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Breaking Points

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After the shock of entering the dense-leaved maple canopy sheared to the ground and shouldered aside like the dead dropped in their tracks, after all that what I finally see are breaking points. The storm’s catastrophe bars comprehension except in stages, but every moment our eyes are open it becomes more real: massive trunks stacked like proverbial pick up sticks — all cliché but what else do I have in the first moments of first seeing? But this is no game. Still, I am so stunned I have no fresh language to describe this — it’s all too dense, thick with damage. The heart aches and the mind can’t find the way to the words, or even the real. When do I see the breaking points? The crack and twist, wood’s open wounds, the new right angle that is all wrong for the verticality of a tree. Not until the end.

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Community Resilience: How Glen Arbor picked itself up after the megastorm

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During one extraordinary week in August 2015, the sounds that dominated our town were the whirr of winds and the ugly crack of trees, followed by the buzz of chainsaws, the hum of generators, and the cheering and car honking as Consumers Power trucks and linemen rolled into town like a liberating army.

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Photos sought for book chronicling Glen Arbor storm

It was a hundred-years storm. Thin trees snapped like matchsticks; thick ones toppled, one atop another, like felled soldiers. The storm’s straight-wind blast left houses with gaping holes, thousands of residents with no power for days, a Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore that is, said one official, unrecognizable, and a cleanup that could take years. Mission Point Press, a Traverse City publisher, will soon release a book chronicling the historic event of Sunday afternoon, August 2.

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Namaste on the beach

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Add “sticky mat” to your haul-to-Lake Michigan list. Yoga on the Beach is coming to Glen Haven, Aug. 13, at 8 p.m. near the cannery. “I really like bringing yoga to places where people wouldn’t normally do it,” said Amy Hubbell, Leelanau County yoga teacher and one of this event’s organizers. “Yoga on the beach is a unique way to get out and enjoy nature as you tap into health and well being.”

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Port Oneida, homage to a farming community

Most of the towns and villages in Leelanau County were built up around the lumber business. And Port Oneida, most of it now part of the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, was no exception. It was first settled in 1852 by Carsten Burfiend, a German immigrant, who traveled with his wife Elizabeth to Buffalo, NY, in 1846. Elizabeth stayed in New York while Carsten went on to work as a fisherman on North Manitou Island. North Manitou had recently been settled by wood dealer Nicolas Pickard and his brother Simeon, who had been in the wooding business in New York. The brothers erected several docks at various locations around the island and began a successful wooding station business, supplying cordwood for fuel to passing steamships traveling from the Erie Canal to Chicago.

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Digging for deeper meaning at Port Oneida’s Kelderhouse Farm

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By F. Josephine Arrowood Sun contributor In these days and in this foodie haven of Northern Michigan, it seems that one can hardly turn around without tripping over another would-be farmer. In sharp contrast to this desire to “live off the land” (as the hippies used to say), the knowledge and experience to live with […]

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Port Oneida Fair returns to Sleeping Bear Dunes, Aug. 7-8

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Think of warmth, sunshine and fun. Plan your August visit to Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore for the 14th annual Port Oneida Fair. Mark your calendar for Aug. 7 and 8, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., with special events on Friday and Saturday evenings.

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Young family walkabout

The family that walks together, talks together and sometimes even finds “cool floaty things” in Lake Michigan. Together. Such is the experience of the Young Family — Tim, Kathy and their kids, Stella, 15, and Connor, 10. The aforementioned “cool floaty things” — Kathy’s phrase — turned out to be leg bones, the remains of a white-tailed deer they found during a spring walk in their own backyard, the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.

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Become a Bark Ranger

Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore is hosting an informational meeting to explore volunteer interest in a new program in which volunteers and their dogs serve as “Bark Ranger” ambassadors to the National Lakeshore. Bark Ranger volunteers would walk beaches and trails with their canine companions to help share information about the park with visitors, highlighting pet policies and responding to questions.

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Run for the Farms

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The sixth annual Port Oneida Heritage Run on Aug. 1 will traverse the beautiful scenery of Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore and support Preserve Historic Sleeping Bear (PHSB), in its effort to maintain the Park’s historic resources.

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