Overnight Camping on Little Boy Lake 10/10

I'm now finally getting more resent postings! Yeah! I'm done catching up!

This past weekend a few girls and I went for an overnight camping trip. It was so fun! The weather was just so nice and it was really great to take full advantage of it!
Here's what we did in one sentence. I'll let the pictures tell the rest. :)
We went out of Big Deep Lake, canoed down Little Boy River, fished in Blind Lake, and camped in Little Boy Lake.

I was in a canoe with Kalle. We had to go over 4 beaver dams through out the river. It was was quite the comedic show. :) Kalle got a good taste of Minnesota canoeing. She was a great sport!
This is the other canoe team, Emily and Caitlin. They did great too but I think they stole pointers from us. :) hehe You can see two of the beaver dams in this picture. Those beavers are quite the builders!
This was our first fish and practically first cast in Blind lake! It was a great fishing day!
Emily caught probably the biggest fish I've ever sign caught. It was huge!
Emily was quite proud of her large mouth bass! :)
Here's another Emily catch!
This picture is great! Emily and Caitlin caught one at the same time but you can tell who's was bigger. :) Emily's such a fisherwoman!
Finally Caitlin redeemed herself. :) Good job!
Here's my fish! This was my first caught with my new lure from Kathy and Daryl. Thanks guys! It worked great! I caught to 2 keepers and 2 to throw back. It was so fun!

Here's our set up. It was great! It's a small DP site.
Here is our dinner, the keepers. Even though the bass was huge, when they get to a certain size they just aren't good to eat. We filleted them and fried them. They were tasty, but note to self for next time, bring an egg. :)

I took this picture to show how close we were to the water. It was sweet! Also we used my tent! Yeah!
Our site was SO pretty! In the middle of the night were heard awesome barred owls calling right outside our tent. They were so loud but is was SO awesome! They sound like "who cooks for you, who cooks for you all?" :)
It was a chilly morning but not as chilly as it should have been for October. The sunrise was beautiful!
This is a great shot of the lake with the mist over the water.
After breakfast we packed up and started heading back. We were one less canoe so I duffed in the middle and took pictures. :) The reflection in the water is so perfect in this one.
Here is our trusty stern Caitlin. Nice job! I think she's saying, "The sun is too bright but I know I should smile."

This is the bow paddler, Emily.
And this is my favorite picture of the weekend! It speaks for itself! I hope everyone is enjoying this weather! We are so lucky! They say that this time last year we had 2 inches of snow!

Tower Hikes 2

Here are some neat photos of the changing fall colors up at the tower. I tried to pick ones taken from the same direction (most of Big Deep Lake).

These first two were taken on a over cast day but its amazing how it makes the variety of fall colors pop! I love it!

This is Big Deep.

This is one of the freaky things that the kids like to do at the tower. It's pretty fun.

The trees are so full compared to what they are now!

This is a group from Rockford. They thought to take this pretty clever photo from the tower. It only took them a good 10 minutes to figure out how to do it. :)

Such a beautiful sky to capture the colors!

These were taken just last week 10/7. What a difference huh?

I like the steak of yellow, don't you dad? :)

Kids Program Part 2

Here are more pictures of the kids and the classes I teach! Enjoy!

This is a group form just last week from Oakdale (near White Bear Lake). They choose for their Rec. time to come with me on a Tower Hike (see other post). It was really fun and we got done early so I took they to see our sample shelters. This is the debris shelter. It's really neat and the kids can relate it to their own shelter from the Survival class.

Of course the kids all climbed inside. Hello! :)

Our other shelter is a Mongolian Yurt. They have groups in the summer that stay over night in here. It's really awesome! I want too do it! :)

Here is a group from Royalton that I took out to the bog. A bog is a sensitive wetland. It has unique vegetation including insect eating plants. Cool! :)

This is one of our events for Pioneer Olympics. The kids study Native cultures in 5th and 6th grade; this is a great way for them to experience some of the hunting techniques and games they played. This is Tomahawk throwing.

He's another event, the Atl Alt. It was away to throw spears farther but was quickly replaced with the bow and arrow.

This is canoeing which is quickly becoming one of my favorite classes but sadly one we won't be teaching much longer. This is a perfect example of the kids having a tough time getting out from the docks. It is quite the challenge for some of them. :)

More of these kinds of pictures will be coming especially as the seasons change so does our curriculum which I'm really excited for!

Brittani visits! 9/25-26

Brittani (who I worked with last year) came to visit me for a day. She pulled in on Saturday night and we just kept it chill because I wasn't feeling so well. We just chatted with the other girls here and then went to bed to get ready for the packed day ahead. I had a bunch of things I wanted to show her and do together. It was SO fun having her here and she was a great sport about coming along to everything!

We got up early (according to Brittani) and went up the tower. It was beautiful! We were lucky to see a turkey vulture soaring around while we were up there. It was pretty sweet!

Here's Britt and I with Big Deep in the background. Notice the colors are starting to change!
Then we made our way to Hackensack for the the big event! The World Chainsaw Wood Carving Contest! Hackensack hosts one every year it is made "world" because two of the competitors are from Japan. It was really interesting and I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking.
We had to pay $5 for parking which I thought was crazy, I mean this isn't Mpls! But we got ride this sweet ferry which was a trailer pulled behind a four wheeler (very high class!). The little boy was riding along with his dad. :)

This was one of the masterpieces done the day before.

This another master piece, viking. All of the pieces from the weekend were bid on at the end.
This was the master piece done by one of the Japanese competitors. Pretty great!

This is the judge going around after he called time. This was a local carver of Hackensack. They had 2 hours to do a bench. He had some extra time. I'm pretty sure he's the guy who does the stuff at Gene Swaggert's office! :)

This guys was my favorite bench. It was of cardinals perched in a tree.

This lady was taking a torch and burning the shaddows on the owls. It was neat to see the different techniques used to get different results.

Tower Hikes 1

One of the unique things to do here at Deep Portage is to hike to the tower. It is 55 ft high and gives a great view of the tree tops. These photos I took on a pretty gray day. I will have more soon of the colors changing and the different weather days. I hope you're not scared of heights! :)

I always have the kids count the steps and tell me what they get at the top. Sometimes I get 88 and other times I'll get 108? hehe

Here is a great view of the North. The lake on the right is Big Deep Lake, one of MN 10 deepest lakes (100ft) and the building in the lower left is our main building.

Here is one of my groups up at the top. These kids we from St. Michael.

It was pretty foggy wouldn't you say?

Skinning the deer

Yes yes... it is true, I helped skin a deer. It is now one more thing I can add to my list of things I have done. :) We got the deer from the DNR. Our heating guy hit it with his car on the way into work. We made venison stew and venison ribs so far. Jerky is on the way. :) So now I can saw that I've eaten road kill.

We took part. Fabi and Charlotte gutted it, Casey and Kalle butchered it, and Caitlin and I skinned it. It's was full staff endeavor. :)

This is my hand with deer blood on it. I think the deer was warmer than my hands. Mine look a little cold. :)

This is Caitlin with the hooves. I think she's going to nail the tendon to a board and make them into coat hooks. :) hehe silly Caitlin.

This is the butchering team. They did great and Casey was a great and patient teacher!

Got a bite Buckwheat?

One of my favorite things to do here so far is to go fishing. We've gone a few times and are trying to catch enough to one day make ourselves some fish tacos. YUM! I've gotten a couple pikes, sunnies, and one northern. It's so fun! Also these are some good photos for me to introduce my co-workers. (more will come I'm sure)

This is Caitlin waiting to catch the big one!

This is Fabi and Spencer, her dog. She is great at fishing! She is originally from Brazil and has been studying and working in Minnesota for the past 9 years. Everyone loves her dog. He's so good and has such a personality. He got an infection last year and they had to remove his left eye. This is his good profile. :)

This is Charlotte and Kalle. Kalle is showing off here very first Minnesota fish! Size is about right huh? :) She is from California and its been fun to talk about it with off and on.

Look Caitlin got one! Good job!