The North Shore

Split Rock
Dropping down from Ely to the North Shore, I headed for Split Rock Lighthouse. Ah, Split Rock! Its beauty arouses the spirits of artists and photographers. I hadn't been there before and was looking forward to it. This summer holiday weekend it was full of tourists from everywhere, the ticket sellers were completely dysfunctional, the 20-minute introductory movie had lousy production values, and the lighthouse itself was, frankly, pretty rinky-dink. Run by the State Historical Society, I give it high marks for preservation, barely passing for operations.
Northward on highway 61, I found a private campground and rented their last campsite for three times what I'd paid in Ely, with their enthusiastic assurance that it was "the last available campsite on the whole North Shore!" Sheesh. With planning, I could have avoided these holiday crowds, but then, planning is what this adventure is NOT about.

Grand Marais

Next day I finally made it to the sanity of Grand Marais. What a gem! Located on a natural harbor on Lake Superior, the town's distance from the Twin Cities keeps out the riffraff and their bratty kids--you have to know about Grand Marais, be willing to drive the distance, and then spend some time there. It's small enough that it's charming and easy to walk around, but large enough to have the desired amenities. For example, The Angry Trout restaurant (Recommended) serving freshly-caught fish with delicious accompaniments and an attractive presentation, indoors or out on the deck, around $20. At the more plebeian Blue Water restaurant, you can get a huge filet of fried, home-battered walleye for $10 while looking out at the harbor from the second-floor windows. Then there's Sven and Ole's, which I enjoyed more for the atmosphere than the pizza. I stayed at the huge, modern, well-run Municipal Campground (Recommended).

The Stalled-Engine Incident

Having packed up the RV and pulled out of the campsite, I got all of 100 feet across the campground before the engine sputtered, died, and refused to start. While I glumly stared under the hood, a campground employee came over to commiserate. In a nice episode of male bonding, we examined the facts and agreed it (a) was fuel related, (b) wasn't flooded, so likely to be (c) the fuel pump or (d) a clogged gas line. This being Sunday, I decided to stay another night at the campground (which had the advantage that I could sample more restaurants), This wonderful person (who moved here from Minneapolis thirty years ago and teaches high school science the rest of the year) chained me to the campground pickup and towed me over to an empty campsite, then pushed me back into it while I steered. Gosh, the residents up here are good people!

For the rest of the morning I watched a parade of end-of-the-holiday-weekend campers departing the campground in their dinosaurs — humongous RVs, bigger and more powerful than Greyhound buses, with very upscale features. For example, I watched one stop, and with a soft hiss of air the door opened, and steps automatically descended to the ground, so the wife could drop some trash in the Dumpster. But driving a dinosaur wasn't enough — most pulled their full-size SUV behind. Talk about a carbon footprint! Talk about the increasing gap between the haves and have-nots.

Monday morning I called a tow truck to haul my Ford RV over to the Chevy dealer (the only car dealer, and largest garage in town), where they kindly took me in, diagnosed a faulty fuel pump, locally found a suitable replacement, installed it, and sent me on my way, all in the same afternoon. Of course, it cost upwards of three hundred dollars, but man, the feeling of relief was worth it.

Naniboujou

Leaving Grand Marais the next morning, I headed to Naniboujou Lodge for lunch. I had long heard about it, read about it in newspaper and magazine articles, and was fascinated with the lurid history of its magnificent wooden structure, way up there on the Gunflint Trail. Heck, I'd never even been on the Gunflint Trail before, so it was time. I gassed up the RV and with great expectations headed up the Trail. Wide and smooth at first, after a few miles it became a narrow old blacktop road with bumps and cracks. Ten miles went by. Twenty. I began to wonder how far up the Trail the lodge was. Of course, I could have looked it up before I left, but isn't it more fun this way? Twenty five, thirty miles. It was odd, I thought, that the lodge wasn't mentioned on any of the signposts. I pulled off the road and walked into an establishment. The jolly fellow behind the desk laughed and told me, "You're on the wrong road! It's on highway 61." Driving back downhill, I wanted to believe him, yet the thought nagged me that the Naniboujou could be just a few miles higher, and he was sending me on a wild goose chase.

An hour later I pulled off highway 61 into Naniboujou's parking lot. The structure was a lot less magnificent than I'd expected, and its location on the shore of Lake Superior baffled me. But the dining room was open and its ceiling was decorated more garishly than any sane person could imagine. The food was wonderful — the French onion soup was luscious, even the side salad was exceptional — the atmosphere just right, and the price not as much as you might fear (lunch under $15). (Recommended)