Boiler Beams

The Quincy #5 boiler house
The Quincy #5 boiler house is a thorough ruin -- the roof is open to the sky, with the beams creaking and squeaking in the wind. On a windy day, one of the beams make a terrific racket, which is especially spooky at night.

The good news from Quincy is that many of the ruins are being slowly restored -- and some faster than others. The old roundhouse (featured her a few times) is in the process of being cleared, hopefully to become a museum. The old Quincy #6 steam engine will be out front -- recently reacquired from somewhere in New Jersey. I'm looking forward to it!

Gnommity Gnome Gnome

Gnomunculus Backyardia in its natural habitat
After hunting down the elusive Blizzard T. Husky, I thought I'd hit the peak of my rare-animal-hunting career. But amazingly, my luck held out -- I have now found the rare Common Garden Gnome (Gnomunculus Backyardia) in its native habitat. Enjoy this candid photo, possibly the only one of its kind!

River Bone

Is this real? It looks kind of strange...
I found this mysterious bone while exploring the Eagle River with Mike (of Copper Country Explorer fame). It almost looks unreal to me, with its cracked, greenish outer layer. I don't know what it came from (a deer, perhaps?), or why it looks so strange, but its colors and textures caught my eye. And now, hopefully it will catch your eye as well!

Chair of Summer!

A sign of summer
This photo comes to you from the lovely Saginaw Valley, which (being downstate) is at least a month ahead of the UP in terms of seasons. We're just getting into summer up here, but this lovely chair was baking in the sun weeks ago.

This is an Adirondack chair, refinished and repainted by my father, baking out in the warm sun on a clear June day. The sun was right overhead, which made the light reflect off of the cross-braces in a very unusual way. To me, this photo looks how summer feels!

Thanks also to D. Travis North over at Shutter Photo for featuring this on his photo blog!

Cliff Swamp, Try 2

The Cliffs, in Black and White
Thanks to all for the help with the last incarnation of this photo. I've given it a high-contrast black-and-white treatment -- I really like this version much more than the highly colorful version before. Enjoy!

Cliff Swamp

The West Branch of the Eagle River
Officially this is a branch of the Eagle River, as it flows past the base of the Cliffs and into the main Eagle River. However, it's really just a swamp with a bit of a current!

I'm not sure what to do with this photo, so I'm hoping that you, my Horde of Readers, might have some suggestions. The colors in this photo are genuine -- no post-processing except for basic levels/curves in Gimp! They look so bright as to be unreal to me. Feel free to leave comments or ideas!

Poppy

It's poppy time!Continuing the spring into summer flower theme, enjoy this poppy blooming in my parent's garden!