January 29 Beckoned by the sunlight ...

Friday:  I had a bunch of household "goals" to accomplish this morning and I checked each one off the list! It was nearly 2:00 in the afternoon before I actually looked outside for any length of time and noticed that it was no longer overcast but actually CLEAR and SUNNY. I considered driving out to Muskegon to the north side of the channel because I've heard there are ice caves out there ... but going alone to an ice cave doesn't sound very safe--does it? 

Then I remembered there was a whole bunch of trails I hadn't explored over at Aman Park--for one, I hadn't found Mr. Aman's grave yet! It was noted on a crude map, and I wanted to find it. I'm not very good at finding graves (i.e. my mother's) ... but I drove over to the Park with the intention to find it.

Here it IS! Jacob Aman is buried beneath this rock out in HIS woods! Who was this guy anyway? I looked up a few brief articles this afternoon about him. These noted that he was born in Ohio in 1849 and lived until June 28, 1928 when he died of pneumonia. He moved to Michigan and purchased a 10 acre farm known as Sand Creek Farm and lived there for the rest of his life. He acquired a whole bunch of land surrounding his farm during his lifetime. The entire area was known as Sand Creek Valley. He bequeathed ALL of it to the City of Grand Rapids upon his death--to be kept a virgin forest and made a park so that others could enjoy the beauty as he had done throughout his life. Thank you, Mr. Aman! 

I also read that Mr. Aman was an inventor, an accomplished carpenter, but kind of a reclusive person. I'll have to read more about him at a later time.

I took 139 more photos in the park today. After finding Jacob's grave, I took the "loop" that wound around to the opposite side I hiked the other day. It is just as beautiful over here ... but no bridge.

I have many more photographs to consider editing--perhaps I will post those later. Before I left my house to drive out to Aman Park, I got on the internet to see just how far further Lake Michigan was--just in case I got a hankerin to see the sunset over at Kirk Park ... I'll show you those pictures later.