We were fortunate to spend a few days with a daughter and her husband at a cabin Up North this week. The cabin sits in the woods on Douglas Lake—the small one in Otsego County, not the large one in Charlevoix County—and belongs to the family of one of our daughter’s lifelong friends. It is our daughter’s happy place, an annual retreat to green abundance and lake living, a change of pace from her life in beautiful, dry Wyoming.
We did many pleasant things while we cabined together. One of my favorites was paddling around the lake every morning with John. I grew up on a lake, and we kids were given great freedom with the canoe. We could put it in the water, properly equipped with flotation devices, and set off on our own in search of turtles and frogs and fish and clams and whatever else we might find. And, despite one fateful, five-county canoe camping trip I took as an adult—during which it rained all but one hour—I still love to paddle.
John was a fine canoeing companion, quiet and competent, content to see what there was to see and amiable with other folks out enjoying the morning. We saw minnows, panfish, a lot of good-sized bass, and the biggest bass spawning bed ever. I remembered how much I like a sound I hadn’t heard in years—reeds brushing along the side of a canoe. And we learned something about turtles.
Turtles that dive under the surface of ponds or lakes or rivers in southeastern Michigan are pretty quickly out of sight. You can’t see very far into the water. Douglas Lake is clear. And, thus, illuminating as to the underwater life of turtles. I’ve always assumed that turtles spent their time under water swimming around. But do you know what those Douglas Lake turtles were doing down there? Standing around on the bottom, watching the lake go by. And walking around.
Now, John and I discussed this. Freshwater turtles don’t have fins like sea turtles. Freshwater turtles have webbed feet. So, while freshwater turtles can obviously swim, swimming may not be their most efficient means of locomotion over short distances under water. Furthermore, walking under water is probably a lot easier than walking on land, due to the weight-bearing assist from the water. The biggest turtle I saw on the bottom of Douglas Lake was bookin’ it, moving much faster than I’ve seen any turtle that size move on land. You just never know what interesting things you’ll come across when you’re canoeing.
Another highlight of our time at the cabin was John’s building a little fire in the fireplace every morning to take the chill off. I’d come in from walking the dog, and John would have a fire going, and the cabin felt cozy. As the day warmed up, the fire dwindled and went out. It was just the right size, and it looked and smelled and sounded just right.
The loons on the lake also sounded great, filling the nights with their cries. The most loons anyone ever saw in the daytime was three, but what they may have lacked in numbers, they more than made up for with their nocturnal hullaballoo. They let loose not just their tremolo, that eerie cry most folks think of when they think of loon sounds. They also yodeled, which sounds like the end of the world is at hand. Camp Grayling, the largest National Guard training facility in the United States, is near Douglas Lake. The loons may well have made more noise.
Over the years our daughter has made the trip to her friend’s cabin, she’s explored a lot of this part of the state. I was with her three years ago when she made her first trip to an Amish furniture place near Mio. This is a good-sized concern, but that year all the furniture had been moved out of the showroom and into the barn, so that the showroom space could be used for a wedding. We got to admire the furniture and the barn.
Now the furniture’s back in the showroom. Becka and John bought a little rocking chair to take back to Wyoming. It’s quite wonderful. And the store’s setting, on and among working Amish farms, added to the pleasure of the purchase. Three-abreast teams of horses were pulling rakes in the fields. Horse-drawn carriages traveled the roads. A mom consulted John about buying a daughter a riding horse. She said they don’t know anything about horses for riding. All their horses work.
We already miss our interlude at Douglas Lake.
22 July 2022