Boreal Access

In 2008 Bearskin Lodge became one of the sponsors of the Hoigaard’s Challenge, three races that are “The ultimate test of Minnesota-ness:”  The City of Lakes Ski Loppet, the Tri-Loppet, and the Trail Loppet.  This weekend the Ski Loppet is being held in Minneapolis and, as has been the case for the past two years, Bearskin will be there. (See http://bearskin.wordpress.com/2008/02/04/city-of-lakes-loppet-or-2-days-in-a-big-plastic-tent/ to read about our first City of Lakes experience.)

This weekend Bearskin will once again have a info table in the big plastic tent on Lagoon and Hennepin Avenues  for Year #3 as a City of Lakes Loppet sponsor.  Quinn and Kate will be at the booth this year, offering an ample supply of Loppet discount coupons, Wilderness Pursuit race entry forms, and general Bearskin Lodge winter and summer  info.  We’re hoping our Bearskin guests will stop in and say “hi.”  We’d love to visit with you!

Wondering why we don’t answer the phone today?  Wishing we’d respond to an e-mail you sent this morning?    We are incommunicado at the moment.

The meltdown of a fiber optic cable in Duluth has left much of the North Shore without phone services, including the area’s major internet service provider, Boreal.  We are able to get on the web via our satellite internet, but can’t access our Boreal e-mail or receive phone calls.  It’s been a very quiet afternoon!

The Duluth News Tribune reports that crews hope to have the cable repaired “today.”  Or not.

Some after thoughts:  This incident should be food for thought for anyone who questions this country’s need to invest more money in the communications infrastructure servicing extremely remote areas.  The accidental meltdown of one cable in Duluth shut down all communications for much of NE Minnesota for most of a day.  There might not be many of us up here, but the emergency, business, and personal communications for a huge section of the state should not be dependent on only one  wire.

Team Bearskin for the Volks Ski 400K: Brittany Burgess, Wendy McAlpine, Kate Vernon, Quinn McCloughan, Jenna and Marv Calvin, Nancy Seaton, Andy McDonnell, Sue Weber, Bob McCloughan and Dave Seaton.

A small but hardy crew of skiers met at 10 AM Saturday here at Bearskin to ski all 77K of the Central Gunflint Trail System.  Our skier’s expertise ranged from “just learned to ski a few days ago” (yay, Brittany, for having the gumption to do a section of the trail) to “started back when skis were wooden.”    Our total time to do the trails was 9 hours, 18 minutes,  or  7 minutes, 15 seconds per K. 

We received a few big donations to PanCan in memory of Dee Peterson in suupport of Team Bearskin, plus we sold a number of purple Volks Ski pins in support of pancreatic cancer research.  Thanks! 

We’ll do it again next year.  Join us!