Summer storms are common in the Upper Great Lakes Region. Storms occur in unstable atmospheric conditions with warm surface air rising, cooling, and then releasing precipitation. Often this precipitation is held up in the upper atmosphere to generate quite large hail stones. The rising air is replaced by “downburst winds” which in some cases cause destruction like tornadoes. They touch down at isolated points along the route of a storm and skip over other areas. These are not swirling winds like a tornado, but they blow in one direction. You can see the evidence of this in trees that fall down all in one direction. Ecologically, these downbursts create light gaps in the forest and the downed trees eventually become fuel for fires which many plants rely upon to germinate. (Note – The Sierra Club Naturalist’s Guide to The Northwoods of Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Southern Ontario is an excellent resource to explain weather and climate in this region.)
Last night just before sunset, a summer storm came to my village of Caspian. I was south of town, teaching Oliver and Ocean how to drive and we were on the border land between Michigan and Wisconsin when the storm came. We approached Caspian shortly after and experienced the aftermath of downed trees. No one was injured, and the Caspian-Gaastra fire department was on the scene directing traffic and clearing debris. It was quite an exciting event in a normally quiet little town.
Since this is the only time we will be in the USA until next year, we usually take care of doctor’s appointments, purchase things we cannot find in Uzbekistan, and other errands/tasks that must be done while we are here. We’ve been driving to Marquette quite a bit recently for visits to a dermatologist and optometrist. Marquette is a 90-minute drive from Caspian and is the unofficial capital of the Upper Peninsula. It is such a lovely town being on Lake Superior, surrounded by forests, and having some of the amenities of urban centers. As you can see above, we stopped at the Trenary Cafe for a coffee and some of the famous Trenary Toast. Trenary is a small town on the eastern side of the Upper Peninsula and the bakery’s famous toast is actually a twice-baked, Finnish korppu. Many Finnish immigrants came to the Upper Peninsula and brought their customs and traditions that still survive today. Jorma Syrannen in 1928 brought the Finnish coffee cake to the UP. Despite my adopted mother being Finn, we never ate Trenary Toast or korppu, although, my relatives drank a lot of coffee always accompanied by sweet cakes and cookies. Cinamon rolls and coffee were usually served at all family daytime gatherings.
We bought eyeglasses for me. I have progressive lenses which are not made in Uzbekistan. I got a thorough check of my eyes and all is healthy. I increased the magnification of the reading section of my lenses, however, and the optometrist suspects I’ll be needing another magnification in a few years. The eyes stabilize around 60 years old, so at least I have that to look forward to. Owen bought some reading glasses as well.
We also visited the dermatologist and Ocean and Nadia had some moles removed. Nadia’s mother died of skin cancer at a young age, so we are sensitive to sun spots, freckles, and moles. Ocean was brave and I ended up having a nice day with Nadia and Ocean.
We are still playing lots of tennis this summer. The courts are always free and we can use free-of-charge because they are open to the public. We had an epic 2 and 1/2 hour doubles match against Owen. Nadia and I lost 1-6, 7-5, 4-6 to Owen. His youth, the speed, strength and agility were too much for us.
Bill's Blog 