Deflection

I did get back to Whitewater on Sunday night, but I have been able to type since then. One of the issue has been that my dad was in the hospital for the past two days and I spent the evenings with him. He got a diagnosis about pockets in his esophagus that trap food. If air comes up out of his stomach, it may go down his wind pipe causing pneumonia. The a person ends up in the hospital.

I will take some time to go through some of the highlights on my trip around Lake Superior. But, first, I find Lake Superior to be very majestic, and I would recommend everyone to take a trip around the lake.

My first highlight is not a highlight at all, since it reflect poorly on highway engineering in the states of Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin and the Provence of Ontario. When I stated working for the Iowa Department of Transporation, the design soils sections was lead be a geologist. Actually, he had great respect from upper level management. But, even before I started working there, Kermit Dirks was having longitudinal drain tiles installed in the grade on the sides of the pavement. This removed the water in the grade and under the pavement. As for the new highway projects, this included a drainable base under the pavement. As I walked hundreds of miles of foreslopes, these was water coming out of these drain tiles like water comes out of the drain tiles in the backslopes. We knew that we were increasing the pavement life at a rate of forty percent without longitude sub drains. Regarding the highway that I drove, there was not one mile of longitude sub drains installed. This lead to the movement of the pavement, and not just crack. The cost of longitudinal sub drains are not that high on a highway project. It was sad to see pavements being installed without sub drains, know that they are loosing the life of the pavements. Another point that I saw was deterioration of the asphalt surface. Without taking the time to study the asphalt that they are using, it is hard to determine the cause of the surface deterioration. But, when driving on these pavement that are coming to the end of their life cycle, I was only able to drive a 40 to 45 mph when I could have bene driving at 55 to 60 mph. Therefore, as one might guess, there was times when I have a long platoon of vehicles behind me. Not my fault, but the highway department. Ok, I get off of waring my engineering hat, but, physically, I never really wore a hat, unless it was a hard hat.

Now for the high lights. On the south east shores, it was very nerves simulating to go barefoot in the sand, and I could walk for miles. This was one of my highlights.

The igneous rocks are another highlight, and they include black basalt, pink granite, and red rhronolite. With the black basalt at the west end of the lake, it leads off dark blue water making this area of the lake majestic. If one takes the time to walk around Cascade State Park, the water cascades through the rocks making a majestic site. If one goes up Orberg Mountain, or what they call a mountain, the view over basalt rock and the dark blue water is majestic. The northwest side of the lake is the location of the red rhronolite rock, and it is a striking color in that this area of the Lake. The pick granite is on the north side of the lake making it a majestic sight. These rocks make the lake stand out a great place to visit.

The tress also are a highlight, as they are in Hawaii. On igneous rocks, the trees struggle to grow. So, to add to the striking colors of the igneous rocks, are these trees growing in these hard rocks. As a photographer, it is the combination of the igneous rocks and tress against the dark blue water that make a great photo.

The cool temperatures on the east side of the lake were nice this time of the year. With the high heat and high humidity here in the Midwest summers, it is nice to find a cool spot.

As I think back over the trip, it seems like I need to think about were I would go on my next trip around Lake Superior. The trailer was the way to go, since there hotels are few and far between, and, finding a nice hotel, the distances are probably even further apart. But pulling the trailer in some location did give the truck a work out, and I need to think about the need to go to the campsites that are in the location of this long steep hills. I would need to make reservation earlier, since. some of the campground were located near highway, with the highway noise, but they had cellular coverage, were the campsites a distance from the highway had not coverage. I need to think these event through a little bit closer.

Roger