Ginormous. If you need a location for your family reunion, convention or major league sporting event, our deck should provide plenty of room. Now taking reservations...

Finally, some progress. The footings are all done and we've got all of the posts in. The section attached to the house is coming along. The ledger and joist hangers are in. Now we just need to square it all up and frame it in.

A look at the lovely, bombproof slab of concrete that we tried to take out. It was over 14" thick in some spots. A typical highway is half that thick. I voted for dynamite, but settled for building over the top of it.

Deck
8 footings down, 5 to go. Now that it hasn't been in the 90's everyday we've been making some progress. I'm hoping to have the footings done in the next few days and start on the posts and beams this weekend. Amazingly, we only have pawprints on one of the footings.

End of Season
The end of a long race season is finally within sight. No more road races or crits and only a handful of mtb races left. Skipping the 24 Hours of Afton this year and focusing on the big one: 24 Hours of Moab in October. Time for some long hours on the mountain bike and some night rides. (photo courtesy of SkinnySki.com)

Gunflint Trail
It seems once again we have averted disaster on the Gunflint Trail/BWCA. 6 years ago we were camping up here only days before "The Blowdown" flat-line windstorm that leveled huge swaths of the wilderness. This year we avoided a 1,000 acre forest fire by less than a week. I claim no responsiblity for either event.

MOOSE!
After visiting the North Shore for about 10 years, we finally saw a moose. Apparently moose keep up to date on the latest trends in American culture, as this one stayed in exactly the same spot for several hours doing nothing but eating.