Last weekend, Matt and I did a little backpacking at North Manitou Island. Much fun.
Thursday, Jodi and I loaded up the kids and dog and drove to her parents' place near Traverse City and got settled in. I still had some errands to run, so after we got some food in us I headed out to hit Nolan's Tobacco, Gander Mountain, and Rite-Aid. Having procured a couple of Arturo Fuente Hemingways, some poppers and some camp soap, and some knee-high nylons (a trick to prevent blistering) I headed back to the house to relax and wait for Matt. Matt got in around 10:30 and I took the backpack he was lending me inside so I could pack in the morning. We were going to go out for a beer, but instead stayed in for a beer since his friend who lived in town had decided to stay in for the night. At about 1 AM we decided we'd better call it a night, and went in -- less than 5 minutes later it was pouring rain.
Friday, June 8, 2007
Friday morning, I got up around 6:30, got my pack set and woke Matt. We had a quick bite to eat, gave hugs to the kids, and headed out for Leland to catch the ferry to the island. I hadn't been able to get a reservation for North Manitou, but we knew we could get out to South if no one cancelled for North, so we were confident that we'd be camping one way or the other (backup plans included going to Wilderness State Park, or driving to Drummond Island and hanging out at a friends' family cabin). When we got there, the cashier told me that they had no cancellations yet, and asked me to come back in 20 minutes. After waiting around (and actually going back twice to check) it was getting close to the time for the boats to start loading, so I went in and inquired what we should do. After some hemming and hawwing, the cashier girl said they might be able to do it, but she wasn't sure how things would work on Sunday (return trip). One of the boat drivers was there and said it wouldn't be a problem (then laughed) and she finally sold us the passes for North Manitou. We boarded and spent the next hour and 15 minutes riding the somewhat rough waters of the Manitou Passage to the island.
I had only one backpacking experience prior to this trip, so I was pretty excited to get going. When you arrive on the island, everyone lines up on the dock and they pass the backpacks along the line. When yours comes by, you put it behind you instead of passing it on. It is a pretty simple system, and it works -- mostly. A lot of people stop passing the packs when theirs comes by, breaking down the flow, but eventually everyone has their equipment and we trudge off to the "village" for orientation. The National Park Service rangers give a brief talk about the rules of the island and warn of poison ivy and being stupid. Then they turn you loose on the wilderness. Since I was carrying my fly rod, they did a quick check of my license and we chatted briefly about the fishing on Lake Manitou. I decided we'd have to try it out.
For reference:
We started out heading North on the main trail, and took an unmaintained trail to the Northeast corner to a location called John Maleski, which appeared to be a clearing at the top of a hill. Along the trail we noticed lots of interesting plants and flowers and generally enjoyed the scenery. When we got to "John Maleski" it was a little underwhelming, as it was just an area that had been a farm, so had fewer trees. Interesting, but nothing earth-shattering. We moved on toward Paul Maleski. This was another clearing, but supposedly it had a house on it somewhere. After doing a little searching, we found the house all the way at the North edge of the clearing, surrounded now by trees and growth, and the house was collapsed in on itself. We walked back toward the trail and shed our packs for a quick lunch of lemon pepper tuna, colby-jack cheese, and pita bread. After finishing our lunch, we decided to head for Lake Manitou and see if we could find a weed bed to cast poppers and artificial minnows into and try to catch a bass. We crossed the pole bridge across the swamp and found the opening that marks the Stormer Camp. From there we followed the main trail just back into the woods, and stashed our packs. We took along only water and our fishing gear in the hopes that the going would be easier. We got a little off course, and ended up trekking through some very heavy underbrush/downed wood, and swamp. I landed on my behind at one point having slipped off a wet log. Swamp muck is not your friend. Eventually, we turned to the west and marched only about 250 feet before we came upon the lake. It was only a minor navigational error. 
The wind was a little too fierce for me to cast the fly rod, and we were on the wrong part of the lake anyway. We tried in vain for a little while to cast into the reeds near the shore, but the reeds hadn't yet filled in enought to provide cover, so there weren't any fish. We noted that along the Western side of the lake, there appeared to be some pretty densely weeded areas, and thought perhaps we would try there later in the weekend. In the meantime, we hiked the 1/2 mile back to the main trial, searched for and finally found our packs, and decided we needed to get to our camping location for the evening. We went back to the Stormer Camp clearing, and tried to find the trail that leads north to the bluffs. Unfortunately, we never found the trail. We trekked the entire mile to the bluffs through the woods. In some places this was a rigorous task. We eventually got to the bluffs to discover that the foliage was much more dense than we expected, making it very difficult to navigate along the top of the bluff. Directly where we arrived at the bluff, it looked like there was a possiblity of getting down, but it looked daunting. We decided to try to walk to the west to find a campsite. We went only a hundred yards or so before wising up and going back. We resigned ourselves to going down the bluff, and walking along the beach back toward John Maleski, hoping to be able to camp somewhere along the way, but if not, we could climb the hill there and camp in the clearing. A few hundred yards down the beach, Matt spied a lowish spot on the bluff and it looked like we could probably scale up the bluff. He dropped his pack and climbed and sure enough, there was a big enough clearing up there to allow us to set up a camp. I started up the hill with my pack on. It was pretty hard going, but eventually I got to the top (panting quite a bit, mind you). Matt went back down and got his pack, and we started setting up camp.
In the process of setting up camp, we apparently displeased the camping gods, because the most hellacious swarm of bugs I have ever seen descended upon us and would not relent. We were in the lee of the island, so there was no breeze whatsoever (even though there was a pretty brisk wind from the south that day). The little gnats and no-see-ums were all over us. In our eyes, noses, ears, getting into the sleeves of our shirts, under the back of our shirts, everywhere. It was enough to make you crazy.
Matt got pretty bent out of shape while we were setting up camp, but I tried to keep him on an even keel. We grabbed our canteen, filter, dinner, and bottles and headed back down the bluff to the water to try to escape the crazy bugs. When we got to the bottom, the bugs had followed us and their friends - the insane ankle-devouring flies that seem to love the shores of the great lakes in the North - had joined them. I immediately went into the water to try to filter some water, but the bottom was not sand it was large, angular, slimy rock. I struggled to keep my balance, but gave up after getting two nalgene bottles and our canteen filled. Matt was boiling water for our dinner and cursing the bugs. Then it was my turn to get a little irrational about the bugs, and Matt had to play sane guy for a while. At the worst point, I simply wrapped my towel around my head (a la Arthur Dent). Eventually, we were able to keep them from totally devouring us by walking up and down the beach -- this seemed to make it hard enough for them to harass us that we were able to eat some dinner. Finally we scrambled back up the bluff and I immediately climbed into my tent, zipped it and killed all the bugs I could see on the inside. Matt had to get his contacts out and was subjected to additional bug torture. We were not terribly amused with the situation at this point. As I looked through the screen of my tent, I could see literally hundreds of the little buggers crawling around on the screen. Apparently not many people camp in that area and we looked tasty. I read a chapter of the book Matt had lent me and promptly dozed off.
Saturday, June 9, 2007
With Saturday morning came the prospect of dealing with the little vamps again. When I awoke, I wasn't looking forward to it. However, they were more normal and a lot less swarmy than the night before, so we quickly got our stuff together, repacked, and had a Clif bar for breakfast. Lake Michigan looked absolutely beautiful, but it really doesn't capture on film well...
We got loaded up and headed back into the woods to hopefully find the trail and get back to the main trail easily, as we had a lot of ground to cover. We miraculously did find the trail, and were able to follow it all the way back out to the main trail. I think if I go back, I probably would be able to find it again, but then again, maybe not. It is not terribly distinct, and in many places we had to guess at its location based on where the old trees were missing.
Once back on the old trail, we headed West across the field at the Stormer camps and up the old RR grade past the Davenport Camps (which was completely overgrown with new saplings). We stopped at the top of the incline for a water break.
After our break, we started down the other old RR grade to the South toward the Crescent City area. The walk throughout is simply beautiful and really serene. The sounds of the chipmunks chirping along with all of the birds makes it feel like you're in a jungle on some faraway island. Wait a minute...
Eventually we came out of the woods into a long clearing, which at first we mistook for the Crescent City clearing, but it is a smaller clearing to the North.
Walking through the clearing we could feel the sun was warmer than originally the forecasts had said (it had to be close to 80F while the forecasts had called for 68F). After a little more wooded area, we came to the clearing for the Crescent City area. We proceeded directly to the beach.
We shed the packs and got out camp stools and had a little lunch. More tuna (Sweet and Spicy), pita, and colby-jack cheese. Mmmm. I don't know the history of the island well at all, but apparently this part of the island once served as a logging dock, and the ruins of the old dock are still there.
After a brief rest, we went scoping campsites. We found an incredible site up a hill off the beach and it seemed absolutely perfect. We tried to gauge the distance from the water and decided it was probably far enough away.
After setting up camp we went back down to the lake to filter some more water and to relax on the beach for a bit. While we were filtering our water, the ranger boat pulled up the beach a couple hundred yards down from us. We finished filtering our water and laid down on the sand to enjoy the sun for a bit. Shortly thereafter, Stu, our friendly park ranger, advised us that we were camped only 155 feet from the water. He informed us that all of the tents we had seen when we came in through the clearing are now gone (most people want to be closer to the dock on Saturday night, so they don't have a long hike in the morning) and we would probably be best off moving to one of their sites in the clearing. We promptly packed up camp and moved over to the clearing, which was completely empty, even though we had seen at least five tents there when we had walked though three hours earlier.
We made sure we were well beyond the 300 feet and set up in a nice spot next to a treeline and a little valley. The site had a nice breeze, but was a little hot during the midday.
We went back down to the beach and took a quick dip in the hypothermia-inducing waters of Lake Michigan. We then took a little time to relax and read. I got a bit sunburned, so I trudged back up to camp and got more sunblock and my long-sleeved shirt. Eventually we had our Chicken Kung-Pao backpacker dinner (it was actually quite good!). We went back down to the beach and walked to the South for a ways to see if we could tell if there were any good places to camp or get back up to the trail should we venture that way. Unfortunately, it is almost all bluffs again for quite a stretch to the South of where we were. We discussed salmonids and their various arrivals and places in the great lakes -- important stuff. Headed back to the camp and cracked open the little bottles of shiraz Matt had brought (okay, yea, that's not exactly essential foodstuffs, but the half-pound didn't kill us -- give me a break 
). While we were enjoying our wine (out of our camp mugs, I might add), Matt suddenly hushed me and told me there was a deer behind me. I slowly turned, and like a cartoon, this doe was popping her head up from behind the edge of the little valley at the treeline, and looking around, then ducking down again. She did this a couple times, then proceeded to walk around our camp (probably about 15-20 feet away) -- upwind of us -- and slowly made her way to a small grove of trees in a depression in the field where we were camped. The whole time she acted like everything was normal and that we weren't frightening to her in the least. It was pretty cool. We again turned in kind of early, heading for the tents sometime shortly after the sun wasn't visible. I woke once during the night, looked out at the stars and saw a brilliant shooting star that had a very long tail (I'd say about 15-20 degrees of the sky). No northern lights that I could see though.
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Sunday morning I woke up around 6 and got up, mostly because I was nervous about being late for the boat. Both of my feet had pretty serious blisters on the back of my heels (actually almost up on my Achilles tendon) and I was worried I might not be able to hike fast, so I thought I would try to get a little bit of a head start on the day. I got the stove going and made some coffee and some oatmeal and then heated some water for Matt's coffee and woke him. We didn't get moving as quickly as maybe we should have, but we got out of camp around 8:30 and were supposed to get to the dock by about 10:30 (although the boat doesn't get there until about 11:15, they told everyone to get there early). We started out at a pretty good clip, but not too fast. About 2 miles in, or so, we stopped so Matt could tend to his feet and I could take a drink. I took a couple of shots of the stretch of patch we were on.
Obviously, the pictures can't really capture what it is like to be in these forests, but it gives an idea of what it looked like. As we got going again, I started to get a little worried about the distance we had to go yet. The trails have few markers, and the few that are there are pretty far apart. The stretch we were on was about 4 miles long, and only had a marker at either end, so when you're in the middle it is difficult to gauge progress (other than time on the trail). I guessed we were walking at a pace of about 20 minute miles, give or take, which would have had us covering the 5.5 miles in just under 2 hours. But I didn't trust my own estimation, so when my watch read 10:05, I panicked and we picked up the pace quite a bit. One little stoppage along the way was needed as Matt abrubtly stopped and scared the #$%@ out of me, when he nearly stepped on a 3 foot garter snake. After looking at it a second, he declared it is no big deal, it looks like it is dead. As he nudged it with his foot, it moved abruptly, but didn't try to nip at him because it had a frog lodged in its mouth. Apparently we interrupted its lunch. Sorry, Mr. Snake. At about 10:15 we finally came to the marker that said 1.1 miles to the dock, and we knew we'd make it in time. In the end, we strolled up at 10:35 and there were quite a few people not there yet. All that worrying for nothing .
At the dock, when we could take the packs off, it finally started to set in just how sore and tired I was. Overall, I think I felt pretty good, but the blisters on my heels were not feeling too stellar and the rest of me was ready for a shower.
The boat arrived on time, but instead of heading straight back to Leland, it went to South Manitou to pick people up there first, adding about 90 minutes to our boat ride. In the end, we can't complain, considering we only got on the boat to North by sheer luck. On the ride back to Traverse City, we made a pitstop at Boskydel Vineyard for a visit with the "Wine Nazi" Bernie Rink. It was a nice little diversion to end the trip with. We bought a couple of bottles of wine and got Bernie to smile to boot.
Now I am popping benadryl like candy to fight off the urge to scratch my skin off (those bugs!!! arrggghhh!!), and nursing my blistered heels back to health, but kind of missing the stars and the crazy chirping chipmunks. Perhaps if I have some time, I'll post some references to some of the interesting plants we saw (a flower Jo knew as "Jack-in-the-box"?).