The Maiden Cruise of "The Green Bean"

We checked the weather this morning and it was going to be a beautiful day. Tomorrow and Tuesday were gonna be miserable, so we decided it was either go today, or nothing! 

It was time to take our famous canoe, The Green Bean, on its maiden voyage!

Ever since we bought it a week ago, the weather has just not cooperated.  We've been itching to get out and take a paddle around.  You know, to try it out.  It's exactly the same canoe as we had before in 2012, but a different color.  We know how it handles, but we wanted to play with it! 

Nearby our home, actually less than half a mile, is a channel of water that is routed around a levee. This is property surrounding Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources land that is a wildlife refuge. It's a protected marsh land for migratory birds. It is called Green Bay West Shore State Wildlife Area.

It's just on the other side of the Northeast Wisconsin Land Trust Preserve, directly behind our property to the east.  As the crow flies, it's 4 tenths of a mile to the channel.

Our plan is to load of The Green Bean canoe onto the roof of the Saturn, and drive around to a little parking area on the corner of this levee system. We chatted with someone else who said that she has kayaked around it.  With the water levels up this high right now, there should be no problem at all going through with a canoe.

Our proposed route:

The outside temperature hit 60ﾟafter lunch, so we popped on out to the garage and loaded up The Green Bean. The two of us can easily lift it up onto the roof. It is 80 pounds. We tied it down with straps to the front tow bar mechanism and the back hitch. We also can put another strap around the middle that goes through the rear passenger compartment. But since we were only going about a mile, we didn't bother with the middle one. We tossed in our life jackets, paddles, seat cushions, my go bag with a first aid kit and some water bottles. We also have a triple zipper sealed bag designed for a cell phone in case of emergency.  

We got to the parking area and unloaded the canoe. We had to portage over this little walkway bridge. This bridge prevents people from going into the preserve with  ATV's, dirt bikes or other motorized vehicles. 

It was a beautiful blue sky / puffy white cloud day!  There was a slight breeze and it was just perfect conditions with a light jacket.

Just on the other side of the walkway, we were able to find a nice easy area to launch the canoe. We loaded in our gear and it was time to set sail.  LOL

Here we go piddle paddling around. There is a silly little camp song I know about:  "A Boy and a Girl in a Little Canoe". That song kept running through my head. We floated on through the water and looked around at all of the beautiful marshland.

Even though things are not greened up yet, the sky was so blue, making the water even bluer. At this time of year, there are very few bugs or mosquitoes--- so this was a perfect time to go canoeing through the marsh. I've always wanted to see what it was like on the back side of the levee.

This marshland is part of the migratory bird route and an important part of the ecosystem. The levees are here not to protect the town, but rather to protect the marshland from ever getting drained down too low. If the water gets drawn too low the little critters and frogs and bugs and things that live here will no longer exist. That is what the huge flocks of Canadian geese, ducks and sandhill cranes need to thrive on their routes North or South. It is also a nesting area for a lot of the game birds as well.  So maintaining a good ecosystem of readily available food is necessary. That's why these marshes are preserved and kept wet and swampy.

We only floated a couple hundred feet when we came across some beautiful Canadian geese. They looked at us, few of them honked at us, but we tried to be quiet as we paddled on by and not interfere. I don't know how many of them are nesting right now, but we didn't go on shore or disturb any potential nesting sites.

A few times the geese would fly up in the air as we paddled past. Then they would fly back to where they were, so I am guessing they are nesting in those areas.

We slipped along quietly through the little waterways, working our way to the West. From time to time the winds would blow a little stronger. It would create some waves, but we were basically floating along in pretty calm water.

We managed to paddle right up alongside of these geese in a row. All 4 took off at the same time. I was using an old cell phone that I don't care if it gets ruined, and I quickly managed to snap snap snap the pictures.  I caught all four in motion.

As we slipped on through the waterways, this beautiful tall marsh grass was dipping and swaying in the slight breeze. It was peaceful and soft, making a quiet rustling sound.

Every time we turned the corner there were new photo opportunities or interesting things to see. At one time all of the levee area had such low water levels due to drought, the trees had started growing in on the side and bottom of the channel around the levee. The maintained water levels are on the other side for the marsh.  It was that way for 10 years or more. Now that the Great Lake levels are so much higher these last few years, the water levels in the levee are higher, thus killing off the trees. They look like some strange stark skeletons standing up here and there.

Along the top edge of the levee all the way around is a walking path. Periodically located here and there are some benches for resting. Maybe someday we will head out here with the dog and walk all of the way around. I think it's about 4 miles total.

We saw some signs over at the parking area warning us about the muskrats. The signs said they had made holes underneath the levees in various places so they warned you to watch your step. As we floated around this corner we saw some muskrats swimming across on the water and taking off down in the holes around this tree stump. It was too late for me to grab the camera out of the zipper bag to actually photographed the muskrats. But here is their home:

Floating along through some of the wider areas of the marsh, we could see where the overflowing water stretches across over to the golf course at the edge of town. We paddled over a little ways where we could even see the Hi Seas Marina across the road. This was never open water before, it used to be a marshy field.  It was quite a large area of water that we could now paddle around besides the little channel we had originally decided to plan a route on. So we got in a little more paddling than we originally thought.

We worked our way around the entire levee system and made it back over to where we could portage out over the levee or just park by the road and walk back to get the Saturn. Maybe next time will portage over the levee and continue on the inside waterway. But for now, this was enough paddling for one day. The winds were starting to kick up and we wanted to head back home

Now that we got The Green Bean anointed with her maiden voyage, it was time to bring her home and settle her into her new resting space in the garage. 

We had come up with an idea to string her up from pulleys up to the rafters of the garage and get her up out of the way.

We unloaded the canoe into the garage in the middle between the 2 garage doors where we had hung some pulleys and threaded them up with some ropes. Inside the canoe, we tossed the paddles, the cushions, the life jackets etc all of the gear that we would need the next time.

 Crank crank crank 

up she went 

raising to the ceiling. 

This really was working out rather well! 

I can completely walk underneath it without ducking, Steve has to duck a bit but he said he will just walk around it. We snugged it up as high as it will go. The garage doors can still shut and open easily with the canoe suspended between them.

So this will be The Green Bean's resting place when she's not in use, or tied on the roof of the Saturn getting towed around behind our motorhome.

The ropes are securely wrapped around boat cleats on the sides, tied out of the way. I think this is a great way to store the canoe so it doesn't take up valuable floor space in the garage.

  Steve says: 

"And there you have it"

Silly guy. 

Motorhome Exercise Day and The Green Bean

We have been having rain rain rain for the past 48 hours. But that's OK because we have been dangerously dry here in northern Wisconsin. The rain has also spruced up the grass and we are getting some green color, finally. The trees are just starting to bud out with the tiniest leaves. A sure sign that Spring is on the way. Although, 3 years ago on this day we had a horrible ice storm and tons of snow! 

When I woke up this morning there was a glowing orb of beautiful sunshine gleaming in through the foggy mists in the backyard. It just looked so surreal...

A few minutes later it got a little brighter and I snapped another picture. In this one you can see our finished little patio and the new position of all the fence panels in an arc. I can't wait for this whole backyard to be lush and green again.

Steve was able to borrow the big torque wrench from Nick to make sure that all of the lug nuts are securely torqued on the motorhome. They need to be 475 foot pounds and he actually had most of them that tight as it was with his air compressor and impact wrench. But now with the borrowed torque wrench, he is sure each one is torqued the same. How nice of Nick to lend it to him. When Steve returned it, he added a cash tip and brought him over a piece of freshly baked apple pie from last night.

Next, it was time to go for a little test drive and check out the brake situation. We wanted to be sure that the little bit of brake fluid leaking that we saw last fall was actually from that tiny switch that goes into the side of the master brake cylinder. After changing it, Steve had wiped everything down good to make sure that if there was a new leak, now we could spot it. 

We thought we would go out and do some hard braking while driving around and make sure that everything is working correctly. Brakes are nothing to mess around with on that big of a motorhome. Being able to securely stop in any condition of course.

We decided to toss a picnic lunch and the dog into the motorhome and drive north on the highway. Just 10 miles up is a nice little county park called North Bay Shore Campground. We pulled into an empty campsite, nose first, just to look out at the nice view over the waters of Green Bay. 

There was nobody around, but the campground is open already even though the water is not on. If it had been warmer out (and nicer), I think we would have just paid our fee and stayed there for the night. But it was starting to cloud over and began lightly misting.  We decided to just stay there long enough to make a lunch, relax for a while, and enjoy our little outing. 

The view out the front windshield was somewhat obscured by tree trunks.  This is the same site we were camping on last summer, and then it was all lush and green and you could barely see the water.

Inside, we were cozy, warm and comfortable. I took a picture with the wide angle shot of the front part of the motorhome. Lunch is on the table and we are going to eat, relax, and watch the local news for a weather update.

I simmered up some apple cider in the cute little teapot my mom sent me from Florida.  I added some spices that are for mulling wine or cider. It sure smelled good and it made a wonderful companion to the rest of the apple pie we had for dessert.

Binney was happy to come along. This is the first time we've gone in the motorhome without Finnegan, RIP. She seemed to be looking around for her little travelling buddy. She was sniffing some of the old toys that must still have his scent on them in the toy basket. 

After a while, we drove on home and parked the motorhome back in it's spot along side of the garage. We will continue to load it up with items and get it ready to take on an outing, once the weather turns nicer. This upcoming week looks like every day will only be in the fifties and nights down in the thirties.

Speaking of apple pie, this little stinker came over last night for a couple hours.  We had 6 big green apples and I told her that I didn't know what to do with them.  She said that she had an idea.  She helped bake the pie that we were talking about in the upper portion of this blog post. 

We ate 3 pieces after dinner last night with her, she also brought 2 pieces home for her mommy and daddy. Now with one piece going to the guy who lent us the torque wrench, there were only 2 pieces left for us for lunch today. I guess it's time to bake another pie?

She also had to go out in the garage and check out the new canoe. There is a center seat that has now been dubbed the "Grandkid Seat". She practiced with the paddle on both sides and is eager to take a ride soon. Once the weather warms up we will go.

I am really looking forward to using the canoe this summer. We really missed owning one.  We sold our last one in 2012 when we sold the house on the river. I really enjoyed floating around on lakes and doing a little fishing. Sometimes we've tossed in a line and I would relax back in the middle of the canoe with the cushion and a pillow and read a book or knit. Steve is a more active fishermen, always casting and trolling, casting and trolling.  I catch bigger fish, though. 

This is one of my most favorite photo of him a number of years back when he was fishing from our older red canoe.  Soooo peaceful and relaxed. That is what retirement should be.

 Hoping for many more years of relaxing days like this with our green canoe.

I told Claire that we are going to name the canoe:

"The Green Bean"

 

It kinda looks like one, don't it?

We did take a nap this afternoon and when we woke up, we were blessed with beautiful blue sky and sunshine again! Even with all the rain that we've had over the last 2 days, we only have a little bit of water backed up in the yard. Not like last year. Most of it has soaked in, due to the real dry conditions.

By tomorrow this will probably all be gone