How does one celebrate a summer solstice, the longest day of the year, the beginning of summer? Well, first don’t forget to plan ahead. I missed it. Second, you need to have the perfect evening…and we did…when we celebrated the longest day of the year a week later.
When I went to bed on June 20th I realized I had let the summer solstice come and go without fanfare. So, I decided to plan a belated celebration. We invited some friends to join us at Nerstrand Big Woods State Park for a picnic. The afternoon was a lovely Minnesota summer day with “just-right” temperatures and low humidity. Which, in turn, made for a beautiful summer evening.
We did a variety of things. First, we went on a nice hike, through the woods and around the campground. Next we built a bon fire (and I burned some old journals – I still have a few more to burn). We grilled brats over the fire and ate typical picnic fare. Yum.
While eating dessert we each read out loud a few poems we had found about the summer solstice. We enjoyed each one.
There happened to be a Naturalist program in the park that evening, All about Owls. The timing fit into our schedule so we went. Andy, the naturalist at Nerstrand, does a great job and we learned several nuggets about owls. The park has started offering more naturalist programs and we’ve attended a few, and alway enjoy gleaning information from Andy.
After the program we rekindled our campfire and made s’mores. I brought an opened bag of marshmallows that were kind of stuck together. We managed to roast a few for our s’mores, and then threw the other big blob of marshmallows into the fire.
I bought some sparklers to help us celebrate. Lo and behold, they were duds…we all remembered that term in relation to fireworks from when we were kids. We threw the duds into the fire pit and there they lit up and made beautiful sparkles amongst the flames. But fireflies made an appearance too, and let their light shine around us. They were better than sparklers.
Last but not least, as we were getting ready to leave we noticed the big, beautiful moon shining bright through the trees, almost full (2 days to go). That was an unexpected treat as it had clouded over and we didn’t expect to see it.
The most remarkable thing of all? We were out in this state park from 3:30 – 9:30 pm and did not have one mosquito bother us. We didn’t slap any, see any, or hear any…it was amazing, and certainly added to the enjoyment of the Minnesota outdoors. We had a great time celebrating summer.
And now… the days are getting shorter…
