The Meaning of Winter

So what's the deal about the red-and-white stick attached to a Bayfield, Wisconsin fire hydrant?  It's so the hydrant can be located in a snowdrift.  Herb is six feet tall, so that gives us some idea as to the amount of snow Bayfield residents are prepared to receive.


Local people say that Lake Superior freezes around the Apostle Islands; when the ice is thick enough, cars and trucks can drive to and from Madeline Island on an ice road.  Many people welcome the ice road: it's less expensive than the ferry for one thing.  A Bayfield resident told of a mild winter when the ice wasn't thick enough--that made transportation to and from the island difficult.


We Missourians know what snow is, but the idea of locator poles on fireplugs and driving on a frozen lake isn't part of our winter experience.  Travel is so great because it gives a person a different perspective.

The Kettle Falls Hotel

The Kettle Falls Hotel, the only lodging within Voyageurs National Park, is only accessible by boat or seaplane.  That alone makes it an interesting place to stay.  To that add that it is a historic building, built in the early 1900s and used by lumberjacks, fish buyers, prospectors, bootleggers, and tourists over the years.

To get there, we made arrangements for a boat to pick us up at the Ash River Visitors' Center.  Hotel owner and operator Rick Oveson picked us up in his boat, and after about twenty minutes of travel on water between forested islands, we arrived at a dock.  We rode in the back of a golf cart from the dock, along a gravel road to the hotel.

There are about 12 guest rooms in the hotel, all on the walk-up second floor.  (There are villas--rental cabins--in the surrounding woods, however.)  Our room in the hotel was not large, but quite comfortable.  A couple of shared bathrooms were accessible from the hall, which was, well, a different arrangement for a city girl like me, but it worked out okay.  Our room was right next to one of the bathrooms.

A lovely screened-in porch runs across the entire front of the hotel.  That's where guests can sit and drink a beer, talk, or eat a meal.

On the left side is the Lumberjack Saloon with its famously uneven hardwood floor.  The building settled and nothing was done about it; the result was a wavy saloon floor that makes a person feel tipsy before he drinks a single drop. Fisher-people and houseboat people drift in during the afternoon.  The music starts up, and the laughter and beer begins to flow.  Pretty soon the place is rockin'.

On the right is the restaurant where one may enjoy some of the specialties of the house:  cream of wild rice soup and fruit of the forest pie.  (Fruit of the forest pie is a blend of rhubarb, strawberries, blueberries, and apple.)  And of course, there is the best fish in the world: fresh walleye from the cold northern waters.  Mmmmmm.

The hotel was named for the the nearby waterfall which is now a dam.  The border waters have the appearance of a series of lakes, but they must flow like a river, the way Nanakan Lake falls into Rainy Lake.  In the days before the dam, the swirling water carved out kettle-like holes in the rock.  Since humankind traveled those waters by canoe, the area was a place of portage over land from one lake to the other.

The Oveson family made us feel welcome during our stay.  Those people have a strong work ethic, and they do what it takes to keep it all going the way it should.  If something needs to be done, they jump right in and do it.  I guess that's what it takes when you're about 30 miles from the nearest road.

I suppose I could go on, but perhaps I've said enough.  It was a memorable experience, and we're glad we stayed at Kettle Falls.  For more details, here is a link:  kettlefallshotel.com/