North American Bear Center, Goldeneyes

Yesterday we visited the North American Bear Center near Ely. This is the bears' pool.

How about a bear hug?
This is Lucky, a resident of the bear center since he was 10lbs. He's now around 250.

Meet Ted, another resident at the center. There is a third bear, Honey, but she prefers her own company and we didn't see her. Ted and Honey were both quite overweight when they came to the center in 2007. With the help of a more natural diet and activity, they have lost a lot of weight, but Ted is still heavier than he should be. However he can move around much better now.

This seemed to be Ted's favorite perch, lol.

I think I found the bear from The Great Outdoors! LOL His former owners had him in a concrete-floored enclosure and he sat on his butt a lot, and still does, so the hair hasn't grown back yet.

Mama Goldeneye above, babies below.

A day of canoeing & wildlife...

Momma Loon sitting on her nest, playing dead. When Kelly first spotted her, we thought she was dead, until we paddle up real close and she moved and scared the daylights out of Kelly, LOL! She started freaking out and trying to back-paddle and saying it's red eyes were staring into her soul, haha!

Kelly and I out for a 2nd venture in the canoe after supper.

Kelly on the island we left her on while we fished. She's in the upper pic, too, but you probably can't see her, lol.

Mr. Camera-Shy

Closest I have ever been to a bald eagle, he was magnificent!

Sparkling Sunlight

Don't know if you can tell it from the pics, but the sunlight is sparkling like diamonds on the water....

Kelly and I had a nice day - shopped all day and had lunch in Ely. Dylan lazed around here watching episodes of Mythbusters on his computer.

$250 Lunch

The guided fishing trip was a bust, lol. Worked our butts off taking the boat across two portages each way and didn't catch squat. Barely caught enough for lunch, but it sure tasted good.
Fish Count:
Me: 3 Perch, 1 Smallmouth Bass - 1 perch and the bass just big enough that our guide kept them for lunch because we didn't have anything else at that point, lol.
Dylan: 3 Walleye, 1 Northern, 1 tiny Perch
Kelly: 0
Guide: 0
We came home with Dylan's last Walleye, that was caught after lunch, and that was it. So disappointing. Especially after we saw the neighbors' catch. A whole bunch of walleye and bass - one monster walleye was 7lbs! They fished in the same lake - we should have hired them! LOL Our guide had us lindy rigging most of the time, something none of us had ever done before and completely foreign to our instincts. Tomorrow I'll pick up some more minnows in town and we'll go back to fishing off the dock....

First fish of the trip!

Dylan landed the first fish of the trip - a nice crappie!

Snowmobile Watercross

Mystery waterfowl

While exploring, Kelly was reveling in find "treasures" such as various dead crayfish parts, the remains of a rusty pocketknife, neat rocks, etc. This is the treasure I found. Not sure what they are, other than some kind of baby ducks. We thought they were loon babies at first, until I discovered online that loons only lay 1-2 eggs per clutch, so that ruled out these quints.

Seat Rock

Kelly wanted to go "exploring" along the shoreline, so we put on our crocks and started off. She's just like I was when I came here as a kid. The first thing she discovered was a "seat rock" like I had told her about, so of course she had to try it out:)

We made it!

Stayed overnight in Madison, WI at a nice hotel. Got to enjoy the pool & jaccuzi for an hour, so that was GREAT! Rolled into Ely, MN around 2:30pm yesterday. The location of the resort (PackSack Log Cabins & Canoe Trips) is right along some other houses, so we weren't thrilled with that, but it is pretty here and our cabin is nice. It's not huge but spacious enough and has everything we need for a comfortable stay. I love the screened-in porch overlooking the lake best, which is where I sit while I type this. When we got here yesterday, we were shocked to hear what sounded like motorcycle races going on, rather than the serenity we were expecting, lol. Turns out there are snowmobile watercross races going on at the west end of the lake this weekend. We can watch them from our cabin or the dock. I didn't know you could run a snowmobile on water, but evidently so! As long as they keep moving fast enough - we've seen a few have to get pulled up out of the water that didn't make it.