Where the Sun Also Rises Horton Bay, Michigan Day 33 - July 5, 2002  Back   |   Next

I am in Hemingway's old neighborhood. From Nancy Devon's deck I see Horton Bay light up with the rising sun. The backyard is a swamp garden with a wooden bridge leading to the dock where her fiance, Ken, keeps his red cigarette boat. A woodpecker taps his code somewhere in the birch and pine. The lake laps upon the shore like a cradle endlessly rocking. There is wild mint in the breeze. I walk upon the bridge which takes me over pools, and through fiddlehead, swamp grass, dwarven pine, and fallen tree rotting in frogspawn pools like the skeletons of prehistoric creatures caught in quagmire. Saplings poke out from the mossy carcass of an ancient pine. Vicky and Matt   East Jordon River East Jordon River Canoe Trip Today we will go on a canoe trip down the East Jordan River and then go boating on Lake Charlevoix. Vicki and I paddle hard to avoid fallen pines half submerged like spiked canoe traps. The water is ice-cold. We know this because the canoe capsizes several times as we try to duck overhanging trees with sharp branches or make right angle turns.   Vicki and Michael Benedict Nancy, Matt, and Vicki at Nancy's house on the shoreline of Lake Charlevoix On Lake Charlevoix we race cigarette boats and tour the harbor. We survey palatial summer cottages with their boathouses. We dock next to the Blue Moon, a sleek super yacht, rumored to be of Merv Griffin ownership. We come aboard another yacht, Trouble. I am introduced to the owner as the one who is bicycling across America. They are having a boat warming party for his son who has just received a starter yacht kit for his birthday. We drink more beer and eat pizza. The son has a clever name for his new boat, Financial Trouble. Somebody asks if I would like to become a lawyer. I tell her yes for I have forgotten myself.