Saturday August 7 Iron Mountain, Michigan

Well, we got the sheeting on the roof yesterday - hauled the sheeting up by hand, and nailed like crazy. We had access to a nail gun, and boy does that speed things up. And, the ladies' team prepared all door and window frames for early next week, when they will arrive on site.

Our aim is to leave the house totally enclosed so that interior work can continue as the weather gets cold.

We're all quite sad that we can't finish the house before we go; we'd love to help Aimee and Joe move in, but the house won't be ready for quite a while yet, as after we leave there are just a few volunteers who donate 1 full day per week to continue the work.

Last night we went to a 'fish fry' at the local Elks Club - some of the folks in our group are members, so they signed us in. While tasty, the most memorable element was the salad bar - the only lettuce I've seen all week! We are being fattened up I think for next week. I may treat myself to a big salad tonight, just because I can!!!

This morning we went to a old iron mine, in nearby Vulcan, Michigan. We went into the mine in a little train, and about 1000 feet into the mountain. I believe we were 300 feet below the surface, though we had gone in horizontally. The bats graciously shared the space with us.

It was quite spectacular - at one point, the mine had caved in (after it had closed because of the economy, in 1945), leaving a huge cavern 700 feet across, 180 feet high, and, in one place, 1400 feet deep - quite an exciting vista, but couldn't get a good photo.

This mine was interesting to me, because I had visited a silver mine in northern Ontario a few weeks ago, and while they had to take out several hundred tons of ore to get one ounce of silver;the iron ore here in Michigan was 55% iron, meaning much less was taken out to get at the iron. Evidently the ore was shipped by train to Gary Indiana for processing.

There, your history lesson for the day. And to top it all off, here's a picture of me in a hard-hat. It may be a while before you see that again!!!

Now, off to do laundry - my clothes have more dirt in them than they do fabric. And they're held together by very lady-like perspiration :)