eastern entrance and ending at Byron Lake. We camped on the east bank of Byron Lake that night, high up on a bluff in the red pines.

The next day we hiked out to the west trailhead junction, and then around the north side of the loop, exploring all the interior trails along the way. We are glad that we investigated the interior trails, as they cross some of the best parts of this tract, chocked full of spruce, fir and birch.


That night, we camped on the northeast shore of North Hoist Lake.

Even though there were no significant animal sightings, the area is still interesting. Being from further south, I was impressed by the spruce and fir trees found in the lower, wet areas. I was also taken by some of the stands of birch.

While we didn't see many critters, we sure saw evidence of them. We found dozens of holes dug by badgers, plenty of coyote scat, and hundreds of trees gnawed on by beaver. At night we heard the barred owls, howling coyotes and splashing beavers.

The area looks attractive for crosscountry skiing, and I'd like to get back there for some of that this winter. If you're interested in hiking this area, a downloadable map can be found here.

Scary Pumpkins

When you live with a two year old, Halloween is a holiday of great contradictions.

While the event is hyped as the ultimate ghoulish, Day of the Dead, All Saints Day, Gothic, creepy night, all of that is hard to imagine with a two year old carving her version of a scary pumpkin. Then comes the horror of Abigail making her scary face!

(The pumpkin, incidentally, is from Perkins).

As other kids walked up Sweet Street hill dressed as ghouls, vampires, ghosts, and even half-dead zombies with the skin sliding off of their faces to reveal empty eye sockets and skulls, Abigail decides to be the purple cat from "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" by Eric Carle.

To add to all the weirdness, as I'm typing up this blog entry, the 1979 seminal goth anthem "Bela Lugosi's Dead" by Bauhaus comes on the internet radio. I turn the volume up rather loud. Then Julie comes up stairs and shares with me that Abbey was digging the song and dancing about the living room.

Spooky.

Fourteen Hikers

Yesterday, Julie and I led a hike for the Western Michigan Chapter NCTA's "Fall Fun Day." It was a drizzly day, but in all we had fourteen hikers.

We took the group on a 6.5 mile hike in the White River watershed of Newaygo County, from 40th Street to Centerline Avenue on the North Country Trail.

As we began our hike, we walked through a forest dominated by oaks. The leaves on the oaks seem to be more vibrant this year, less brown and more red. The misty rain made the woods a particularly quiet and colorful place.

One crazy piece of trivia from our hike was that of the fourteen hikers, five had thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail in the past. Two had just returned from their thru-hike less than a month ago.

The hike went pretty quickly. As wet as it was, no one was too eager to stand around too long to take in the fall colors or to stop and sit for a lunch or snack break. Instead, folks kept moving quickly enough to ward off the chill of the cool, damp air.

The other rather unique thing about this group hike is that there were no real speed demons or stragglers. Everyone walked just about the same speed; even Julie, who was pulling up the rear with Abigail riding in the backpack carrier.

Perkins View

Here's a quick, last look at Perkins while some of the plants are still standing. This picture was taken a week ago when the sun made a rare appearance. Frost this past week got the last of the peppers, although it stayed warm enough in the city that the home peppers are still producing, as is chard, kale, broccoli, zucchini and cabbage.

I'm hoping it gets dry enough between now and December to rototill some manure and straw into the Perkins garden. With my limited time and recent weather patterns, it's not looking good.

Getting Lost

One of the books I'm reading is "A Field Guide to Getting Lost" by Rebecca Solnit. Mostly I've been reading it on my way to and from work on the days I take the bus (and when a particularly chatty man from our neighborhood doesn't sit down next to me).

As the title discloses, the theme of the book is the many ways in which people go about getting lost. They get geographically lost, but they also get emotionally lost. People get socially lost, psychologically lost, and so on.

A curmudgeonly critic from the Boston Globe (who apparently rather enjoys reading textbooks more than personal reflections) wrote, "What's ultimately so frustrating about this "Field Guide" is the sense of what it could have been. Solnit is clearly an authority on more subjects than you can shake a stick at. But being knowledgeable is one thing; having something to say is quite another."

To this natty nitpicking I would add that knowing how to say something, and say it well, makes a tremendous difference. Here's a sample of Ms. Solnit's talent with words, reflecting on what it means for people to be in relationship with each other.

A happy love is a single story, a disintegrating one is two or more competing, conflicting versions, and a disintegrated one lies at your feet like a shattered mirror, each shard reflecting a different story, that it was wonderful, that it was terrible, if only this had, if only that hadn't. The stories don't fit back together, and it's the end of stories, those devices we carry like shells and shields and blinkers and occasionally maps and compasses. The people close to you become mirrors and journals in which you record your history, the instruments that help you know yourself and remember yourself, and you do the same for them. When they vanish, so does the use, the appreciation, the understanding of those small anecdotes, catchphrases, jokes: they become a book slammed shut or burnt...

The stories shatter. Or you wear them out or leave them behind. Over time the story or the memory loses its power. Over time you become someone else.

I've always liked the power of prose writers who can capture reality in unique ways that help us see the world with fresh eyes. As those writers provide insights that help us understand the fullness of terra firma, Ms. Solnit exposes the geography between people and helps us understand that stories and memories are the road maps that keep us connected to each other.

In the Field Guide, she shares her experiences with getting lost, sometimes intentionally and sometimes by accident, sometimes with frustrating results, and other times ending up in places of wonder.

Last Pickins?

Life has been busy so the walking, gardening and blogging haven't gotten much attention lately. Yet old man Winter forced me out to the Perkins garden for the second time this week. While it's still uncertain, it looks like we might see our first killing frost this week.

The more certain thing in the forecast is snow. It's amazing how such a natural, annual phenomenon can get so many people buzzing. What I find even more amazing is the amount of people that talk about the impending white stuff with dread in their voices.

Let's face it folks, snow will be in the forecast in these parts for the next six months. Better get used to it (or move to Florida).

But back to the garden.

I was a bit saddened to take what could be a final look at the faded zinnias, the same ones that seemed to be seedlings just yesterday.

I clipped a dozen habanero peppers, a few chilies and premature sweet peppers, and picked up a few of the reddish tomatoes that had dropped from the vine since Sunday.

Then, dare I admit, with the threat of a tear welling up in the corner of my eye, I turned away from the Perkins plot and walked back through the mist to my Jeep.

Summer has truly come and gone. And while winter brings all kinds of good things with it, I will miss waiting for the next thing to sprout, bloom, or ripen in the garden.

Peppers

A little research on the internet suggested to me that the best way to use up all the aji amarillo chiles would be to dry them.

A little more research on drying peppers offered two options. The first option is to dry them laid out in the sun. Well, in west Michigan in fall, that's not an option as most days are cloudy and many rainy. The other option is to string them.

So today I strung all the ripe peppers (there are many more coming!) and hung them in a west facing window over a heat vent for drying.

Walking to the Bitter End

In my travels for work, I've spied a quaint looking little coffee shop on West Fulton that I have always wanted to check out. A couple of coffee shop junkie friends of mine, Len and Joanne Baron, had told me that this is one of their favorite haunts. So with some time on my hands and an eagerness to spend the morning with my daughter, Abbey and I were off to explore, by foot and by stroller, by 9:15 this morning.

It was a grey day, but very warm for late September in west Michigan.

We left our house and headed down Sweet Street hill to Plainfield Avenue, and followed the Avenue south, passing lots of other pedestrians along the way. Saturday morning seems to bring out more walkers.

We hooked a right at Leonard Street and walked over to the east bank of the Grand River, where we turned south along an abandoned railroad track. At the south end of the track is Canal Street Park, a nice, linear park that follows the east bank of the river for almost a mile. When we got to the park, Abbey popped out of her stroller and walked along side of me.

Part way through the park we stopped at the "ground" that Abbey spied. Since the slides were all wet, and Abbey is a finicky kid, we didn't spend a lot of time there. But I did dry off one slide of her choice with my bandanna so that she could get in a little sliding and some climbing around on the play structure.

From there, Abbey continued walking by my side to Sixth Street, and across the historic Sixth Street Bridge. I was impressed that Abbey had walked a little more than a half mile straight on her short, little legs.

At the west end of the bridge, we came across an elderly couple from East Grand Rapids that were looking for the fish ladder. We invited them to join us, as we were on our way there. We followed the walking path along the west bank of the river south and stopped at the fish ladder along with dozens of other folks. While lots of salmon were trying to breach the dam, there were few in the ladder itself.

We continued following the walking path south along the west bank of the river past the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum and around the elevated walkway that gets a good glimpse of the "horsies" on the carousel inside the Grand Rapids Public Museum.

Once at Fulton Street, we headed due west for seven blocks to our destination, the Bitter End coffee house.

The coffee house certainly has character. The outside has an attractive facade, and the inside has wood panelled walls with lots of curiosities hung upon them. While the atmosphere was very nice, I wouldn't say the same about their product. My latte was stirred, flat and had mediocre taste, and the baked goods were severely Saran-wrapped, generic fare. Abbey's steamed milk lacked any froth.

Perhaps the brewed coffee is better, and maybe the espresso suffered from the lack of passion exhibited by the withdrawn, sleepy barista who prepared it. I'll give it another shot some other day before I write it off as "just another coffee shop."

The other curiosity was that more than half of the dozen or so tables were filled, each with one person (most male) clicking away on their laptops. Nobody talked to anyone else. It was almost like being in a library.

Abbey and I sat outside, and we had a nice little chat with a high school age girl who plays the flute.

After our coffee was gone, we buzzed back to the east on Fulton Street to the downtown GVSU campus. In the quiet courtyard, I let Abbey out of her stroller for some more walking. We enjoyed the fountains and colorful flowers in this protected area.

Abbey found some wire benches and asked what they were. I explained that they were for sitting, so she had to try one out.

Then it was back in the stroller, under US-131, and across the river on the blue pedestrian bridge. On the east side of the river, we stopped for a while to watch a crane lift girders up to the top of the new Marriott going up downtown.

Then we followed the pedestrian pathway on the east side of the river north behind the Amway Grand, DeVos Place and the post office. North of the post office we passed lots of people fishing and even a DNR Conservation Officer checking licenses and creels. One party had three salmon lying on the sidewalk. Abbey suddenly got a sad look on her face and said "They're not moving!" I offered up a quick explanation about how the people are catching the fish to take home to eat, and realized by the look in her eyes that I have a tree-hugging daughter who still has to come to terms that the fish she eats was once a living creature.

Just a little further north we came across something unique enough to take our minds off of the motionless fish. A man sat at a picnic table in Canal Street Park playing a penny whistle.

We stopped to listen for a while before he introduced himself to us. Dave Stuart O'Neil plays an assortment of Celtic instruments. He then pulled out a small, single-drone bagpipe and played Ode to Joy for Abbey. He wound up our little mini-concert by playing a song on a beautiful wooden whistle he said he uses mostly for weddings.

From there we rushed home--up the east bank of the river to Monroe Avenue, Monroe to Leonard Street, then up Taylor Avenue to Grove Street. Grove took us to Plainfield, which we followed back to our neighborhood, taking a detour up Hanover Street to Forest Avenue to Sweet.

Abbey was glad to be back home with her Mommy, and I was glad to prop up my feet after a six and a half mile urban hike.

Thursday Walk

Yesterday evening I called up my friend Eric Doyle to see if he wanted to go for a walk and a beer. The plan was to meet at 8:00pm at the corner of Sweet Street and Plainfield Avenue.

I walked down the hill, and not seeing Eric at Plainfield, proceeded on down another block to Coit Avenue where I found Eric walking south. The sun had set just before we met and dusk was in the sky. It was a cool night, but not cold. Perfect for walking.

We headed south on Coit to Plainfield where the old Creston Library stands. This quaint, triangular building is being renovated into a cafe by a well-known local restaurateur. We snooped around the construction site a bit, checking up on the progress.

From there, we walked down the wide sidewalks of busy Plainfield Avenue. After crossing Leonard Street, we looked for the shortcut that Belknap neighbors take to get to Plainfield. This shortcut is for pedestrians and brave cyclists only, as it is a steep, dirt social path worn into the grassy hill of Belknap Park just south of Coldbrook Street. The path climbs the steep, grassy hill and ducks through a thicket of trees near the top before emerging along side of ten tennis courts.

From there, we wound around the side of a well-maintained ball diamond. A night game was being played under the lights on the other diamond to the east.

On the southeast corner of the ball diamond we found another social path that heads southwest through the woods towards North Division Avenue, a path to be explored another time.

Once along back of the diamond, we climbed the steep northern face of Belknap Hill along "The X." The X is more rightfully known as EarthworK, a large-scale earthen sculpture constructed by artist Robert Morris in 1974. EarthworK was Morris’ first in the United States and is an environmental piece consisting of two asphalt walkways that cross on the hill.

At the top of the hill, we took in the view to the north and west. We walked another block to the small pocket park on Fairview Avenue. We looped west through the park to take in one of the City's best views to the west from Belknap Hill, and to inspect the decrepit historic stairs that used to connect the neighborhood to the factories below.

We continued south to the better set of stairs at Fairbanks Street. We descended the 400' hill, crossed North Division Avenue, and walked into the North Monroe neighborhood. North Monroe is full of older industrial buildings, some still being used for industry, others being used for offices or condos. The area has seen a great deal of reinvestment in the past few years.

We walked past the latest major reinvestment in the area, the Icon on Bond, so that we could check up on the construction. Five floors of this soon to be nine storey building are already framed in.

A block away we walked into the Cambridge House for a quick break. We were surprised at the lack of people in the bar on a Thursday night, traditionally a rather busy time.

We took a look at the beer list, but it was rather short and lackluster, so we opted for Irish whiskey. They have quite a nice selection at Cambridge. We both settled on Tullamore Dew Crock. Eric had his on two rocks and I took mine neat.

Cambridge provides a generous pour, so we stayed there for quite a while enjoying the whiskey.

Afterwards, we walked over to the Sixth Street Dam where the fishermen were out in full force. The kings and the coho are running hard right now, so you'll find people out there fishing for salmon all night this time of year.

Canal Street Park extends nearly a full mile north from the dam along the river. Upon reaching the northern end of the park, we followed an abandoned rail line another block along the river to Leonard Street.

We hooked east and deliberated whether it was time to go home or if we had time for a quick beer at Graydon's Crossing. My stomach won out and we stepped inside of this nice, new English-style pub on the south end of Plainfield Avenue near Leonard. Again, the place was rather devoid of customers.

I had a craving for their hearty onion rings, so I enjoyed those with a pint of Guinness, while Eric sampled a Dragonmead Inquisition Pale Ale, made in Warren, Michigan.

We parted Graydon's at about 10:30pm and walked north up a quiet Plainfield Avenue, back past the old library, and parted ways at the corner of Coit Avenue and Dale Street, I walked east on Dale, back to Plainfield, and then on up Sweet Street hill to my home.

The total loop was about four miles, with a couple of good hills in the mix. Was it enough to wear off the calories of the Guinness and onion rings? Probably not. But it certainly was an enjoyable way to spend a September Thursday evening.

Lasagna

If we could grow noodles, darn near all of this lasagna would have come out of our garden this year.

Okay, maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration.

But the tomatoes, chard and zucchini all came from the back yard.

While Julie and I enjoyed the fresh taste of the lasagna, Abbey decided to just pick through it patiently. She got more enthusiastic about eating a little later when Daddy took out the "brown chocolate."

Harvest

August kept us busy with corn and tomatoes. We've probably canned about two dozen quarts of tomatoes by now and had our fair share of corn on the cob--all you can eat three nights a week for almost a month. Not to mention the beans!

Then came labor day and Wheatland, so we haven't been picking or eating as much out of the garden with all the other goings on.

So yesterday was my first time back to Perkins in more than a week. We were canning more tomatoes, so I figured I would pick what's there...close to another half bushel! While I was there, I picked the two remaining orange pumpkins, bringing this year's total up to eleven. No real big ones, but Julie made some tasty pumpkin soup out of one picked earlier. And there's still three or four coming along.

I also picked five butternut squash, seventeen acorns, and eighteen butterbush. Needless to say, we'll be sharing a few of those.

Since the deer pruned the peppers over the fourth of July, we'll be having a late September crop of those, and they're coming in really heavy. If you have any recipes that would be good for mild aji amarillo chiles, let me know. I probably have close to 100, as they're prolific little plants.

Mamadou Diabate

Julie and I had the opportunity to see Mamadou Diabate and friends perform at this year's Wheatland Music Festival in Remus, Michigan.

Mamadou plays the kora, an African harp made out of a huge calabash gourd covered with a cow hide. He comes from the west African country of Mali, and hails from a long line of jelis, a musician caste with the important role of protecting the people's history in song.

It's really amazing to think about a guy coming all the way from west Africa to a hay field in Michigan to share the music of generations of Malians with a bunch of 21st century Midwesterners. I had this same thought when I saw Gerard Edery and the Ivory Consort performing songs from Spain from the 10th through 13th centuries, when Jews, Muslims and Christians forged a common musical language in songs sung in Ladino, Hebrew, Arabic and Galician-Portuguese. I got the chance to thank Gerard personally for bringing forth these songs, but did not get tha chance to thank Mamadou.

We purchased one of his CDs and we have found ourselves listening to it at least once a night every night since the festival. Most of the music has no words, and the songs with lyrics are not in a language we understand. Nonetheless, the music evokes all kinds of feelings.

There's more about Mamadou, the kora, jelis and clips of his music on his website. Check it out and consider ordering a CD of your own in support of this artist.

Grand Crossings

Grand Rapids Mayor George Heartwell came up with a good idea this past summer. Seeing at the high gas prices and looking forward to the annual Labor Day Bridge Walk up at the Mackinac Bridge, Mayor Heartwell decided that Grand Rapids should have a bridge walk of its own on Labor Day.

So that's what about 2,000 people did in Grand Rapids this morning. We followed the Mayor as he walked a little bit more than five miles and crossed seven of Grand Rapids' downtown bridges. Julie and I got there five minutes early, but still there was no sight of the Mayor on the other side of the crowd waiting at the bridge in Ah-Nab-Awen Park (see map at end of this post, #1).

We were to meet a number of other people at the bridge walk, but given the crowd, we were only able to find our friend Pam, who had the sense to call earlier this morning to set up a meeting place. But we soon lost Pam as Julie, Abbey and I had to hang back in the stroller crowd.

Approaching the bridge, we bumped into Steve and Nora Faber and we walked most of the morning with them. As we crossed over the river and walked north behind the Grand Center (map #2), we could see the thronging crowd crossing over the Michigan Street bridge in front of the building that's become known as "the giant flash cube on the river" (the thruway passes right by this building, and the curved surface ensures that the sun reflects in drivers' eyes every sunny morning).

As we approached the western side of the Michigan Street bridge (map #3), we could see the bottleneck of walkers passing below us along the river walk. We quickly came to appreciate being in the back of the line with the strollers, dogs and wagons, rather than with the rat race up front.

After passing under Michigan Street, we followed the river north along the river walk, passing the fish ladder and dozens of people searching for steelhead in the Grand River (map #4).

As we passed the fish ladder, Julie and I spied two of the three Tom Otterness sculptures we had missed on our previous downtown hike, "Medium Bear" and "Walking Fish."

From the fish ladder, we proceeded north to the Sixth Street Bridge (map #5). This is an historic steel truss bridge that used to help the furniture factory workers cross the river between work and home. It was built in 1886 for the whopping sum of $31,000.

The walk then wound through Canal Street Park, an area I frequently pass through when I walk to downtown (map #6). This park was developed in the late 1990's when some of the furniture and other factories in the neighborhood saw conversion to apartments and condos.

While we were waiting there for a potty break, along came Alan Adsmond, a friend of ours from the North Country Trail Association. Alan is an AT thru hiker, and his wife Lou wrote a fabulous little book of recipes about the meals she packed in boxes and sent to Alan and his son to keep them nourished on their thru hike.

After meeting Alan, we continued to walk north, around to the east of the historic Water Department building at 1101 Monroe Ave NW. This building always has nice plantings, as they have no shortage of water in the summer.

Upon passing the building, we saw a shark headed southbound on Monroe (map #7). "La Grande Fische" is actually a recumbent bike in disguise, and it did a good job of catching the eyes of those walking by.

After crossing the Leonard Street bridge (map #8) at the south end of our neighborhood, the walk turned south and headed back towards downtown on Front Avenue, through a rather uninspired industrial area. We recrossed the Sixth Street bridge, then followed the river walk south to Michigan, walked around the Grand Center to the east, and over the Pearl Street bridge (map #9).

We passed the Grand Rapids Public Museum along the river walk (nice photo of the walkway on the Museum's home page), and then crossed another historic truss bridge (map#10) that connects the area by the GVSU Eberhard Center with downtown west of Monroe Mall. Just north of this bridge is where the new Marriott is being built.

We noticed, for the first time, that there is a little gargoyle-like grim reaper sitting up on the east side of the bridge. I took a photo, but the lighting only returned a silhouette of this critter. He's pretty cool, so we'll get a pic on a future walk.

From the bridge, walkers could easily see the newly refurbished
Michael Singer & Sasaki Associates, Inc. work entitled "River's Edge Environmental Sculpture." Built in 1995, this sculpture had been neglected for many years. It has recently been refurbished and overgrowth removed. Lighting for the work has also been installed on the bridge, making it interesting to view at night.

We then crossed the busy Fulton Street bridge (map #11) and bumped into our neighbors Noah and Megan Kruis. This is also where Steve and Nora departed for home.

Reaching the far side of the bridge, we were fortunate enough to catch the start of the West Fulton Labor Day parade (map #12). We came up to the corner of Front Street as the drummers set the beat for marching. We walked along with the band for a few paces, then turned north into the beautiful, new GVSU downtown campus.

From there, the hike wound northerly, back behind the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum underneath some beautiful red pines. In my opinion, the Ford Museum has some of the best executed public park spaces in Grand Rapids.

When we got to the end, all the completion certificates had been handed out to a crowd that was much larger than expected. But the Mayor's secretary was on hand taking people's names and addresses, so we left Abigail's name so that she could get her certificate in the mail.