Fall Color Cruise & Island Festival 2005

I took a total of 530 pictures at this year's festival.

I was now doing primarily digital photography. Project Lakewell was no longer in the picture. Several individuals with Lakewell experience joined Kenn Kuester and the fledgling Teaching & Sharing Center 501c3 non-profit in its first year running the voyageur encampment. We were also joined by Randd Miller who anchored the north end of our camp. The first three pictures are of the set-up on Thursday, October 6th. This was the earliest the festival could take place (second full weekend in October).

The balance of the photos are from Friday the 7th, and Sunday the 9th. I have no image files from Saturday.

As mentioned on other pages, Kenn Kuester (above left) played the role of Father Marquette. When Lakewell decided to discontinue doing the Fall Color Cruise & Island Festival after 2004, Kenn's determination to still do it himself was the motivating factor in our T&SC sponsorship, plus eventually the official establishment of the event as a branch of the T&SC designated Michigan Living History Encounters. Kenn, I, and my daughter Sarah had been helping Lakewell since that first 1990 encampment. So, we had experienced help. What we lacked was a variety of furs to display. Randd had some furs with him. We adjusted our displays to work with the resources available.

Since we only had three MLHE presenters on Friday, I stayed pretty close to our camp, and took no pictures of the other areas on the island. On Sunday with the additions of Mike, Riley, Donna, and Richard, I wandered about getting shots of the rest of the festivities, activities, demonstrations, displays, and several photos of the riverboat.

It is not all just fun and games. After the close of the festival at 5:00p.m. on Sunday, it is time to pack everything up. We were often the last ones off the island, someimes finishing in the dark. Yes, that is me removing logs we did not split into firewood. I also made sure we raked our site, and I would spread grass seed where we had our fire circle.

After all the work, there was one more fun part. On Monday evening following the event John and Karla Chamberlain, the owners of J&K Steamboat, hosted a volunteer cruise aboard their riverboat for those who helped with the three day festival. Vendors, demonstrators, and all aspects of volunteers were welcomed aboard, which included food.