I think you have a pretty good plan!  Nothing like warming the old bones after a hunt.  Let us know if the plan comes together.  I always said that I would continue to hunt as long as I could get that feeling of anticipation beforehand and the excitement after the shot and thank god I still have both as it sounds like you do as well.  Tom

That IS the sauna. 6x12'. With the exception of milling the logs, built entirely with handtools. It was a personal challenge to see if I could do it. Short of shooting, it may be the most addicting thing I have ever done. At -30 my beard freezes solid in a couple seconds but otherwise I can stand outside several minutes to cool down.

SBoomer wrote on Nov 14^th, 2018 at 10:49am:


Wonderful!! 
Given the neat appearance of the outside, inside must be quite nice too.

Looking a little closer at what you built and its Northern Michigan location, my thoughts go quickly to all the Finns and Swedes and Norwegians that worked the iron mines there and the Finns and Finland-Swedes that had extensive financial and other connections with copper, etc. mines at Teluride, Colorado and elsewhere (Park City, Utah is one). I knew little about all this until I read a book by a Finland-Swede Lars Sund. He did extensive research on these two concentrations of Finns, Swedes and Norwegians, primarily about Finns and Finland-Swedes, folks that owned iron mines in Michigan and copper mines in Colorado in late 1800s-early 1900s and sold shares in these mines to Finns and Swedes, mostly in Finland. I would presume that you have some ancestral connectivity to those folks.

Lars Sund even wrote a well-researched historical novel about the Finns and Finland-Svensk in Teluride, CO, as well as other book(s) about those in Michigan. Some few decades back the Finns made a film based on this historical novel  -- it is called Colorado Avenue after main street in Teluride. Last I knew film is only in Finnish. On our first trip to Teluride we almost crossed paths with the Finnish film crew (which was to have arrived same day as us) and were able to answer a bunch of questions from Teluride's Mayor, etc. as to why a Finnish film crew was coming to Teluride. We had our autographed copy of Lars Sund's book, which has never been translated to English. 

Thanks for awakening some nice memories.

Bear tag? We can't talk about using a .32-20 on a bear anymore, yu otta no that.

calledflyer wrote on Nov 16^th, 2018 at 12:10pm:

Sorry, I didn't think about the caliber.  I used to always get a bear tag for season overlap.  Just wondering if bear are that common in Michigan?

You and that ol' shooter get yerselves an attaboy. Nicely done!