Split Rock Lighthouse Weblog

What could be more American than lighthouses?  I never mind spending  July 4th at the lighthouse.  While I could have hopped on my motorcycle and ridden into town to watch the fireworks from close up I found it more peaceful, and just as good of a show, to observe from the observation deck at the base of the lighthouse 130 feet above Lake Superior.

This was much better than the Fourth of July ten years ago, the day that the massive storms blew through northern Minnesota washing out Highway 61 and causing the devestating blowdown damage to hundreds of thousands of acres of mature forest in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness just a few miles to the north of the lighthouse.

This Independence Day show was a bonus.  A near-full moon, a clear and warm evening, and a calm breeze made sunset and darkness especially captivating.  From my vantage point next to the lighthouse at a little after 10 p.m. I counted fourteen fireworks displays up and down the North Shore, across the lake in Wisconsin, and even 45 miles away in Duluth and Superior.

Towns from Tofte, Silver Bay, Two Harbors and Duluth in Minnesota to Superior, Port Wing, Cornucopia, Bayfield and Ashland in Wisconsin were celebrating our country’s independence in small town style.  Granted, the displays were pretty small when viewed from where I was standing but to see the flashes and displays of bright explosions followed minutes later by muffled booms over the calm lake added an element you can’t get from up close.

To celebrate in my own way I lit the lighthouse beacon for an hour at sunset.   Not a bad evening after a very busy day at the lighthouse.