Wild, wild life
One of the downsides of living so close to the city is that we don't exactly have abundant wildlife here. There are occasional exceptions--such as a few weeks ago when we were awoken at 3:00am by a loud noise outside and I looked out the window and it was a raccoon trying to get into our neighbors' trash cans--but by and large we mostly just have your usual garden-variety nuisances like squirrels. So a trip to Wisconsin, especially up north, is always a treat because there's usually a better-than-even chance that we'll see something interesting. This trip wasn't terribly exciting in that regard, but we did have a few sightings.
For example, one day we were walking down the street near the cabin when a deer bolted across the road in front of us (as referenced in Nanci's comment on the dangerous intersection). The deer was followed by a sweet old lady who proceeded to tell us that she feeds the deer every day, and that she calls her "Honey". Then, when we were walking back 20 minutes later or so, the sweet old lady came running out of her house to give us a couple of pictures of Honey since we didn't have our camera with us. (I'm telling you, this is the sort of thing that happens in Wisconsin.) Anyway, later in the week we did have our camera with us when Honey made an appearance. I know most people who live with deer consider them to be pests (just like we don't understand why tourists here take pictures of squirrels), but I don't care--any deer sighting is cool with me (Baby also thought it was pretty cool because she started laughing and panting at it like it was a dog):
Otherwise, most of our sightings other than chipmunks and neighbors' dogs were of the avian variety. We saw big families (or should I say gaggles?) of geese...
...and ducks (a paddling?) that swam right past our dock...
...and even a lone loon, which is pretty much the unofficial symbol of the North Woods and gets bonus points for being on the Canadian dollar coin...
...otherwise there were plenty of mosquitoes and flies and spiders, but that's not so exciting, is it?
For example, one day we were walking down the street near the cabin when a deer bolted across the road in front of us (as referenced in Nanci's comment on the dangerous intersection). The deer was followed by a sweet old lady who proceeded to tell us that she feeds the deer every day, and that she calls her "Honey". Then, when we were walking back 20 minutes later or so, the sweet old lady came running out of her house to give us a couple of pictures of Honey since we didn't have our camera with us. (I'm telling you, this is the sort of thing that happens in Wisconsin.) Anyway, later in the week we did have our camera with us when Honey made an appearance. I know most people who live with deer consider them to be pests (just like we don't understand why tourists here take pictures of squirrels), but I don't care--any deer sighting is cool with me (Baby also thought it was pretty cool because she started laughing and panting at it like it was a dog):
Otherwise, most of our sightings other than chipmunks and neighbors' dogs were of the avian variety. We saw big families (or should I say gaggles?) of geese...
...and ducks (a paddling?) that swam right past our dock...
...and even a lone loon, which is pretty much the unofficial symbol of the North Woods and gets bonus points for being on the Canadian dollar coin...
...otherwise there were plenty of mosquitoes and flies and spiders, but that's not so exciting, is it?
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