Driving back in time

Several days ago I began driving with my dad from St. Louis to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. I will be spending the summer working at Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, on Lake Superior. I have worked at several other National Parks, but this is only the second time I have been an NPS employee wearing a ranger uniform – most of my previous experience was as an SCA intern or as a volunteer. So I am excited to be wearing the Smokey Bear hat again!

We left on Wednesday, May 14, after a day and a half of frantic packing on my part. Even with my previous experience, it is hard to decide what to bring for a summer away – and even harder to figure out how to fit it all into the back of a Chevy Malibu! I will be sharing a house with four other people, including one roommate, so there is limited space; the kitchen is supposed to be fully equipped – with dishes and everything! – but I love to cook, so there were a number of things that simply Could Not Be Left Behind. There were several large boxes/crates, so everything else had to be in smaller portions that could be shoved in the spaces around the edges. It’s like a game of 3-D Tetris, but I got it all in! And even room for a very small bag for Dad…

(I am extremely grateful to my Dad for driving out here with me, as he has done almost every summer since 2005. Regardless of the fact that for him, it’s an excuse to take a trip to a beautiful National Park! – it would be a very long way to drive by myself, and I also love that I mostly get to just enjoy the ride… Thanks, Dad!)


We drove over into Illinois, then up through Wisconsin to the U.P. What was interesting was that we were also driving back through time… In St. Louis, spring arrived a month and a half ago. The tulips and lilacs are finished – forget about the daffodils! – and the trees are just finishing leafing out into their full summer foliage. The temperatures have been in the mid-to-high 80’s (F) during the day, even though it still cools down at night – but summer is definitely almost here.

Driving north, we began to see all those steps being reversed. We didn’t notice it right away, but by the time we drove through Madison, WI, it was quite obvious. Lilacs were only just starting to open! Crabapple trees were blooming! The streets were lined with absolutely stunning tulip beds in full bloom! I spent summer 2007 in northern Vermont, and I remembered being delighted to find that the lilacs were just beginning to bloom when I arrived – I would get to experience spring all over again! But even so, it caused a few double takes.

Then we kept driving north.

We spent Friday night in Green Bay. As we drove toward Green Bay, we were noticing there was less foliage on the trees. Once we left Green Bay, there was hardly any foliage – a lot of evergreens, and a lot of bare trees. The only leaves were on the birch trees, and a few willows – and the weeping willows we saw driving past towns, all looked a little scruffy because their fronds were only half grown out.

Then we drove the rest of the way, up into the Upper Peninsula.

There was no foliage. There were only evergreens – pines, hemlocks, probably spruce and fir (I don’t know my local trees yet…) There were hints of red where some trees – probably maples – were just starting to bloom. The willows had not yet begun to grow out, although their branches were already bright yellow-green in anticipation. There were no flowers blooming except a few daffodils when we drove into town. There were chunks of ice floating all over the surface of Lake Superior.

Everything had been reset.

We asked the rangers at the visitor center if this was normal for May. They said that everything was behind by a few weeks, after the rough winter. Well, so was everything in Missouri – the wildflowers that we go to see every year were almost a month late! So it wasn’t the winter that made everything rewind as we drove north – it was just the latitude. And, once we reached Lake Superior, the proximity of open water.

I am very excited about getting to see spring here. I have already seen a few wildflowers – one that I know from home, one that is obviously a close cousin to one from home, and a couple that I will have to look up. I don’t know what all the trees are, and the leaves are not yet out to help me! I hope that I am prepared for all weathers, but it will likely be a while before I wear my shorts - much less my swimsuit! But I plan to enjoy the cool while I have it, and make the most of my time here at Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore! I’m here until Labor Day, and by the time I leave it will be turning to fall here… then I will hit rewind again and drive south, arriving when there is still a month of summer yet to enjoy!