You know what they say about best laid plans, right? Well, that idiom could certainly sum up our 2024. For a variety of reason, all of which I won’t go into terrible detail, it has been a challenging year. A multitude of health issues (including a bulged disc) and navigating the loss of Carolyn’s father in September, led to us to cancelling our original plan of hiking the Border Route Trail in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) of Minnesota. We were excited about that trip as we both had heard it was stunning, remote and beautiful, but I suppose it will have to wait for another year. We had even reserved a remote getaway cabin on a nice lake for the end of the hike to celebrate our 10 year wedding anniversary. Perhaps we’ll put a placeholder in for another milestone.
By the end of September my back had finally started to feel better. The bulged disc wasn’t too bad after receiving results from an MRI, and the doctor said it would likely fully clear up on it’s own. Still, it was probably some of the worst pain I’ve had to deal with, and I’m still slowly getting better (note to self: don’t lift super heavy things). We both hadn’t taken a full week off of work since our 2-week experience in Iceland the year before, so we were both burned out, tired, and needed to get away. Carolyn had been researching the Ice Age National Scenic Trail (IAT) as she was planning to do a solo trip sometime in the fall. She had bought the guidebook and already planned a route through the Chequamegon-Nicloet National Forest in northern Taylor County Wisconsin. It wasn’t a far drive away from us, only 4 hours, so we made the quick decision that this was going to be our hike this year. We’d plan to spend 5 days on trail and cover around 50 miles, taking our time and leaving room to see how my back responded to the stress of carrying a backpack around. It would be an easy, flat, slow, and relaxing hike through the northern Wisconsin woods at the start of fall, which was exactly the type of experience we both needed.
The IAT is one of the 11 National Scenic Trails in the United States. At 1,200 miles, it is the seventh longest (fun fact, the longest National Scenic Trail is the North Country Trail, which is over 4,600 miles long!). The IAT starts in the eastern part of Wisconsin in Potawami Start Park near Door County and meanders around the state to it’s western terminus in Taylor Falls, on the border with Minnesota. The vision of an Ice Age Trail was to protect and showcase the unique land features that were left behind from the receding glaciers some 12,000 years ago. As the glaciers retreated, it left in their wake unique geology that are some of the oldest examples of glacier retreat in the world, including kettle moraines, which are small lakes and ponds surround by mounds and hills of deposited glacial silt. I’m no geologist, but I guess if you were, you would think that this was pretty cool!
I’m always interested to see new trails, especially the National Scenic Trails, so I was looking forward to experiencing the culture and community around it and to see how the trail had been built and managed. I’ve been actively involved in our local chapter of the North Country Trail for the last 6 years. Carolyn and I have adopted 5 miles of trail and are active in helping build new trail (hey, take a guess on how I hurt my back?). Maintaining and building trail is hard work, requiring a lot of time and sweat equity, so I find myself looking at trails a lot differently now than I did before volunteering. I am more appreciative of all the excellent trail in our country that has been built and is being actively managed by an army of wonderful and dedicated volunteers. Carolyn arranged a ride with one such hero, “Buzz”, who is a volunteer with the High Point Chapter of the IAT, to shuttle us to the start of our hike. Buzz is a legendary trail volunteer and is known for shuttling over a hundred hikers annually to experience his slice of heaven in northern Wisconsin.
Before starting our adventure it would not have been complete without visiting the highest point in Wisconsin first. At a striking 1,951.5 feet, Timms Hill is marginally the highest point in in the state. According to Buzz, there is another hill nearby that may actually be a few more inches higher. Sadly, you do not get any views from the highest point in Wisconsin unless you travel up the fire tower. But it was certainly a nice view from the top.
After achieving the Wisconsin highpoint we travelled to the small town of Rib Lake where we would spend the night at a local campground before meeting up with Buzz the following day to get our shuttle. Rib Lake is like any small town you’d come across on any national Scenic Trail, outfitted with a coffee shop, pizza place, a few bars, a quaint hotel, a small-town post office, and a Dollar General. It’s a perfect resupply stop for any wary hiker. We ate dinner at one such establishment for a pre-hike burger and grabbed some ice cream at the pizza shop. We walked back through the small town to our campsite as the sun was beginning to set over Rib Lake. A purple and orange sliver of horizon settled over calm waters as geese flew high overhead in “V” formation – migrating south as cold weather returned to the area. The weather forecast for the week looked fantastic: warm and sunny days followed by cool nights. In a surprise twist, no rain was forecast for the foreseeable future. That almost never happens!
The following morning Buzz retrieved us at mile marker 280 where we parked our car at a roadside trailhead. Buzz was everything I expected him to be – a mellow mannered retiree with a passion for trail. We had a good conversation on the 40 mile ride out to mile marker 226 where we would start our hike. He drove us past an interesting “display” of old chainsaws that someone had created into somewhat of a memorial and history lesson. Some people have very unique talents and curiosities!
After saying thank you and goodbye to Buzz, we made our first few steps into the Chequamegon-Nicloet National Forest. The sun was shinning through leaves that were well along in their fall transition. Warm yellows, tender oranges, and abrupt reds filled the walk as we meandered through dense hardwood forests and through low-lying bogs and small lakes. It was an enjoyable walk devoid of any other humans (and wildlife, for that matter).
10 miles later we arrived at picturesque Lake Eleven and set up camp on a south facing bluff overlooking the lake. It was a quiet evening with a bit of wind starting to rustle through the trees. It felt good to be outside and hiking again. It’s easy to lose track of what is important when life starts to get too busy. Running from one thing to the next, we aren’t provided much time to sit still and focus on being present. Backpacking is a good way to reset those expectations and remember what it’s like to live a little.
The next day’s walk was similar to the day before – a lot of pleasant woodland meandering that wasn’t too difficult or taxing. My back was feeling pretty good so I took that as a sign that perhaps it would remain that way for the remainder of the trip. During the hike we talked about Carolyn’s late father and about all we’ve been through over the past year. We talked about our future and about our life and what we wanted to do and accomplish in the years ahead. We cracked jokes and laughed and didn’t take ourselves too seriously. The majority of the time we simply enjoyed the silence and got wrapped up in our own thoughts. Backpacking tends to create these spaces in your mind that let it wander and reflect. Walk enough, and sometimes your able to clear out some of those old cobwebs that have accumulated up there in your head.
We ended our day roughly 12 miles later after crossing the gently flowing Sailor Creek. Nestled within a canopy of Hemlocks, we set up camp. For a second straight day we saw no other humans. Our friends were the squirrels collecting nuts and chanting to their neighbors. Their chatter rattled the forest until the sun went down and the dark emerged from the shadows.
We were greeted again by sunny skies on our 3rd day. It got pretty cold at night, perhaps down to 35, so I slept with my water filter just in case. The hike ahead was more of the same wooded landscape. We traversed a geologic feature called an “esker” which was something I had never heard of before. An esker is a long, narrow ridge of sand, gravel and boulders that form when meltwater from a glacier fills in and deposits sediment in a channel beneath the glacier. As the glacier retreats, the sediment is left behind as a ridge in the landscape. We hiked along this ridge which was maybe about 50-100 feet above the forest floor. Hemlocks towered on all sides and it was a pleasant walk on nicely manicured trail. At the end of the esker we surprisingly ran into Buzz doing trail work with his brothers. A large tree had fallen over the esker and they were working to remove it. Whenever you see a cut tree on a trail, just remember the effort someone took to walk all the way out there and remove it, and give them a moment of thanks!
After hiking another 12-mile day we ended at Westpoint National Forest Campground along the shores of the Mondeaux Flowage. The campground was quiet with few other visitors, and it was nice to have a picnic table and access to a pit toilet. I will admit, although my back was taking the punishment of walking long days and sleeping on the ground pretty well, the hardest part was squatting and bending to take a doo doo in the woods. I was really rolling the dice out there during each episode, so it was nice to have the option of sitting on a toilet seat the following morning.
Once we got our tent set-up we decided to take a swim. It wasn’t that warm out but the water looked inviting and it would be really nice to wash off the sweat and salt that was rubbing us in all the wrong areas. We stripped down to our natural state and waded out into the water for a quick dunk. Luckily, we didn’t get any leeches, which is always a concern after we had an unfortunate incident in Isle Royal a few years prior (just picture being covered with tiny leeches all over – yikes!).
The next morning we started with a pleasant hike around the Mondeaux Flowage. The flowage is essentially a reservoir with a dam at the end – I guess it’ just another name for it (and a new term to add to my vernacular, along with esker). We skirted around the shoreline for the majority of the morning and got many different views of the flowage with beautiful fall foliage surrounding it’s edges. We even at one point saw a porcupine bumbling through the woods. I’ve see a porcupine in the woods only three times in my life and as far a wildlife sightings go, I would consider it quite rare and unique. I’ve certainly seen more bears than porcupines!
After departing from the Flowage we traversed a section of trail that was the least enjoyable of the hike. The woods were new and claustrophobic and in one section crossed quite a large beaver damn. After this section we finally emerged on the other side of the Chequamegon-Nicolet National forest boundary and were presented with our first road walk. Light grey sky surrounded us as we walked along a barren dirt road and saw deer race through empty farm fields.
We had to take a small 0.5 mile detour to Chelsea Lake once we completed the 3 mile road walk to get water, after we realized that the water spigot at the next camping location had been turned off for the season. We were greeted by two guys on ATVs on the way to Chelsea Lake and we stopped to chat. They owned the property adjacent to the lake which comprised a large swath of corn fields. For the first time on any hike, I wondered if the nearby lake had much pesticide run-off from the corn fields, and whether the water filters we had would filter out chemicals (on later searching, no, normal backcountry filters only filter out microorganisms, not chemicals. Some manufacturers do make versions of backcountry filters that remove pesticides. I guess my only note if hiking the full Ice Age Trail or a large section where you plan to be out there for several weeks or months would be to consider a filter that can also filter out pesticides).
At the park, we took the opportunity to eat dinner at some picnic tables that were underneath a pavilion and out of the wind. It was starting to get cold and breezy, and as we chomped down on our ramen noodle dinners we saw two guys pull up in a boat. They struck up a short conversation and asked if we were hiking the Ice Age Trail. One thing I did notice during our small hike on the IAT is that many of the locals knew what the trail was and had a lot of appreciation and pride for it. It was nice to see.
After dinner, we walked a short 1.5 miles back on trail and to our camping spot for the night. It was near a busy road and we could hear cars and trucks driving back and forth through the night. The temperatures were supposed to be the coldest of the trip, perhaps dipping down to below freezing. Perfect for sleeping.
Right before bed I had a sip of Chelsea Lake water and it gave my tongue a weird sensation, almost like it was tingling. I asked Carolyn if she thought it tasted strange and she said she thought it tasted just fine.
The next morning we packed up our tent for the last time of the trip. We only had 7 miles left until arriving at the roadside trailhead where we had parked our car 5 days ago. Again, the weather was nice and sunny and it didn’t take long for the earth to warm after a cold night. The last day was spent hiking through much nicer forests than the day before, with pleasant and well-maintained trail. My hip started to give me some issues near the end of the day, so it was good that we were nearing the end.
After spending a week in the woods, I always look forward to a hot meal and shower. But at the same, I also wish I could just keep on going. It’s really nice not having cell service and not knowing what’s been going on in the world. So much of stress is fabricated from things we read, listen and watch in the news. How much of that stuff really impacts our daily lives? Perhaps being completely oblivious is they way to go.
I hadn’t thought about work for the whole week, either, another major area of stress. Client calls, e-mails and project work seemed like a distant memory. The last few miles of the hike my mind slowly started to drift back. How many e-mails would be in my in-box? It would be nice if all of work would just stop when I went on vacation – but unfortunately that’s not the case. It’s almost as if your penalized for taking time off because you have just that much more to do when you get back.
Sitting and staring at a screen for 40-50 hours a week is not what the human body was designed to do. We are supposed to walk and move around and bend and breath fresh air and work up a sweat. It’s probably no surprise why I’ve had so many back and hip problems recently. In fact, office workers have the highest incidence of low back and neck pain, nearly 40-60%! I bought a standing desk at the beginning of the year, which seemed to help, but I’m still just standing in a static position. I have to remind myself to move around, walk outside for a break, breathe in actual fresh air. I think we all sometimes lose sight of the fact that we are actually humans.
The car finally came into view as we exited the woods. We gave each other a high five and changed out of our dirty clothes. We made the short drive back into Rib Lake and went to the pizza shop we visited on our first night for ice cream. A few locals were inside eating lunch. The place was quiet and warm and smelled good. My stomach rumbled.
We ate too much pizza and then began our drive back to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. It was a great trip and one that we desperately needed. A quiet woodland walk where we basically saw nobody else was certainly the perfect getaway. Sometimes you just need to relax and let the stress lift off your shoulders. It’s been a hard year, filled with injuries and grief and tough decisions. A long walk in the woods was the perfect antidote and escape.
Thank you Ice Age Trail for providing that for us this year. We hope to be back soon. Maybe next time we’ll even spot that elusive wooly mammoth.
