MONK & CAMERA Backwoods Blog; in the woods and on the road… The great temptation of modern man is not physical solitude but immersion in the mass of other men, not escape to the mountains or the desert, but escape into…
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SNOW LOAD Backwoods Blog; in the woods and on the road… Last week it was time for annual backwoods winter maintenance, which translates, “Get the damn snow off the roof…” If you want more specific details, check out backwoods blog entry #69 from last…
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SLIDE BANK Backwoods Blog; in the woods and on the road… Last week’s polar-freeze temperatures hit subzero for several consecutive days and the river finally froze (which is a little later than usual). This means the “river ski season” is now open,…
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SKI DOO Backwoods Blog; in the woods and on the road… This is a color slide of my twin sister and I sitting on our childhood snow machine in front of our house (I can barely see over the handlebars). It…
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EXCHANGE HOTEL Backwoods Blog; in the woods and on the road… Last winter I posted a story about the time my father took a load of grain to the grist mill in Houlton back in the 1920s. As you may…
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WINTER SWEAT LODGE Backwoods Blog; in the woods and on the road… In my six decade lifetime I have experienced thousands of campfires, hundreds of saunas but only a handful of traditional sweat lodges. In mid-January I attended my third sweat…
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MLK DAY Backwoods Blog; in the woods and on the road… It has been years since I first read MLK’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail,” one of the great political documents in American history. Martin Luther King, Jr. was only thirty four years old when he…
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MONTICELLO STATION Backwoods Blog; in the woods and on the road… The thermometer hit minus 1 overnight, our first sub-zero temp of the winter. Overall, it’s been relatively mild thus far, nothing much to brag about. I did happen to…
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WINTER SCHOOL BUS Backwoods Blog; in the woods and on the road… In the winters of ’31 and ’32 my father drove school bus for the Littleton school system. Back in those days the driver also had to supply the bus; which…
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NEW YEAR Backwoods Blog; in the woods and on the road.. To perceive freshly, with fresh senses, is to be inspired. Great winter itself looked like a precious gem, reflecting rainbow colors from one angle. My body is all sentient.…