June 1, 2008 - Bayfield, Ashland and Washburn, WI

I can’t believe it is June 1st. Where has the time gone. It does not seem like we can have been gone for 3 whole months already. The time has flown by and we have enjoyed each day. I now realize that I don’t need a large home. I have gotten quite good at living in a very small space. The best thing is that I can clean the whole place in about 30 minutes.

We have spent the past two days in Washburn, WI. Washburn is a tiny town up on Lake Superior between Bayfield and Ashland. We are in a nice city park right on the lake. It is a small campground and not very busy yet. There are probably 10 campers here. Some of the people spend the whole season here and have permanent places. There is not a place to put a boat in the water at this park, but you don’t have to go far up or down the road to find a place to put in.

Yesterday, we drove back to Bayfield. Bayfield is about five miles west of here. It is an old town, but the area has seen the addition of newer homes and some condos on the water. The downtown area has been converted into little, touristy shops. There are several nice restaurants and lots of bed and breakfast places. We parked downtown and got out and walked around the marina and visited some of the shops. Then we took a drive into the older sections and saw some beautiful old homes. One, in particular, is a large old Victorian home that has a fabulous view of the lake. Like Duluth, this city is build on the hillside and the homes are stacked up the hillside so that they all have a view of the lake.

Today, Sunday, we took it easy. We decided to drive into Ashland and got in the truck only to have the truck not start. Mike said he had planned to buy new batteries before we left home, but just did not get around to doing so. He tinkered with the truck and finally got it started. While he was doing this, I checked Marge (GPS System) to see if I could find a place to get batteries on Sunday. Fortunately, there is a Wal-Mart in Ashland. I called and they had what we needed. So, we took off for Ashland.

Ashland is a small town too, but larger than Bayfield by several thousand people. They have a nice downtown area that appears to be active. Since this was Sunday, all the shops were closed. But, I saw a lot of stores with merchandise in them, so it must be where people shop. The Wal-Mart is on the eastern edge of the town. It appears to be a new store.

Mike went into the auto section and I did a bit of grocery shopping while the truck was being serviced. Once we were done, we started back toward Washburn. The sky out over the lake was dark and threatening. The wind had picked up and Mike was anxious to get back because we had left the canopy out on the camper. We both were crossing our fingers that the wind had not caught the canopy and blown it up over the camper. We had that happen once years ago and it is not a good thing to happen. We got back and, thankfully, the canopy was ok.

Tomorrow we are leaving for Michigan. We hope to find a nice place to spend a few days.