Loading ourselves, water bottles, bug spray, bicycles, and our cameras on the ferry for the short trip to Grand Island, Lea and I aren’t sure what to expect. The massive island has been in our sights the whole trip, resting just a half mile across the water from our campground, and looking in all its grandness like much more than an island. It is somehow part of the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, somehow part of the Hiawatha National Forest, and somehow also inhabited by people who live in private residences. All we know for sure is to take the mosquitoes seriously. They can be bad up here in the UP anyway, but Lea is very allergic to the bites, and gets impressive welts that last for days.
We’ve both taken our film cameras with us for this trip, and my older smartphone has a deteriorating battery life, so we are saving its use purely to keep track of time. The last ferry will leave the island at 6pm, and we do not want to be stranded for a night alone on the island without adequate protection, which is precisely what would happen.
After exiting the ferry and slathering ourselves again with the bug spray, we refer to the rather cryptic map of the island’s dirt roads, and pedal toward what we think will be beaches. The drone of the mosquitoes around our heads is so loud that we take off at a good pace, mostly out running them, but the terrain is quite rocky (even on the gravel roadway), and very hilly, so we are often creeping along just barely ahead of the bugs.
We discover we have taken a wrong turn, but also discover a very old cemetery, and then a great trail through the forest that eventually leads us to the water. We have our small picnic on the beach, where the soft breeze keeps the mosquitoes away. After lunch and some quiet shore time, we climb higher into the interior and after a couple hours make our way to the high cliffs overlooking Lake Superior crashing into the rocks below. We follow this trail back down the western edge of the island, stopping to take pictures here and there. Using film is a wonderful experience in itself. The smartphone/digital camera has filled our worlds with amazing images, but with only 36 exposures to a roll, I find that I am much more selective and mindful of what I choose to freeze in time. There is no immediate satisfaction of seeing the shot either – we will wait weeks for these to get developed. I find that I remember each shot I took, wondering what it will look like when I get it back, whereas with my smartphone, I often forget I’ve even taken some photos until I’m scrolling through to find something else.
I love that Lea is into film as well, having made room in her suitcase to bring her 35mm from Switzerland for this trip. By the end of the day, after discovering a shipwreck that’s washed up on shore, after bicycling and swimming and swatting at skeeters, we make it back to the ferry in plenty of time, and rather than staring at our phones like most of the others on the boat, we rest against the seat and take in the bay, the waves, and the water, recalling the day in our mind’s eye, which feels like something I haven’t done in a long, long time.
