The Cabin

"The Cabin on the North Shore"
When first hearing this term, "the north shore of Lake Superior," I wondered why people felt compelled to make that distinction. I assumed it was like "Northern Virginia", where I lived at the time (being part of the Washington metropolitan area sets it apart from the rest of the state). But, Superior is the largest of the Great Lakes and borders on three U.S. states (Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota), plus Ontario, Canada; and if you follow a path around the lake, Michigan and Wisconsin border the south side and then the road turns to the east and you follow the north side of the lake through Minnesota and Canada, before it turns south to join Michigan again. So, in this part of the country, when someone says "the north shore" you know they’re talking about Minnesota.
To reach the Snure Cabin from Minneapolis, it’s a two and a half hour drive to Duluth and another two hours to Grand Marais. There we stop to provision before continuing the twenty minute drive to the cabin in Hovland. Mid-June is a good time to be here - it’s starting to warm up (55º when we arrived) and the mosquitoes have not yet arrived (I guess they fly south for the winter?). Son, Scott, and family officially opened the cabin this year during spring break in April (they’re a hearty bunch).
Doug has been coming to this area since 1938 to stay in a 1929 vintage cabin which was later sold by the Snure family but still stands where the nearby Brule River joins Lake Superior. Doug especially remembers one glorious summer, in 1945, when he, older brother Frank, baby brother Rand and his mother, spent the entire summer at the cabin known as "Shingobe." Frank once told us of that summer: "During the days of World War II, not much was going on in Cook County so far as tourism was concerned. We had no means of transportation during those two and a half months. We walked down to a neighbor’s, Dr. Carl Fay, to use the telephone to order groceries. We then walked to Highway 61 with a wheelbarrow for the trip home to the cabin. We also walked to the other side of Naniboujou (a lodge that is still in operation today) to get our milk and cream from a farmer. Those were fun days."
Doug and his brother, Frank, began building the current log cabin, at the mouth of Carlson Creek, in 1978. It has been enjoyed over the years by many families of Snure children, grandchildren and friends.
In the summer of 1999, Doug and I came here on our own boat. The 41-foot DeFever trawler was the perfect boat for doing the "Big Loop," which is basically a circumnavigation of the eastern part of the U.S. We started on the west coast of Florida (Venice) in April, made our way across the Okeechobee Canal to the east coast and up the intra-coastal waterway to New York. We continued up the Hudson, Champlain and Richelieu Rivers into Canada. Following the St. Lawrence and Ottawa Rivers, we transited the Rideau Canal system into Lake Ontario and the Trent Severn Waterway into the Georgian Bay of Lake Huron. The locks at Sault Ste Marie took us into Lake Superior where we made our way along the Michigan Coast and then over to Grand Marais, MN. Several family members were there to greet us and we ended up spending a couple of weeks at the cabin before heading back to Florida, via Lake Michigan and the rivers back to the Gulf of Mexico and to our slip at Casey Key, FL. After so many years of coming here by car, it was a real thrill for Doug to arrive by boat. It was such a momentous occasion that it was written up in the local newspaper, The Cook County News Herald
Today, we had lunch at Naniboujou Lodge, which was first opened in the 1920s as an ultra-exclusive private club. Babe Ruth, Jack Dempsey and Ring Lardner were among its charter members. A membership of 1,000 was envisioned, but when the stock market crashed, beginning the 1929 depression, the club began to fail. The club eventually was foreclosed and sold in the mid-30s. Today you find a revitalized Naniboujou but still reflecting the aura of the 1920s. It’s now on the National Register of Historic Places and boasts Minnesota’s largest native rock fireplace which stands in the 30 x 80-foot Great Hall, which is brilliantly decorated in designs of the Cree Indians. The Arrowhead Room, a cozy sunroom with an outdoor feel, is used by guests for afternoon tea, board games and reading. There are no televisions or phones in the lodge’s rooms (and no cell phone coverage here) which generates a feel for a bygone era.
Back at the cabin, we built a fire and enjoyed curling up with our books and watching the fog creep in from the lake. Having no internet connection or cell phone coverage forces us to relax and enjoy playing cards, board games, hiking and reading. As someone once said, "How are you going to get away from it all if you take it all with you?" We have a fully equipped kitchen here. Sometimes a little too "fully" - when family members get something new, the first thought is "take the old one to the cabin." But it all gets sorted out on a rotating basis. Being here always makes us want to cook "comfort foods" like beef stew with dumplings (which Doug made last night), chicken and biscuits, chili and cornbread and hearty soups. And then there are the pies and cobblers - particularly using blueberries which grow here (unfortunately not this time of year).
This is a vertical log cabin with two porches, one off the kitchen and another facing Lake Superior and it’s rocky beach. It’s a simple, open floor plan of kitchen, dining area (with a view), living room (same view), bathroom and a ladder to the sleeping loft. The loft has a king-size bed at one end and at the other, one single and two double beds. As some family members get older there has been a desire to have a downstairs bedroom, which we hope to build during our stay here this time. Our other hope is to screen one of the porches for more comfortable outdoor seating during mosquito season. That may have to wait for a future visit. There’s an outhouse as well which looks out on the Lake and purposely has no door. That takes a little getting used to but you soon realize how private this spot is. There are cabins on each side of us but the woods between create a lot of privacy. We’re also on a cove, so boats going by (which there are few) are very far out on the Lake.
Up here, in addition to Lake Superior, you’re virtually surrounded by lakes and streams for fishing and canoeing. You can also hike through acres of unspoiled forest and enjoy one of our favorite hikes: along the Brule River to Devil’s Kettle. East of here is Old Fort William in Thunder Bay, Canada (we’re only about 20 miles from the border), where you can tour the fort and museum and enjoy one of their many summer festivals. Grand Marais now has several restaurants, (including Sven & Ole’s Pizza and Birch Wood Terrace Supper Club), art galleries, many quaint stores and boutiques and even a golf course. One of our favorite spots is the "World’s Best Donut" shop where they encourage you to get a logo coffee mug to take on your travels and send back photos of you with your mug, which they have displayed all over the shop. Their donuts are superior (no pun intended) to Krispy Kreme and Dunkin’ Donut and may actually be the world’s best.