It’s easy. Just reach into your screen, let your fingers do the walking to 47.9638° N, 89.6848° W, snatch a few needles from a white cedar, balsam fir or black spruce, roll and crush them between your finger tips, hold them to your nose and INHALE.
I know, I know. That’s virtually impossible, but I’m sure AI or some sort of augmented reality will make it happen soon (there’s an app for that!)
Until then, I’ll do my best to describe what I hope heaven will smell like.
Call it a read-and-sniff moment.
Hmm, let’s see. Wildly sweet notes with hints of boreal tanginess? The clear, cool Canadian air allowing the aromatic compounds to operate at maximum molecular capacity? Or try this: remember dumping the water out the Christmas tree stand when you were a kid? (Provided it held a balsam, cedar or spruce). Sort of like that thing, but without the New Year’s Day rancidness. That woody, resinous thing that rushed up your nose and blew away the cerebral fog of post-holiday depression and took you right back to the moment you ripped into your Barbie doll, G.I. Joe, ugly sweater, Lionel train set or Easy-Bake Oven?
Here, though, it’s a year-round gift.
All you have to do is do what I did a couple of hours ago: take a walk down the Pigeon River trail with the roaring sound of a 130-foot waterfall in your ears and do as suggested in Paragraph #1.
But of course, to make that possible, you’ll just have to pack your thermals, Department-of-Defense-strength bear spray, hiking poles, Anishinaabe phrase book and come with me next summer! Which brings me around to…
Other items to report:
God willing and the Nomadkins creek don’t rise, I’ve been invited back to volunteer at Grand Portage next season. Which, if it wasn’t apparent by now, is a thrilling—and olfactory-stimulating—proposition.👃🌲
Good knee news! After donning my flannel shirt and slipping into my knee brace, I carefully hoofed it 1.86 miles this morning (during my “aromatherapy” hike). All the credit goes to Treg, my physical therapist who also happens to be a fur trapper. If you’d like to know the many ways to prepare a beaver tail so it’s a tad less “chewy,” he’s your man.
Departure date is Saturday, September 16th. Tentative itinerary: Southbound to the headwaters of the Big Muddy (but crystal clear and drinkable at Lake Itasca), over the Big Sioux River, across the Missouri, a mind-numbing interstate cruise through the Midwest, overnight with new friends in Kansas, then finally terminate at my favorite North Mississippi campground for a few weeks. After that? Only my tattered old Rand McNally Road Atlas knows for sure.
As always, I’m endlessly grateful for your readership and interest!
Peace & Love,
Mark
This week's scratch-and-sniff moment.