Out on this peninsula sits one of the coolest old homes that I’ve ever found. Accessible only by air, it has a fantastic view of a lake on three sides.

Meticulously built from a wide variety of stone, this home sits in a spot that used to have a road long ago…but that road sits well underwater these days. I drove as close to it as I could but I was still a long distance away.

Incredibly scenic, but sadly just too far away from…well…anything. Near what some would call a ghost town, I suppose…but otherwise isolated, this stone house is one of my all-time favorites.

Not too long after I’d found the happy barn (which I posted about last week), I came upon this one. I’ve photographed it before, and it doesn’t look as if it’s fallen any more than it had the last time I’d stopped by, but it is definitely not in the same condition as the smiley-face one.

Sadly, this barn has been collapsing for some time. Fortunately, it’s still likely to be striking a photogenic pose for a while yet.

Naturally, if there is an opportunity for a windmill or a well, I’m gonna take it. Thankfully, there was this this fantastic specimen standing nearby.

Oh yeah – there’s this building right next to the barn. Isn’t it glorious? That brick. The roof that used to be there. The row of windows. And a fortunate sky. Some days it’s better to be lucky than good!

I’ll have to keep an eye on this old farmstead the next time I’m in the area. Of course, you’ll see the results here.

This schoolhouse sits in the town of Griffin, which some would label as a ghost town. I don’t know about that, but I didn’t take the time to find out. This was a surprise discovery I saw from the road as I was bolting further west for a couple of photo targets.

This is the Langberg School, located in the far southwest corner of the state. The storms which had clouded the skies just a short while earlier had moved on, giving me a nice, sunny summer backdrop for this photo.

It’s sad to see these old schools in such disrepair, just like the churches and farmsteads. But they’re incredibly photogenic, and fun to hunt down (and discover along the way).

I’ve passed this old farmhouse on Highway 83 innumerable times. I’d marked it in my GPS as a place worth investigation years ago. I finally seized an opportunity to check it out one evening (as you can tell by the long shadow), and it did not disappoint.