You may not find this terribly rewarding unless you're included here, so this is a good time for casual and random browsers to turn back before they get too caught up in the sweep and majesty of the proceedings and can't let go.
We're sidling past the second largest erratic boulder on the lake, 3 July 2026. Used to it by now.
Cats on a very hot day (11 July 2026)
Lake levels down! It came up to the shrubberies a few weeks ago. (It's the Climate Hoax again!)
There's the fellow with the magical flying hydrofoil again.
I'm sure that I could do that, too, no problems . . . but I'm busy at the moment.
Back to the canal
Look at that -- all the débris's been carted off. Our prayers have been answered!
Including the piles of branches stacked up on either side
An obviously mucky bottom but no piles of unpleasant or even dangerous nasty branches. But it looks like clear sailing once over the mush.
Dare we try that out now? The last time we tried to walk through there, we nearly lost our wonderful inexpensive Simari water shoes.
-- Wait there!
We'll go up for a closer look at how far the sludge bed extends up the canal.
That's not too bad, but it should still take some more work on it.
We'll have to think long and deeply about what to do next here, and . . .
. . . get back to the bike before the north wind tries to push it through the slops.
That a small shrine on the point just across the bay, where our friend Gary the DJ lives, and it subsequently developed that it was he who cleared out the entrance after I'd mentioned that I couldn't hope to get a propeller through there as it was.
Our cats frequently pile up against one another, even during midday naps.
Some cars belonging to the clan members of Mussent Point, parked out in the backyard of our Bjork neighbors.
And some more of them. So kind of the Bjork clan to let us plant them here for a few days, because . . .
. . . the crappy old cattle guard planted at the entrance to the Mussent Point property, chiefly to keep unwelcome wildlife out, is about to be torn up and replaced by a much better one. 13 July 2026
Alas, once partially excavated by a team of excavators, it turned out that there are water and electrical pipes underneath, and time for reflection will be required. The reflection will have to wait for the fall, and in the meantime the understanding excavators kindly supplied a gravel filling.
That's the view three weeks later, nicely tamped down for our cars (though the deer won't be fooled).
Ach, that vile thing is still there! Always, always, in the way!
Choupette and Melvin appear to be discussing something . . . or perhaps conspiring something.
Melvin is, as usual, the more skeptical one.
But apparently some kind of agreement has been reached . . .
. . . though they're not too pleased about having been surveilled by the humans.
Within the past 20 years or so, the water level in the lake was so low that masses of tag alders grew up, and some seriously thrived, along all of the shorelines. Eventually, the water level rose once again, and over the next few years the weaker alders gave it up, but the hardier ones, that had laid down serious root systems, have clung on. (Hint: Those are these.)
The point of Mussent Point has long been afflicted by a mass of these tag alder hangers-on, and one day recently, one of us, thinking that this might make a pleasant swimming spot, set to work to drag out, dig out, and in some cases to handsaw out, whatever could be sent off on its way.
These are the last survivors, desperately hanging onto root systems that probably run 5 or 10 meters back under the shore.
We think of it as cleaning up a rather sloppy vestige of the past untidiness, but as it turns out, the shore here is not that great for swimming anyway. Too many rocks underfoot. We should have guessed that.
And we had to pile all this refuse somewhere (that's about half of it).
Air quality blues
Choupette, in the early morning, has noticed that something's wrong today.
She's right, as usual. It's 15 July and the sky is in extremely bad shape.
The word gets out quickly, with all sorts of weather and air-quality warnings on the web . . . it's all the fault of the Canadians.
Canadian wildfires -- they haven't been raking their 369 million hectares of forest properly, as our Expert Government explained to the California authorities not so long ago.
It's probably also been made worse for us because many of the Canadian firefighters have been down in California helping us out again, as usual.
A Biblical view. Or something from a 1952 sci-fi movie.
Should we just go back to bed and wait it out?
But life goes on -- what could we do without hitting the grocery (beer/wine) stores in town?
Crossing over onto the island of Minocqua
Still, we can't go without our daily hydrobike adventure, right? Oh . . .
. . . this is so embarrassing.
Another try at the canal
Friend Gary the DJ has come over to dig out more of the canal entrance, whilst we've straggled up to the far end of the first tranche, at the entrance into the mid-lake, where . . .
. . . we crashed up onto a new pile of undersea logs and branches. After ten minutes trying to get the bike turned round, with its inconvenient turning circle, we return to pass along the bad news.
So Gary the DJ heads back home to his boathouse across the lake. We'll consider the longterm issues later.
The very unpretty view down the North Bay at the centre island Adjidaumo. We hope this is all over soon.
A distressingly short parade of the Merganser mom and remaining kids. A few families are still sporting up to eight survivors so far.
Returning to Mussent Point on a choppy but fun afternoon
Even cats can question what the Old Harry has gone on here!
Another quick look round the South Bay
(the lake's quietest spot for meditations, reflections, and useless planning)
Zero for basking turtles. We'll pursue this farther into the back cove.
Nothing
Not even on this old favorite
Giving up on the back cove, here's what we all agree must be a lively beaver lodge. Beavers have been seen round here, but they're not talking.
A last horror-movie creepy scare before we look over at . . .
. . . the highway bridge, and head for home.
If we can sneak past this horror movie hydrobike grabber
A vision not seen on this lake before. Very cute. (They all waved . . . they know they're cute.)
Clearing a way through the propeller obstacles
Choupette's miffed at Melvin and wants to continue the argument. Melvin remains mum.
Busted
When the slightly agressive mood is on, Choupette just can't give it up.
Melvin wants no part of it. -- Leave me alone, will you?
Whatever it was, they'll have to settle it later in the day.
25 July 2026, and who do we encounter near the Adjidaumo centre island. Our good friend Kim Schmutzler again (who's obviously an experienced kayaker, given the choppy wakemakers plowing back and forth out here in the centre).
(photo by Kim)
When the skiboats come hauling people past and bouncing our hydrobike wildly up and down, Kim just rides it out calmly, taking it all in stride (so to speak).
Having come back to Mussent Point to visit with Kristin and the others, Kim's bound back to wherever for the night.
Loving cats can usually find their own sleeping arrangements.
The Lake in the Wisconsin Northwoods
Mussent Point is at no. 12.
The text overlays are updating a few names to our current understanding.
The Northwoods Land Trust has produced a 7-min YouTube film, 'Land & Water: the heart and soul of the Northwoods', that features a number of beautiful aerial passes over Lake Katherine.
Next up: Another arboreal catastrophe, a birthday party, and two basking turtles
Dwight Peck's personal website
Feedback
and suggestions are welcome if positive, resented if negative, 
.
All rights reserved, all wrongs avenged. Posted 12 August 2026.
