maine wildlife tour

Warmth and worldly flair define a vast riverside estate

The Bielby home is one of seven custom-designed homes and gardens throughout Southwest Michigan on this year's Heartland Alliance for Human Needs & Human Rights Celebration of Home & Garden to be held Saturday, June 11.

A new tour feature is the opportunity to lunch, serenaded by a strolling violinist, in the gardens of a private New Troy estate. Jewell Events Catering will serve locally grown foods and hand-crafted local wines. The home tour supports the Heartland's affordable housing programs. Tickets are available online (heartlandalliance.org), or from Lovell and Whyte, in Lakeside.

Reminiscent of an Old World country estate, the home of Keek and Bill Bielby sits on six and a half acres atop a bluff overlooking the Galien River. Tall trees abound—as do owls and deer, squirrels, and other wildlife.

Terrace gardens surround the home. "I wanted it to feel like a European country home," Keek says. "We chose stucco because that lends a bit of history to a home."

Inside, custom woodwork, old brick, lush fabrics, and a vast array of outsider art add to the feel. A three-season porch features stacked stone around a Rumford fireplace. Another Rumford warms the open family room and kitchen areas.

A seamless walnut butcher block takes center stage in the kitchen, under barrel-vaulted beamed ceilings. Natural white oak floors flow from room to room, inlaid in the dining room with French limestone.

Antique British Colonial double doors lead into a windowed, yet cozy, sitting room. It opens onto a terrace, and is anteroom to the master suite—accessed through another set of antique doors. The ceiling follows the roof line along the back of the house, giving the master bedroom a sloped ceiling. The master bath is divided into a "his" side and a "her" side. Each side has a walk-in closet and a sink. Her side sports a soaking tub and dressing area, his side a large walk-in shower. Stained glass windows lend "a little color, a little light.

Safari « Maine Wilderness Tours

The word is exotic. It beckons to an era of English explorers and porters. Stanley and Livingstone. Hemingway’s treks and his close brushes with death. Big tents with dinners served on fine china and wines poured into crystal.

Safari is actually the Swahili word for journey or trip.

However for me it has always meant adventure. Right out of the Saturday afternoon serial movies that we used to watch at my friends house. I think the show was called “Passport To Adventure” and would run fifteen minute segments of feature length movies. Meaning over the course of six or seven weeks we would actually see the entire movie. We would see the jungle adventures of Alan Quatermain, Tarzan, or even Charlie Allnut (Bogart) piloting the African Queen down the Ulanga River.

My recent trip to Tanzania fulfilled a life long dream of visiting the Dark Continent and going on safari. However I wasn’t visiting the jungles brought to life by Edgar Rice Burroughs, but the Serengeti. Or as the local Maasi call it, the endless plains.

After months of planning with Thomson Safaris, my wife, Carolyn and I made the long journey to Tanzania that included an eight-hour flight from Boston to Amsterdam, and then a ten-hour flight into Kilimanjaro Airport, the major airport serving eastern Tanzania. We still had yet another one-hour hop on a small bush plane to take us to the northeastern tip of the Serengeti. However we were in Africa!

Arrival and the Adventure Begins Fortunately I had built into our trip a two-day layover in Amsterdam and a full day at a game lodge resort near Arusha before we actually began the safari. This was a wise move as we were well rested before arriving at the small Arusha airport for our trip north and gave us an opportunity to visit Arusha National Park. It also pretty much guaranteed that we would have our bags when the safari began. Lost bags are a common problem on these multiple interconnecting trans-oceanic and trans-continental flights.

Maine, The Pine Tree State

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