Fish Pic

Kirsten and I are dabblers. That is, we don’t focus all of our time on one type of activity. This summer, while we are in the heart of the BWCA, we haven’t solely done canoe trips this summer. We’ve been more on the every other week plan. Why shun the gorgeous BWCA? For the north shore (of Lake Superior) of course!

Last Wednesday we were able to combine our love of the north shore with our love of small town summer fests. The Fisherman’s Picnic is the biggest shindig in Cook County, and it’s on the lovely waterfront of Grand Marais. How could we pass it up? We grabbed a tent site in the municipal camp grounds, and watched the town transform. Since we showed up a night before the festivities began, we saw all the merchants setting up shop beforehand. Most impressive was the log rolling pool, with world champion and local resident Jenny. But the real show that night came from the top of the Gunflint Tavern. They have a sorely underused rooftop that overlooks the harbor. Shortly after we headed up on another clear night, a tall ship passed the lighthouse (btw, great use of adjectives to whomever named those vessels). It was headed to Duluth for its weekend festival, and suddenly we had the best seats in the house/town/county/state (I’d argue).

The next day by the time we got going the Fish Pic (as the locals call it) was in full swing. Kids swarming the log rolling pool, fish burgers on the grill, terrible 80s rock band tee-shirts being hawked, the smells of mini doughnuts and cheese curds ever present, local musicians strumming on stage, and of course, Kirsten’s favorite, sidewalk sales! The weather these last few weeks has been perfect (especially on our days off!), and the sun and tourists were out. We ended up spending most of the day munching and people watching (another O’Brien favorite, right behind Loon stalking).

That night we found a good fish spot, the Dockside Fish Market. Great spot. Better prices than the Angry Trout next door, nice deck seating with a view, excellent fare, and of course their wine with a Salmon on the label is from the WA. After sampling some of local fish, we headed up the hill to do some more Minnesotan culture sampling at the local musical production, How to Talk Minnesotan. While cute and definitely capturing the state’s cliché stereotypes, the accents were off and many lines were flubbed. I’d recommend the book instead. We cut out at intermission for our next stop of Grand Marais Idol on the waterfront. Basically a karaoke contest of cute kids, though there were some impressive a capella performances and one funny Timon and Pumba Hakuna Matata sing along.

The next morning we rolled out of the tent to grab another tasty breakfast at Blue Water with Kirsten’s Dad’s seminary buddy Terry, and his son Patrick before they headed out for a BWCA trip. Since we got an early start we got to see that Superior was calm on another lovely day. Thus we headed up to Bear Track Outfitters for a tandem kayak to check off another summer goal, kayaking on the big lake. Thankfully it was flat most of the day, and we got to cruise the shoreline before it got too choppy for our small craft.

We ended our Fish Pic trip on a high note, Sydney’s Custard (and Gyros) stand. One of two roof top seating venues in town, and it’s custard Sydnamis are top notch. Hands down beats the sad DQ in town. Hope you can end one of your Northshore/BWCA trips at Syd’s too.