door county.

occasionally i just need to get the hell out of dodge. today was one of those days. it was (still is) gorgeous outside, and sitting in my apartment all day didn't sound too fantastic.

i've been cooped up without a car lately, since about three weeks ago i got into a pretty lame car accident. the saab was rear-ended and the back shoved in nicely, and it is no longer drivable. so i've been hitching rides with whoever is willing to give one, and also riding my bike around a lot. but today i just needed to get out-out... not just ten miles to the other side of appleton.

i decided to take my camera with me, northeast. it was either door county, or up north along the lakeshore -- but door county won out. not a huge surprise. i love it up there. and on fantastically sunny late-august fridays, it's particularly welcoming.

on my way up to green bay, i passed a convoy of corvettes -- the fox valley corvette club was clearly out for a ride. there had to have been at least twenty, if not closer to thirty ... i was a little bit disappointed there weren't any oldies in with the mix. and i don't even like corvettes.

up in door county itself, it took me one attempt at a photo at cave point county park (the free alternative to whitefish bay state park, although i'm going to check that out someday) to realize the camera battery was all but dead. so there went that idea (the photo above was taken with my mobile phone).

lake michigan is really something, especially on days like this when there's a wind. if it smelled like salt in the air, we might as well have been on the ocean; i was moved enough by this feeling of having gone really, really far to get to this place that i sat down on the edge of a bluff and sun-soaked for a minute, imagining that i was in big sur or somewhere. it's really hard to imagine the smell of salt, though, when all you can smell is fish and lake.

anyway. it was gorgeous. drove up the eastern side of the peninsula, meandering around country roads and trying to avoid hitting the numerous cyclists out enjoying the day.

the northernmost point i reached was ellison bay, where i tried my luck at another county park, only to find that it ended in a gravel road and woods -- which would have been wonderful if only i had brought some decent walking-in-the-woods sort of shoes. on my drive back down the road, though, i happened upon a brand new contemporary home and was architecturally enamored. lots of modular shapes and glass -- something straight out of dwell magazine, and not the typical sort of home up in door county at all. i'm still kind of dribbly about it.

struck gold at an ellison bay used bookshop called wm. caxton ltd. which apparently is also a local publisher. i found a damien hirst book for $25, which was a very good deal -- unfortunately the binding is almost ready to totally give, but this chick does not care. i was super pumped to find that book, and the bookstore -- it was amazing. all of the sections were huge, the shelves suuuuper high, and wayyyy too much material to casually browse in less than a few hours.

made my way back down the busier west side of the peninsula and returned home around 2pm. a short day trip, but well worth it. day trips are definitely ace.