Friday, October 22, 2010
I woke up early and made some hot water for Theraflu. Again, I had everything laid out on the extra bed, so I was able to get ready fairly quickly. I went down to the lobby and got a cart. I brought it up in the elevator, and piled all my stuff on it for the trip down. I made one last inspection of the room to make sure I didn’t forget anything. I stopped by the front desk to tell them I was leaving, and I was on my way. Nobody else was out and about in the hotel except for the front desk clerk. I had an enjoyable stay at the Casino and hotel, I just wished I would have been able to be there longer. But I was in North Central Minnesota to hike the Chip, and the only reason I was staying at a hotel at all was that I was feeling a little under the weather.
I headed east down Highway 200. I passed Whipholt Beach, a spot where the road goes next to Leech Lake. From there you cans see how huge the lake is. I turned right on Highway 84 and headed down to the One Stop in Longville. This time I had arranged for the Fitzgeralds to meet me at 7 am, so I could eat some food without rushing. I arrived around 6:40 am and the food was ready. So, I was able to eat at a fairly leisurely pace instead of cramming it down like I did the day before. And I was ready to go when the Fitzgeralds showed up.
We drove about 4 miles north to the Highway 84 Trailhead, and that’s where I left my van. Then they drove me to Mable Lake Road, where I had ended my hike the day before. I offered them some money again, but they refused. I thanked them, and they were on their way. I set out the Spot Messenger, and started taking some photos of the area.
Soon I was on my way, my next real landmark would be when I reach the Boy River Crossing at Highway 200. That would be in about 4 or 5 miles. I started walking through some scrubby woods, but I did see on really tall pine tree. Soon I came to a spot where I could see a glimpse of a lake off in the distance to the north. I believe if was Swift Lake, and it wouldn’t be seen with leaves on the trees. Then I came across a fairly large frosty meadow on the left side of the trail. At this point, I’m still hiking generally in a southwest direction. The trail has been going in a southwest direction ever since Milton Lakes, which is the northern most area the trail goes to in the Chip.
Soon, I’m hiking on the side of a ridge, with some lowlands to the right. Again, it’s kind of misleading to call it a ridge because I didn’t have to hike up a hill to get on it. But there’s lowlands to the right, so it seems like a ridge. I was thinking maybe I’d see the Boy River over there to the right. It’s over there somewhere, but I didn’t see it. The other thing I didn’t see was Mabel Lake. But I wasn’t expecting to see because it’s at least 1/2 mile to a mile away from the trail. There’s a Forest campground on the other side of Mabel Lake, but it’s kind of inconvenient to get to from the NCT
I had not seen any grouse yet this morning, but these woods are not as thickety as some of the other woods I hiked through the day before. And the Grouse seem to like the real thick woods. But I did hear some gunshots. But the gunshots seem to be from the north and west, which led me to believe it was from Tribe members hunting for deer on the Leech Lake Indian Reservation. The boundary for the Reservation is the Boy River, just to the west of where I was hiking.
I continued on the trail and started to see some pothole grasslands and marshy areas near the trail, but I didn’t see a clear cut water source. In other words, they may have water at some times of the year, but not at other times of the year. But there was a water source at the beginning of the hike, just down around the corner on Highway 53, and there’s the Boy River coming up at Highway 200
I crossed some logging roads, but I’m not sure it any of them went over near the Mabel Lake Campground. I was hiking in some more mature woods. In fact some of them had spray painted marks on them meaning they would be selectively cut. They were blue markings, so I pretended they were trail markings, but the regular trail markers were few and far between. There were a few blue diamonds nailed to trees, but not many. And a few of the trees that had blue diamonds on them also had the blue markings to be cut down.
I continued on and soon I could see a swampy grassland area with a straight piece of land on the other side. That straight piece of land turned out to be Highway 200. It was about 2 football fields length away. But I didn’t get to Highway 200 all that fast because the trail goes parallel to the highway for a ways then makes it to the circular trailhead. It’s a nice trailhead with one of those big NCT signs that has the map of the whole NCT in the Chippewa National Forest. After the trailhead, it’s a short walk to the Highway 200 bridge over the Boy River, where there is another trailhead of sorts. This is more of a canoe launch area, but there’s room to park. I guess you could call it a trailhead because it’s for the Boy River Canoe Trail. I set my Spot Messenger down on a post, and started taking photos of the area.
The Boy River is a very windy river. It curves around and almost makes a loop. I guess it’s not as bad as the Kickapoo River in Wisconsin which is known as the worlds windiest river. I looked to the south where the old NCT maps shows there being a campsite on the east side of the river. I looked down that way, but didn’t see anything that looked like a campsite. Plus there were “No Trespassing” signs on the southeast side of the river. I decided not to investigate further.
Also, near the Boy River Bridge there is a sign that says “Adopt a highway, next 2 miles, The Friends of the North Country Trail.” Hey, that looks like some good publicity for the trail. I went back and put my backpack on and picked up the Spot Messenger. It had sent the “Okay Message.” I crossed the Highway 200 bridge over the Boy River, then I crossed Highway 200. There’s a spot there where a few more cars could be parked, right where the trail starts up again. And there’s a sign marking the start of the trail.
So I’m walking in the woods again and soon I cross a little logging road. Now, I’m told that if you take a left on that road and go down a short ways you’ll find a spot that used to be a home site that could be used as a campsite. This site is not shown on any map that I know of, and is on the west side of the river, not on the east side of the river like the old NCT map had shown. But it is mentioned in the NCT Wiki, which I should have read a little bit better.
I continued down the trail through some mature woods. These woods were definitely not as thickety as some that I had seen yesterday. As I hiked, I could see highway 200 for a ways to my right, then I saw a very big marshy grassland to my right. I looked out there to see if I could see any wildlife, but I didn’t see anything. But there’s probably some deer bedding down out there. I kept going through the woods and made it to Macemon Road. This would be the first of two trail crossings of Macemon Road. The road comes south from Highway 200, then takes a right at the northern end of Long Lake and goes due west for about 2 miles then turns right again and goes north to Highway 200 again. There’s a bunch of houses along Long Lake on the east/west section of the road, but there are no houses on either of the north/south sections of the road.
I kept heading west and soon I found a nice little lake to the north of the trail. Beyond the lake was a good grassy clearing. I didn’t see any houses or structures nearby, so I thought to myself that this would be a good place for a trail campsite. It’s just a nice spot.
As I walked I came across some more clearings near the trail. There must have been two or three of them. It is unknown to me why these clearings were created, if it was natural or cleared by man. Then I got to a spot where there is another small lake, but this time it’s to the south of the trail. But this spot would be a bad site for a campsite because I could see a house and some buildings on the other side of the little lake. That’s hardly a good spot for a backcountry campsite.
I headed down the trail, still seeing some small clearings from time to time. Then I saw a bunch of people heading toward me on the trail. There were 4 people and they were the Janesecs, who lived nearby. They were out for a walk. There was mom and dad, who looked to be in their 40’s and a young lady and young man that looked to be of high school age. The young lady appeared to be the daughter of the couple, while the young man appeared to be not related. Perhaps he is a foreign exchange student. They all seemed to be enjoying their walk in the woods. Mr and Mrs Janesec were wearing blaze orange hats while the young lady was wearing a red jacket and the young man had a red backpack on. They asked me if that was my bike that they had seen near the western crossing of Macemon Road, and I said yes it was. I took their photo and gave them an “I saw Tman” card.
After seeing that nice family, it wasn’t long before I reached the spot where I had locked up my bike, which was near the western crossing of Macemon Road. Speaking of bikes, I thought this Macemon Road area would be a good area for a Hike and Bike Route. A Hike and Bike Route is where you lock up your bike at one trail crossing, the drive to another trail crossing and park. You then would hike the trail until you get to your bike, then ride your bike back to your car. It’s kind of like a biathlon. You could lock your bike at one Trail crossing of Macemon Road, the drive to and park your car at the other crossing of Macemon Road. Then hike the NCT back to your bike at the other crossing of Macemon Road, then bike on Macemon Road back to your car on Macemon Road. Confused yet?
I have done the Hike and Bike a few times, most notably on the Ice Age Trail in Wisconsin. It’s a good way to cover more ground when you don’t have two cars. I’m not particularly keen on doing an out and back, which means hike the trail, then hike the same trail back to your car. So I like the Hike and Bike option.
Well when I got to Macemon Road I saw a woman walking on the road. It was Kit, another local resident that had been a trail volunteer for the NCT. She said she still helps out from time to time, especially when they are going to mow the trail, she will walk it and clear all the downed limbs so the mowers don’t have to stop. I told her I was walking west to the Highway 84 trailhead. She said she had not walked that way for a while, but she remembers that the campsite at Crown Lake was kind of hard to find. I took her photo and gave her an “I saw Tman” card, and we were both on our way. She actually emailed me afterwards, using the instructions on the card, and reported where she saw me. It was great meeting her. She continued north on Macemon Road, doing her daily exercise walk, I continued westward.
There is a clear-cut area to the north of the trail for a ways, then when I cleared it, I came upon a rather odd trail bridge. This bridge wasn’t very big or very long, but it had the hand railing in the middle of the bridge, instead of the outside of the bridge. Normally the railing is on the outside so you don’t fall off. But the drop off isn’t very much here, so you probably wouldn’t get hurt if you fell off this bridge. But still I’ve never see anything like it.
Then I got to a part of the trail that appears to go across private property. There are no Trespassing signs on both side of the trail, so you must not stray off the trail here. But eventually, I got to a forest property sign, which indicated I was back on National Forest Land. Shortly after that I spotted Crown Lake. And I was keeping my eyes peeled for that Crown Lake Campsite that Kit said was hard to locate. I should have asked Kit more questions about the location on the campsite, because I was looking around like crazy for it and was unable to locate it. The NCT goes along the southern shore of the lake which is a long narrow lake heading to the north. The thing that is unusual about the lake is that there is a huge beaver house in it. One of the biggest I’ve ever seen. Perhaps the beavers downed some trees covering the campsite that I can’t find. The NCT should post some type of campsite marker, like they had at the Milton Lakes Campsite.
Speaking of markings, the trail here is very well marked, and it looks like it has been marked recently. Ever since crossing the Boy River, the trail has been marked a whole lot better. There are blue rectangles painted on trees at a regular rate, whereas, before the Boy River there were plastic blue diamonds nailed to trees very infrequently. But, the Boy River is the boundary between the Arrowhead Chapter of the NCT and the Star of the North Chapter, So there are two different chapters involved.
The trail goes to the north of Lundeen Lake. But the Lake is at least a quarter mile to the south of the trail, and I didn’t see the Lake. But I did see a tree with about 4 Fungi shelves sticking out of it. That was kind of cool and it reminded me of what a fun guy I am. These were more mature woods, pretty much the same as I’d been hiking in ever since the Boy River. It seemed like there were a lot more leaves on the ground than in the scrubby woods. I crunched along as I went. Soon I came upon a little pond, then a road.
The road was County Highway 126, which is a nice gravel road. I continued on, but the landscape had changed when I crossed the road. All of a sudden there were these leafy plants growing on both sides of the trail. I’m not sure what type of plants they are, but they are about 5 feet tall and still had the leaves on them. They are all over the place on each side of the trail.
Pretty soon I saw some people in blaze orange walking towards me, and they had guns. It was the Fangel Family from Longville, and they were out hunting Grouse. Mom and dad looked to be in their 30’s while the son looked to be around 13 to 16. They were having no luck hunting Grouse. I told them that I had not scared up a Grouse today on my hike, but yesterday I had scared up a bunch of them in the scrubby woods. I showed them on my map where I thought the best places were for Grouse hunting on the trail. Try up by the Highway 4 Trailhead. I took their photo and gave them an “I saw Tman” Card, and they were on their way. Mrs Fangel actually checked out my website and made a comment about their photo. That was nice. And it was great meeting them.
Afterwards I wondered if the Fangel boy was in Scouts. I should have asked him. He seemed to know how to hold the gun correctly. He would be a good candidate for the shooting Merit Badges. About 15 years ago there was only one gun shooting merit badge and that was called “Rifle and Shotgun Shooting.” But the Boy Scouts of America split the merit badge up, and now there are 3 gun shooting Merit Badges. They are “Rifle Shooting,” “Shotgun Shooting,” and “Black Powder.” I’m sure the Fangel boy would be able to earn some of those badges. The Boy Scouts of America teach more people about gun safety than any other organization.
I continued down the trail. I knew it wouldn’t be far until I was back at the van. Highway 126 and Highway 84 are only a mile apart. I was walking through a grove of red pine when I saw a building on the left side of the trail. It looked like some type of commercial building, perhaps a place that fixes cars. There seemed to be a few cars around. I was surprised how close this building was to the trail. It wasn’t more that 50 yards. It looked like a fairly new building, too. And there wasn’t any junk laying around it, which was good, because I didn’t want to call out “Junk to the Left’ as I did when I was biking the Root River Trail with Jill. Whenever there was a farm or house that had some old beat up equipment around, I’d make the call. Usually Jill would be following me and could then look at the junk, too. The Junk Call didn’t happen all that much on the Root River Trail, I don’t want to give it a bad reputation. But, as in all rural areas, it happens.
Pretty soon the trail turns and I could see Highway 84 off to my left. At this point the trail is traveling parallel to the Highway about 100 yards away from it. Then the trail gets closer to the Highway, and starts going parallel to it again. All the time the trail is in some red pine woods. And then the trail goes right up to Highway 84 and goes parallel to it again. Soon I could see the trailhead and my van on the other side of the highway. I had made it back to the van. And I made good time, because it only was around 1:30 pm.
Now I had a dilemma, should I keep walking half way to the next road, which is 3.5 miles away, and hike back, then go over to that road and do the same. That would be a 7 mile hike to cover 3.5 miles. Or I could go get my bike and place it over there. But the ride back was pretty long and awkward. It would be about 7 to 8 miles to get back around. Plus, I am supposed to have a Meetup hike meet here at the Longville Trailhead the next morning. But I didn’t know if anyone was going to show up for the Meetup hike. I decided to hop in the van and go get the bike, then go to the Longville Librairy, which is only about a block from the One Stop.
I arrived at the Library, which kind of looked like a ranched style house. They had 6 computers and I arranged it with the librarian to use one. I was kind of miffed when I stayed at the Casino that they didn’t have a computer room at the hotel. Sometimes they call it a Business Center. But I finally got to use a computer here, so I was happy. I updated my website and sent some emails. I looked up the NCT Wiki and printed out some pages. I checked the Meetup site, and nobody had signed up to do the hike the next day. I didn’t know what to think about that. Maybe somebody would just show up.
After I was done at the Library I decided to go scout out my hike for the next day. So I drove over to County Highway 125 and looked at the Trail Crossing, then I took Highway 5 to the Woodtick Trail and went to the Fourth Crossing of the Woodtick Trail. This is actually the first crossing that is closest to Highway 5. But, evidently they start counting the crossings starting at Highway 371 going east. So the Trail Crossing I was at is known as the Fourth Crossing. They have a nice parking lot there, and are supposed to have a water pump, but I didn’t see it. I hiked my bike down the trail a ways and locked it up.
Then, I continued driving down the Woodtick Trail looking at the Trail Crossings and getting an idea of the terrain. After Moccasin Lake, I turned north on Forest road 3790 which looked like a good road, and I stopped at the trail crossing on that road. That’s where I met a hunter named Mark. We started talking about the trail, and he said he saw some people out camping at the campsite at Long Lake, also known as Gut Lake. I said I would be hiking through there in the next day or so, and I would check it out.
I continued down the Woodtick Trail to Highway 371 and headed north to Walker. I was taking a little tour of the town. Then I saw the Bank of Walker, and I checked my clock to see that it was about 4:50 pm. I pulled into the bank drive up because I was getting a little low on cash. They gave me $100 from my Credit Card, and I was their last customer of the day.
I found the local grocery store. I believe they call it the Super One. I went in and bought some stuff that I thought I needed. I bought a Walker Postcard for my mom. While I was checking out, I asked the clerk if Walker had a Municipal Campground, but the lady said they didn’t but Akekly did. Then, I said what I was really looking for was a place I could take a shower. And she said that I could go to the Community Center. She had the Bagging guy give me directions to the Community center. Basically, you go up the hill near the two water towers and you take a left, and the Community Center is just down from the two towers. I had decided that I was feeling pretty good so I would sleep in my van that night at the highway 84 Trailhead. All I wanted was a shower and some good food.
I made it to the Community Center just like described. But I was thinking about the Lords of the Ring when I saw the two towers. The Community Center is fairly new and looked really good. But, it wasn’t exactly what I expected. I guess Indoor Hockey Rinks are considered Community Centers in Minnesota. There is more than just an indoor hockey rink, there’s an outdoor one, too. Just kidding, there is one, but there is also a workout gym, meeting rooms and other stuff at the Community Center. I found out that this building is home to a youth hockey team, adult curling team, rotary club, library, and more.
I went in and asked how much it would cost me to take a shower. This caused a little bit of trouble. In the office there were two young ladies that looked to be around 10 to 12 years old. They were looking around in the office to find out how much it cost, then they tried to call someone, then finally, one of them went down a hallway to the rink where her parents were painting, and she found out it is $3. That was a lot of rigamarole to find out. Meanwhile, I could see some people working out in a different room and I could see a lounge with a fireplace down another hallway.
So, I went down the hallway towards the rink and found the locker room. I was the only person in there so I spread my stuff out. I took a shower then put on some fresh clothes. I was all ready for a night out. All I had to do is find out where to go. I wasn’t too keen on going back to the Casino because I like to experience new places when I’m out and about. When I had finished dressing, a guy named Matt came into the locker room. He obviously had been working out in the workout room. I asked him if he could direct me to someplace to eat where I would encounter some of the local flavor. He told me about Benson’s on Main Street, right near the BP Gas Station. I thanked him and left.
So I went down on Main Street and found the BP Gas Station then found Benson’s. I walked in the front door and found a counter for ordering pizza to the right and a room with and old wooden rowboat to the left. The rowboat had a Plexiglass cover on it and was being used as a table that would fit about ten people. I continued back into Benson’s and found a bar on the right and a room with tables and a big fish tank to left. The place had a fair amount of people in it, but wasn’t too overcrowded. But it must get pretty swamped with people during the summer. I found an electrical outlet up near the bar and proceeded to sit next to it so I could recharge my camera battery.
Jenn the bartender served me up a local brew and I ordered a 12 inch 4 meat pizza with only 3 meats on it because I don’t especially like pepperoni. I was sitting next to a young guy named Tanner. He looked to be under 30 or so. He and another guy were talking about pulling out piers and doing other stuff to close down places for the winter. The other guy was talking about getting a job at a ski resort out west for the winter. Tanner and I started talking about trails. I said that in Wisconsin we have mainly limestone State Bike Trails and we have to pay for a state bike pass. In Minnesota, they have nice asphalt paved bike trails and you don’t have to pave for a bike pass. He said it’s because the snowmobilers pay for all the trails with their fees. And the snowmobilers cannot ride on the paved trail, the have their own trail next to the paved trail. He said it was a little unfair that snowmobilers paid for everything. But he likes riding on the paved trails, too.
Soon the 3 meat pizza arrived and I began working on it. I didn’t think Jenn thought I would be able to eat the whole thing. Some guy down at the end of the bar bought a super humongous big burger and fries. Evidently, if you eat the whole thing, you get a free meal the next time you come in. But Tanner said that most people get one and split it between two or three people because it’s a good deal.
I was watching a St Cloud State Hockey Game on one TV and a baseball playoff game on the other TV. The baseball game finished and Jenn changed it to the Minnesota Wild Hocky game. Yes, I was in Minnesota, where Hockey is king.
I finished off the pizza, and had long since finished off the beer. Jenn had served me up some water to go with the pizza. And it was a good pizza. I paid up the damages and headed out. I drove back to the Highway 84 Trailhead north of Longville and slept in the back of the van. I was feeling pretty good.