Cabin Fever
A couple weeks ago, I checked the calendar and realized that the summer--as defined by Scooter's school schedule--was almost over. We hadn't yet had a chance to visit our place near Grand Marais on the North Shore of Lake Superior. So we did some quick organizing, found a cabin available at a nearby resort, and scheduled a last-minute Trip Up North.
Four nights, leaving Saturday and coming back Wednesday (tomorrow, actually--I'll upload this entry when we get home).
After about the first day of the trip, She Who Puts Up With Me and I had a minor epiphany. An epiphanette, if you like. For the past two summers, we've taken the kids on a road trip to Yellowstone. That's four days of driving, a couple of layover days, and three days actually there. Going Up North is only a half-day drive, and we all seem to enjoy it just as much. We get twice as much vacation in our vacation.
This has rekindled talk of building a cabin on our property. Right now, there's nothing there you would reasonably want to stay in: when I was in college, I tried my hand at building a couple small structures (a gazebo and an A-frame cabin), but the gazebo is now falling down, and the A-frame never got finished since I ran out of time. We don't want to camp in tents with two kids who are still toilet-training, so we pretty much have to stay at a hotel or resort.
The cabin we're renting this trip is just the sort of thing I'd like to have: it is basically a house in the woods, with all the amenities like electricity, hot and cold water, a full kitchen, three bathrooms with showers, etc. I don't feel like I have to prove I can live like my ancestors in the woods. Just being among trees and near water is sufficient.
Actually building our cozy little nest in the woods is a different issue. Any construction project is going to have to begin with road improvements: about 3/4 mile of forest road would have to be widened to accommodate construction trucks, and depending on the building site we select, up to an additional half mile of road may have to be built through the forest. We're probably talking $25,000 (minimum!) in road improvements alone. It could easily be more, since I think some of the best building sites are up on a ridge overlooking Lake Superior, a good quarter mile from where the existing road runs.
There's other issues, too. Power will probably have to be off-grid, since we're 3/4 mile from the nearest power line. Being off-grid in the middle of the forest can be challenging, since the trees block solar panels (unless we clear some of the forest around the cabin), and wind power means building a tower considerably higher than the tallest trees. It would be visible for miles, and might not even be allowed as an eyesore in the middle of the woods.
For now, dreams of a cabin are just that--at least until we have the time and money to start making it a reality. Someday, perhaps, this dream will come true.