Boundary Waters Day 4
The fourth day in The Boundary Waters was our last, and shortest, because we were to be picked up at 3pm.
Again, the day started slowly as we had blueberry pancakes and hash browns with the requisite hours of cook time. After I had attacked the frying pan and gotten it as clean as I thought it was going to get, which wasn't clean enough to allow plausible deny ability of the fact that we used it in the fire, Jon scrubbed the frying pan like a mad man and got it that clean. Whew, we weren't going to need to buy them a new pot set.
We decided that we wanted to a hike instead of paddling. We'd had enough of paddling, and we were going to get a couple of miles of paddling even if we wanted to hike.
We found a hiking loop near the south east side of Snowbank. That would good for two reasons, it was a loop which makes hiking it quickly easier, and it was near our pickup point which meant we could spend more time hiking. We brought our lunch and planned to have it on our hike.
Cleaning up camp didn't take too long as our gear was fairly minimal. We did a quick two minute loop around our island to check it out and were on the water at about 11:30am, heading for the short trail that's supposed to take us to the hiking loop. We got to the south-east corner of Snowbank, which was heavily populated with fisherman in motorboats, and tried to find our trail head.
I tried to steer clear of the fishermen, not wanting to get yelled at for scaring away their fish, but our obvious lack of fishing gear and random paddling around the lake caused some of them to take note of us. One asked us if we had heard the weather report. We hadn't. He said the forecast was calling for storms today. A quick check of the skies showed that it was a definite possibility.
We headed for the next cove as a couple of fishermen sped towards us. They were not speeding to get to the best fishing hole, but instead came to ask us if we were lost. We told them we were looking for a trail down on this end of the lake and one of them responded "Oh yeah, it's not used anymore. It's not maintained anymore." He didn't know where the trail might be. We decided to land and Jon would walk into the woods hoping to stumble across the trail.
A few minutes after wandering through the woods, Jon reported that he had found a trail and that it was marked with orange tags. Mike and I backed the canoe out of the cove we were in and headed for the adjacent cove where Jon came out. There was a log that had been worn down, like when a canoe hits it head on, and there was a clear trail that looked like it hadn't been maintained for a few years. We figured this was the trail we were looking for.
Mike set a waypoint on his GPS at our canoe so we could be certain of finding our way back out. We followed the trail about a hundred yards into the woods only to find it abruptly end. There were no more orange tags to be found. We could see a blue tag, and Jon found a couple more, but they were in a straight line and didn't have any walkable path near them. Jon hiked farther into the woods only to find a similar set of grey and red tags, but no trail. After about 10 minutes of searching, and getting eaten by mosquitoes, we backtracked and called it a no-go.
It was about 1pm and we decided to head for an island to eat lunch. Lunch was a simple beef stick and banana chip affair. As we were finishing lunch, the weather turned ugly and it started to rain. We were uncertain of the length or intensity of the rain, so we quickly finished eating and headed towards our pickup point. I don't think anyone wanted to relive the stormy/windy/choppy seas of the previous day. We were quick to get off the island before the water got a chance to get nasty.
We made it to our pickup point at about 2pm and hung out until close to 3pm when our pickup arrived. Once back at the outfitter's, they checked our canoe's various scrapes with the back of their hand and it passed muster. They said that we should head down to the office to check out, and in about 15 minutes they would call down to say if we were clear to leave or if we owed them more money.
We sat outside the office, like kids at the Principal's office waiting to find out if we were in trouble. I mentioned to the owner that the Kevlar canoes are quite easily scratched and he, I believe jokingly, said that we needed to get out of the canoe in deeper water. I responded that we landed our canoes the same way as everyone else we saw and noted that even a stick will scratch the resin of the canoe. He eventually agreed that they were easy to scratch and then got on his radio to check if our gear check was satisfactory. It was.
We breathed a collective sigh of relief and headed back to my car for the 4+ hour drive home. Jon and Mike gave me a hard time for bringing up the scratches on the canoe. I was sure the owner was pulling my leg, but they weren't so sure and were a bit worried that I might have said too much (like that's never happened before!).
The drive home was uneventful, though we eventually met up with the bad weather that had been forecast. At one point, the rain was so intense that all I could make out of the car a couple of hundred feet in front of us were its dim taillights. I remarked that if it stopped abruptly, we were going to stop abruptly too. Luckily, that didn't happen.
A quick shower for everyone and a quick dinner at Chili's closed out the evening with a pleasant mellow air.
Everyone had a great time, and Mike and Jon said that they would be interested in doing it again. Now that we have a better idea of how The Boundary Waters work I think that we can plan out a trip that would suit our needs better. It was pretty clear that the outfitter expected us to be fishing and not paddling 50 miles in two and a half days, so we either need to plan everything ourselves, which I think we can do now, or find a different outfitter that's more geared towards hiking trips.
All in all, it was a good time and I hope we all get to do it again.
Again, the day started slowly as we had blueberry pancakes and hash browns with the requisite hours of cook time. After I had attacked the frying pan and gotten it as clean as I thought it was going to get, which wasn't clean enough to allow plausible deny ability of the fact that we used it in the fire, Jon scrubbed the frying pan like a mad man and got it that clean. Whew, we weren't going to need to buy them a new pot set.
We decided that we wanted to a hike instead of paddling. We'd had enough of paddling, and we were going to get a couple of miles of paddling even if we wanted to hike.
We found a hiking loop near the south east side of Snowbank. That would good for two reasons, it was a loop which makes hiking it quickly easier, and it was near our pickup point which meant we could spend more time hiking. We brought our lunch and planned to have it on our hike.
Cleaning up camp didn't take too long as our gear was fairly minimal. We did a quick two minute loop around our island to check it out and were on the water at about 11:30am, heading for the short trail that's supposed to take us to the hiking loop. We got to the south-east corner of Snowbank, which was heavily populated with fisherman in motorboats, and tried to find our trail head.
I tried to steer clear of the fishermen, not wanting to get yelled at for scaring away their fish, but our obvious lack of fishing gear and random paddling around the lake caused some of them to take note of us. One asked us if we had heard the weather report. We hadn't. He said the forecast was calling for storms today. A quick check of the skies showed that it was a definite possibility.
We headed for the next cove as a couple of fishermen sped towards us. They were not speeding to get to the best fishing hole, but instead came to ask us if we were lost. We told them we were looking for a trail down on this end of the lake and one of them responded "Oh yeah, it's not used anymore. It's not maintained anymore." He didn't know where the trail might be. We decided to land and Jon would walk into the woods hoping to stumble across the trail.
A few minutes after wandering through the woods, Jon reported that he had found a trail and that it was marked with orange tags. Mike and I backed the canoe out of the cove we were in and headed for the adjacent cove where Jon came out. There was a log that had been worn down, like when a canoe hits it head on, and there was a clear trail that looked like it hadn't been maintained for a few years. We figured this was the trail we were looking for.
Mike set a waypoint on his GPS at our canoe so we could be certain of finding our way back out. We followed the trail about a hundred yards into the woods only to find it abruptly end. There were no more orange tags to be found. We could see a blue tag, and Jon found a couple more, but they were in a straight line and didn't have any walkable path near them. Jon hiked farther into the woods only to find a similar set of grey and red tags, but no trail. After about 10 minutes of searching, and getting eaten by mosquitoes, we backtracked and called it a no-go.
It was about 1pm and we decided to head for an island to eat lunch. Lunch was a simple beef stick and banana chip affair. As we were finishing lunch, the weather turned ugly and it started to rain. We were uncertain of the length or intensity of the rain, so we quickly finished eating and headed towards our pickup point. I don't think anyone wanted to relive the stormy/windy/choppy seas of the previous day. We were quick to get off the island before the water got a chance to get nasty.
We made it to our pickup point at about 2pm and hung out until close to 3pm when our pickup arrived. Once back at the outfitter's, they checked our canoe's various scrapes with the back of their hand and it passed muster. They said that we should head down to the office to check out, and in about 15 minutes they would call down to say if we were clear to leave or if we owed them more money.
We sat outside the office, like kids at the Principal's office waiting to find out if we were in trouble. I mentioned to the owner that the Kevlar canoes are quite easily scratched and he, I believe jokingly, said that we needed to get out of the canoe in deeper water. I responded that we landed our canoes the same way as everyone else we saw and noted that even a stick will scratch the resin of the canoe. He eventually agreed that they were easy to scratch and then got on his radio to check if our gear check was satisfactory. It was.
We breathed a collective sigh of relief and headed back to my car for the 4+ hour drive home. Jon and Mike gave me a hard time for bringing up the scratches on the canoe. I was sure the owner was pulling my leg, but they weren't so sure and were a bit worried that I might have said too much (like that's never happened before!).
The drive home was uneventful, though we eventually met up with the bad weather that had been forecast. At one point, the rain was so intense that all I could make out of the car a couple of hundred feet in front of us were its dim taillights. I remarked that if it stopped abruptly, we were going to stop abruptly too. Luckily, that didn't happen.
A quick shower for everyone and a quick dinner at Chili's closed out the evening with a pleasant mellow air.
Everyone had a great time, and Mike and Jon said that they would be interested in doing it again. Now that we have a better idea of how The Boundary Waters work I think that we can plan out a trip that would suit our needs better. It was pretty clear that the outfitter expected us to be fishing and not paddling 50 miles in two and a half days, so we either need to plan everything ourselves, which I think we can do now, or find a different outfitter that's more geared towards hiking trips.
All in all, it was a good time and I hope we all get to do it again.
posted by Mark at 10:25 PM
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