Trips

It shouldn’t be too much of a surprise that the North Shore of Lake Superior is a crowded place in the summer. When planning our Duluth adventure, The Adventuress and I looked at each of the state parks, but only found one that 1.) had a campsite available for two nights, and 2.) did not involve a long hike from the car to the campsite. The park that we found ended up not being on the North Shore, but was close enough.

Adventuress is a nature gal, and heard about a Bioblitz happening at Ft. Pierre National Grasslands in the middle of June. Naturally, the first thing I asked was “What’s a bioblitz?” “Oh, it’ll be great! We’ll meet with a bunch of other nature types and inventory all the plants we come across.” I’m usually suspicious of anything involving other people, but Adventuress seemed intent on doing this. So, at the end of the work week we piled into the car with Adventure Dog and headed south to Pierre.

On a recent trip to northeast Minnesota, The Adventuress and I decided to make the trek to Eagle Mountain. The weather reports kept showing that Monday would be rain free, so we took the day and headed up the North Shore. The weather was perfect for the hike, and getting there was a breeze (with only minor delays for road construction). The highest point in Minnesota is supposedly also one of the most remote of the highest points in the U.S. If you measure remoteness by availability of cell phone signals, this is probably true. Minnesota is also the state with the highest point located the closest to the lowest point, at Lake Superior. In the end, this means that its a relatively short trip to dip your toes in the cool waters of the lake after the hot hike to the summit. For all the guff that North Dakota gets about being flat, it turns out that at 2300 feet, Eagle Mountain is 1200 feet lower than White Butte (ND’s highest point at 3500 ft).

After the madness of the weekend, post rush hour San Francisco was pretty tame. It took a few minutes to figure out how to get down to the airport, but that trip went smoothly. Soon, my rented Hyundai Accent was zipping down the 101 towards Palo Alto, and eventually towards Groveland. The GPS continually guided me east, across the bay and through the hills on the east side. The urban jungle gave way to rolling hills covered in tall, tan grass and spread out trees. The countryside looked a lot like western North Dakota, only with more tress. After crossing the Don Pedro Reservoir (which appeared a good deal lower than normal), it was back into the hills.

Woke up with the sun. This is getting to be a habit. I actually slept really well, must be getting used to this pad. To bad I’m not staying another day or two. Right as I was about to break camp, it rained. Fortunately, it only lasted a couple minutes, but the tent and ground tarp had to be packed out wet. Paddled back to the portage. The lake was quite a site. A rock just outside of the bay had a vaguely bird like top. The top of the rock stood up, pooped, and waddled to the water. The “rock” turned out to be a grebe, sitting on a rock.

The aches and pains set in this morning, it took a little while to get going. Fortunately, I had some ibuprofen along, which helped me function enough to start moving. The portage to Hassel wasn’t too bad, but a bit long. Shoes were the footwear of the day, I think my landings and launches were cleaner because of my new footwear. I lost my sandals when I took the canoe, fortunately they were easy to find. A valuable lesson learned: if it isn’t strapped down don’t expect it to be there the next time you look.

The goal today was Battle Lake, and it was a battle to get there. The sleepless nights had caught up, and so I started out later than I wanted. Breakfast today was reconstituted hash browns and a western omelet (powdered eggs). The cooking process was a little more involved than I would have liked, especially for a day when I was going to break camp. It wasn’t until almost 9am that everything was loaded up and I got underway.

Not long after I had fallen asleep, I awoke to the sound of rain pattering on the tent. Normally, the rainfly would handle it, but there’s more stuff involved this time around and not everything fits into the tent. A quick inventory from memory didn’t turn up anything that would get too damaged from the rain. “The food bag!” flashed in my mind, as I leapt up and ran outside. Wait, should I bring it in? Wasn’t there a lot of advice indicating its a really bad idea to bring your food inside your tent? I came to a quick compromise and set the bag next to the tent, then gathered up the remaining external gear, like the fishing pole and life jacket, and piled them next to the tent. There was a “Now what?” moment, until I remembered the tarp. With it being pitch black and raining, there wasn’t much time to plan out a proper strategy to hang the thing, so it was just draped over the tent and miscellaneous gear. After staking and tying down the tarp, I called it good and crawled back inside to the still dry tent.

Sleep is hard to come by when you’re already keyed up, and you have to get up by a certain time that’s way earlier than the usual wakeup time. Carousing boy scouts don’t help the situation any. Five AM finally arrived. Time to get dressed, pick up the gear, and head out. I dropped the gear off in the outfitter’s van, and wandered over to the gas station for breakfast. A peanut butter crispy bar and coffee, breakfast of champions! I was alert enough to notice that we were about to take off without some necessary gear, like a paddle and life jacket. Apparently my driver was less awake than I was. After that was straightened out, we headed out right about 6 AM.

Saturday morning, I said goodbye to the folks and Anna, and hit the road. The drive from the cabin to Ely was long and mostly uneventful. As I drove north and east, corn and wheat fields gave way to pine forests. The thick trees caused the satellite radio to cut out annoyingly frequently. One bridge went across a small stream, the sign said “Mississippi River”. Ely is a tourist town. It seems like every other building on the main drag (Sheridan Avenue) is a canoe outfitter. I found Voyageur North <http://www.vnorth.com/>__ on the east side of town, and checked in. John, one of the owners, welcomed me, and walked me through the area I’d be in. The wild blueberries are in season, and it doesn’t sound like bears are an issue in the area around Crab Lake. John also showed me the food bag, and walked me through all the gear they provided. It was a lot to absorb, fortunately printed notes were included.