Hiking Around Snowbank Lake, BWCA

On the way to my house Aras was talking along the lines of ". . . say if a guy left his tent poles at home. . . " That got me thinking. Out of everything I could remember packing, I could not remember putting my poles in, or on my backpack. This had me a bit alarmed, to say the least. We arrived at my house. I had been planning to stop, simply to say farewell to my wife, Jeannie, children and father-in- law, but now it was a frantic search for the tent poles. I tore around the house . . . nothing in the basement, nothing in the trunk. I was nearly frantic, when I found the errant poles in an older pack I had considered taking. Off we go. At this point we knew Larry, a co-worker at VERITAS who had accompanied us on earlier expeditions, would already be pleased as he loves camping debacles. Forgetting tent poles certainly takes you to near debaclous heights.

I was starving, but not paying enough actual attention to exit the freeway safely. When we got to Cloquet we stopped at Grandma’s. I had a Reuben sandwich and Aras had something he didn’t like as much. Afterwards I splurged on a delicious latte truffle. After all, the weekend was non-stop trooping through the woods, so I could afford some empty calories.

We stopped at a gas station for GPS batteries. I remembered that I had not filled up my water bag in town so I had Aras pick up a gallon of water so we wouldn’t have to turn back. We headed out of Ely on Hwy. 169, past the International Wolf Center.

A few miles out of town we turned onto the Fernberg Trail, County 18, and headed for the trail head. Here is where things got a bit confusing. We only had a topographical map of Snowbank with us. I had left my state maps at home. So on our topo map we thought we were on Fernberg looking for another road, when in reality the map showed the turn off from 169 onto Fernberg which we had already made. We went back and forth on the road. We stopped at the "Kekakabic Trail Head" parking lot. We couldn’t make heads or tails of the map in the parking lot. Finally, we drove down the end of the road to a resort named "Smitty’s on Snowbank."

We hopped out and asked the guy behind the counter.  Smitty, I assume.  He looks at us kind of strangely and indicates it’s the large parking lot we had just passed. I offered a dumbfounded, "We wondered if that was it." At this point I think Smitty started to wonder if we are ready for the woods. After all if we can’t see a clearly marked parking lot, how will we navigate through the wild? He asks us where we are going and we chat for a while. During the conversation, Smitty indicates that there are at least two wolf packs, and to watch out for moose as they were in rut. "They’ve already treed two hikers this year." This clearly got Aras thinking. Smitty said if we saw a moose just give them plenty of room and don’t spook them. Smitty also suggested a couple of campsites that we should check out on the far end of the lake if we got a chance. He also convinced us to go north first, which wasn’t our original plan.

Tim and Aras at the trailhead. (ak)

At the trail head, we met two grouse hunters. There was also a Volkswagen in the parking lot that had obviously been there for a while. I filled up with water with Aras’ help and we got our packs on and left at 10:50 in the morning. We were supposed to self register, but there were no permits, so we put our contact info on a brochure and stuffed it in the box. (Trailhead location is N47, 58', 05.0", W91, 27', 56.7"). Using a compass heading I thought we must be on a spur trail leading to the main Snowbank trail. On the trail we saw a grouse on a log, and a lot of really beautiful lichen. Most of the lichen I have seen before seemed so flat but this was thick, be-jeweled, fluffy stuff.

On the trail we saw a "Bearing Tree." Neither of us could make heads or tails of what the cryptic scratches might mean. Although we are sure they would mean something to a surveyor. After a half hour of walking we hit a two track trail.

We took a GPS reading (N47, 58', 22.2", W91, 27', 53.1") and headed up the trail.

Before too long we saw a cairn and a marker indicating the Snowbank trail. At this point it really felt like we were on our way. We were too far from the car to run back for something, and we seemed to finally be on our destination trail headed roughly North up the west side of Snowbank.

The trail conditions were very good. It took little route finding to pick our way through the woods. Although the trail is thin, it is well tramped down. The trail got a little rougher and we started doing more short ups and downs hitting a bit of a ridge line. The ridge line was really at peak fall colors. There were few leaves on the ground, but brilliant reds, yellows, and oranges in the trees, punctuated with a few light greens for contrast. All this time, exactly where we might be on the map was a small mystery. It was easy to see we were on the Snowbank Trail headed North on the West side of Snowbank. We could see bays and islands on the lake, but guessing which bay or island you were seeing was a bit difficult. Additionally, I think it was at this time we started to become aware that our map was not all that accurate, i.e., sometimes the trail didn’t seem to follow the topographical features in the same way the map showed. We also noticed the places on the map where the topographical lines veered over the water, perhaps indicated an alignment problem in printing. Aras seemed a bit better than me in figuring out our location. He also had hiking poles and so spent the entire trip on point. He set a good pace the whole trip. The rear position would enable me to get my camera gear if Aras were being treed by a moose. Speaking of camera gear, Aras had a tiny Yashica T4 which is renowned for being light weight and quick on the draw. I had my Nikon kit complete with three lenses and a couple of filters. This was a pain in the neck literally, as it didn’t integrate with the backpack at all and I had to sling it over neck and arm for easy access.

Before lunch (11:36) the trail becomes tougher. The trail intersects the Flash Lake portage which we reached around 12:12. Shortly afterwards we encountered three hikers, two men and a woman - all college age. We said "hi" and asked how it looked further up the trail. They just grunted and offered no conversation. It’s still a mystery why they were so grumpy. Perhaps they were in a hurry, had had a falling out on the way, we’ll never know. We assume they owned the dusty Volkswagen in the parking lot.

We came to a beautiful peninsula which we stopped at for lunch at 2:09 or so. It had a nice latrine, fire grate and a great view of the lake. Aras fired up his stove and ate the hiker staple, Ramen Noodles, two packages of noodles, one package of spice. He could have saved at least 15 grams of weight by halving his spice load I suppose. I had peanut butter, pita, bagel, gorp, and dried fruit. This campsite finally allowed us to figure out where exactly on the map we were, although it required us to ignore a small inlet, which didn’t seem to appear on the map. This was a leap that seemed reasonable. (N47, 59', 0", W91, 27', 37")

Tim reads the map near the blowdown. (ak)

It was just before lunch that we started to encounter the remaining bits of the July 4^th blow-down of 1999. It was pretty amazing hiking through that area. Huge trees had been tipped over or in some cases all mowed off at 40 feet as if a weed whacker of enormous proportions had suddenly appeared. We stopped a lot that day to simply soak it all in. The catch phrase was "Journey not Destination." Some of the blown down wood appeared to have also burned, but we could not really tell if this was from a planned burn or natural, but limited fire. The scenery was fantastic. Time and time again, awe inspiring views would present themselves, as if we were walking through the pages of a copy of National Geographic magazine. On the trail, I asked for help finding the tube from my water supply. Aras pointed out that the container of water was gone. I took the pack off and sure enough it was. I left my pack and found my water bag ten minutes back.  I had quickly donned my poncho just ten minutes prior and must have allowed my hydration bag to slide off. I felt pretty lucky to have found it so easily.

By this time, it was getting to four-ish and we were a bit concerned in that we had not yet passed the two camp sites we had expected to see. I suggested we continue on the trail a bit further, rather than turn around. I could not build a case for this based on the map, as our reading of the map indicated that we must have passed the campsites at least a half mile back. Aras humored me, and lucky me there was a campsite up a small ridge about 5 minutes further. We never did find two campsites on the area, only one.

Tim poses by our first campground. (ak)

We set up camp quickly. The camp site overlooked the lake and was about 50-60 feet above the water, with a pretty steep pitch down to the lake. Still it was pretty easy access to water for filtering. Aras and I chatted while filtering water, and soaked in the view. We headed back up to camp again, and I worked on a fire while Aras worked on the stove. This is where trouble began.

It had rained all day Friday. While it had been warm and mostly clear on Saturday, the wood still seemed a little wet. It snapped when you broke it, but it would hardly start. While I was struggling to build a fire, Aras grumbled about the stove. For some reason it would prime, but never really light the way it should. Luckily it was field serviceable and he started taking it apart. I must have started my fire 6 times without much success. I abandoned the "log cabin" fire-making method for the "teepee" which worked much better. By this time Aras had got the stove going and I had him try and feed the fire while I boiled water for my meal.

Aras enjoying a morning cup of coffee. (tb)

I had a freeze dried shrimp, pasta and white sauce meal. It was outstanding if a little pasty in spots. Perhaps I should measure the water more closely. Finally, we had a small fire. It was well past dark now, and you definitely needed head lamps to see away from the fire. We quickly ran out of anything that looked like dry wood, so we headed back to the blown down timber that crossed the spur to the campsite. We sawed and snapped until we had enough wood. Before too long we had a cheery fire going. There really is nothing quite a cheery as a snapping little fire. It warms the bones and the soul equally. I was ready to hit the hay, but Aras wasn’t quite there. We bagged our kitchen gear, food, and toilet paper and hung it in a nearby tree. Aras wanted to hang it using the best practice, where both bags are hung from the ends of the rope, completely out of reach with no rope attached to a tree, other than the one over the limb. I didn’t think that was completely necessary, but it is the best way so I played along. We were too close to the tree but the right height, and just far enough from camp. This camp was located at N47, 59’ 56 .5", W91, 26', 11.1".

It was cool at night, but I was snug in the tent with a hat on. I slept poorly, which is typical for me in camp. Between the noise of the woods, the smallness of the tent and pad and my imagination, I rarely get 8 hours of sleep in a tent. While preparing the fire and cooking we heard wolves howling distinctly in the distance. This was a first for both us us and a real treat. We couldn’t tell how far away they were, but it seemed pretty far.

Before bedtime, I noticed that my hat had gone missing. While scavenging for wood, on the trail leading away from our camp, Aras managed to spot the hat. I was glad to see the hat again. I was feeling pretty lucky at that point.

Sunday: Slow and Cold

View from the lake where Aras filtered the water. (ak)

Sunday was the day with the most foreboding weather forecast. The forecast included high probability of rain and the potential for sleet and snow. We slept in just past 8:00 A.M., I believe. It was cool and rather damp, but not raining. We had a breakfast. I managed to scorch my porridge pretty good. The stove was still acting up a bit. It was shortly after this that I figure out I had left my green scrubby at home and needed to borrow one. After more load adjusting we broke camp and headed back onto the trail at about 10:40 or so about 15 minutes after the rain began. It was a light but steady drizzle. Not much of an early start. The trail was even rougher at this point as we headed up and down larger hills.

Tim posing by a blowdown area. (ak)

More blowdown area later on.  Note how all of the trees are broken off at the same height. (tb)

We crossed larger blown down areas. Each of them had us wondering what would a person do if they had gotten stranded on the wrong side of the blown down wood. It must have been slow hiking. Up until this point we had encountered very few trees across the trail blocking our progress. Most of the blocking timber had been cleared by members of the Kek trail club on one of their spring cleaning trips. The notable exception being the short spur to our campsite. As we hiked Aras pointed out more scat, which was a puzzle to us. They were longish and hairy. Nothing too fresh was seen though. Aras thought it might be bear, I really had no idea.

We crossed a large swampy area, had a breather at 11:43 and ate some gorp. At this point I worked on getting my pack, camera, and poncho all working together. Aras switched to Gortex to keep out the chill. This was a pretty exposed hillock and we both were ready to start warming up again. We were constantly fiddling with our gear to adjust temperature. We found that adjusting, or taking off, a hat could really fine tune our body temperature quite nicely. I took fewer notes this day due to rain and general laziness.

 

 

A view of Tim's poncho from the front and back. (ak)

Gear Note: In my memory, the poncho nicely covered my pack. That was before I bought my current pack. Bottom line, the poncho did a horrible job. I looked like Quasimodo, and it barely covered half my pack.

The trail veers away from Snowbank at this point making a run-around Wooden Leg Lake. We hiked over our first beaver dam this day. The dam was very old and enormous. It was so old that bushes and grass completely covered the dam. It felt very secure and scenic. It was the first dam, but not the last. We crossed too many to count.

It rained most of the day and the vegetation was soaking wet. Both of us were kept warm by both layers and activity. This was the first time I went camping with an all synthetic stack of clothing. It was great. The layers more than stopped the wind, and the damp didn’t change the insulating properties. Thankfully it wasn’t a harder rain and we never did see any snow.

A lot of ground we covered looked like excellent moose habitat. It was low and swampy with lots of small brush. Still no sight of moose. We looked hard at the landscape but nothing stirred. Wooden Leg Lake especially looked like the place to find a moose. We noted there were not very many candidate trees for being treed in if a moose came our way. There appeared to be a stone structure of some sort near the south west side of the lake. We were too wet and behind schedule to investigate.

Aras checks the current location. (tb)

We rounded Wooden Leg lake and headed back to a view of Snowbank. We stopped at a campsite on the North End of Snowbank and had lunch. We planned to eat a cold lunch so we could make up lost time, so I supplied bagel(s), pita, and peanut butter. We were too tired to head down to the camp site so instead ate at a cairn and sign pointing the campsite out. I would like to point out by this time we had passed numerous bald ridge-lines and been very impressed by the navigation cairns (a pile of rocks/stones). They were clear and in good condition.

Based on our progress simply getting to the North end of Snowbank we were becoming a little worried we wouldn’t get out in time. We hadn’t planned on seeing the actual camp site, but Aras needed water, and I needed a latrine so we headed towards the camp site. I couldn’t find the latrine so dug a hole a ways off from camp. We both wondered if we should leave our packs out by the cairn. When we got back I noticed I had left my peanut butter container on a rock, open by my pack. It was practically an invitation to any bears in the area.

We headed off for our campsite on Grub Lake. After a mile or so we headed away from Snowbank to Grub Lake. Hiking in this area was a little deceiving. Grub Lake is long and you are far enough from 10.the lake where it’s difficult to tell if you are seeing a patch of Snowbank or Grub Lake. It was getting late. I was a little winded and suggested a breather. We stopped for a while, then got going again. Studying the map indicated very little water ahead on the trail, so we stopped for water. I think it was pumping water where I misplaced my gloves. At this point we headed up to our campsite. What campsite? There was no campsite! We were tired and wet after a hard days hike.

We hiked to the point in the Lake where the trail veered off, limbo-ing under several fallen trees. No camp in site so we limbo-ed back. Still no campsite. We saw a likely spot on an island near where we had filtered water. I headed off to investigate the island while Aras checked out the entire North shoreline of Grub Lake. Since it was now past five and we had no chance of reaching another site in the dark we decided we had two choices. One, stay in a blown down area on the trail. The problem was that there was barely enough room for tents, no spot for a fire, and it was very rocky. Additionally, as it was a valley it might have had one of those cold katabatic drafts. Choice two was the island. The only problem was exposure to the wind and game trails clearly trampled down. We found no immediate sign of other campers like sooty rocks. Regulations aside, we were staying on the island.

A view from the island at sunrise. (tb)

The island as seen from the trail. (ak)

Later on that night when I dug a cat hole for a latrine, I buried my waste and covered it with a rock. Under the rock I had just picked up was the remains of toilet paper. We had not been the first to make this choice.

We quickly made our priorities. First shelter, then food, fire and water. We moved quickly, but ran into filter problems and stove problems. I had a nice crackly fire though which helped us warm up. We ended up filtering in the dark. I drank a lot of water this evening, as I had run out of water between lunch and Grub lake and wanted to stave off dehydration. The stars really put on a show as it cleared after dusk. You could see the Milky Way quite nicely. This was the best meal of the trip for me. Dehydrated beans, Textured Vegetable Protein, Dried Ground beef wrapped in a nice pita or tortilla. It was amazingly good, and didn’t take much cooking or cleaning.

Aras figured out the filter problem at this point. It appeared that the optional membrane post–filter was shot. Once removed the water flowed nicely. We were still playing with the stove a bit.

We were both concerned about progress. We knew from the topographical map that the worst was ahead, and that our current rate of progress was not enough to get us out in time on Tuesday. This presented some problems. The quality of Aras’ food supply eroded on Tuesday pretty quickly. (Although I might dispute this fact, after going through his gear looking for a lighter on Tuesday.)  In any case, not only might we run out of food, but we didn’t want to worry anybody. At this point, we weren’t even sure if we would make it out within 24 hours of our expected departure time.

I stayed in my wet socks, as I wanted totally dry socks for the morning. After food, fire and pumping we turned in tired but happy. It took me a few minutes to warm back up after changing socks. In addition my legs were quite chilly to the touch which I only noticed after I stopped moving. I awoke to the call of nature. It was so still the lake was like glass and I could see the Northern lights near the horizon. I didn’t dawdle though since it was so cold.

Monday: Hustle, Hustle, Hustle

Aras had set his alarm for 6:30 so we would get an earlier start. We took some time to build up our courage enough to open our tents and get our boots on. Our boots had frozen solid as they were still wet from the day before. The tents were covered in frost as was any gear left out. Sleeping bags were plenty heavy as well from condensation in the tent. Putting on the solid boots wasn’t that bad in reality because I had toasty dry socks. Aras, who only had damp or damper socks to choose from, was even less enthusiastic about his frozen boots. It took me a good ten minutes to gear up mentally to slide the boots on.

Aras loading his pack. (tb)

We had breakfast and covered up any track that we had been on the island. Hopefully, the next people who stop will never know we were there. Leaving the island I found my mitts. I’m still feeling lucky. I also found someone else’s Nalgene bottle on the trail. I later lost it and did not retrieve it. We got back on the trail by 9:30 or so. Not as early as I would like but Aras has a certain pace in the morning.

The next few miles were hard scrambling. Not only was it hilly, but there was a lot of downed timber we had to climb over or scamper under. It wouldn’t be hard ordinarily, but with a fully loaded pack it’s a challenge. This was especially true for me as I had the water bag and camera strapped off of my pack, outrigger style.

All the scrambling and huffing was worth it once we saw the great views on the ridge line overlooking Snowbank. Before we saw the big view, there was one ridge though deep in a blown down valley that looked like 60 feet pretty much straight up. It took some mental effort to keep going, but what’s the choice, turn 13.back? We had a long uphill to a point called Juniper Ridge. It was at this point where I started to wonder if the author of Hiking Minnesota had never made it to this end of the Lake. His entire description of everything North of the Boot Lake portage was two sentences, indicating you would past vistas and camp sites. This spot was truly amazing. Lucky for us it was also dry which made the granite scramble pretty easy, although still tough cardio wise. If the weather had been worse, and there had been icy patches, it would have been a dangerous climb. While stopping to enjoy a view we also adjusted my camera. Aras figured out a way to get it supported by the pack and still be accessible. The new arrangement made it more difficult for me to swing the pack on but was much more comfortable.

A view of Snowbank lake from a ridge. (tb)

We were making our best time of the trip. No doubt the warm dry weather helped.

We had lunch at the east side of the Boot Lake portage. Aras walked slowly over a log, which I thought looked too slippery. I took a rock jumping route, but ended up with one misstep into the stream. We had lunch and filtered water as we were heading away from easy water access. By this point I knew the bite valve on my hydration system was leaky and I was losing too much water. The inlet side of the water filter also showed an uncanny ability to move towards sand and rocks. This is an ability that I still don’t fully understand. Right after lunch clouds rolled in and it cooled.

Now we were in less harsh terrain. We walked through marshy wooded areas. I made a quick pit stop at the next camp site. (I think my bowels got excited just seeing a campsite sign.)

Aras pointed out a Pine Marten on a fallen log but I couldn’t get the camera out until he had scampered away. A Pine Marten looks like a cross between a fox and a otter, with a little racoon and weasel thrown in for good measure. We kept on hiking. We quickly passed Birdeseye Lake. Birdseye Lake is a few feet off the trail, which you wouldn’t know, if you were simply looking at the map. Then at 3:30 we stopped at the campsite at Disappointment Lake for a snack. Both of us were really pleased with our progress. Neither of wanted to make camp at 3:30, because it was way to early and the next two camp sites seemed achievable. My feet took a pounding on this day. So we headed South near Disappointment Lake and got to the 85 rod portage to Parent Lake by 4:15 or so. At this point we knew the far camp site on Parent Lake was within our grasp. We also saw a lazy beaver house on Disappointment with no dam to go with it.

Quick break on the trail. (tb)

We passed a grassy swamp with prime moose territory but no moose in sight. At this point my feet were aching pretty good, but I was feeling really good about the progress we had made. My ankles also started to hurt, as if the shoelace was cutting into the ankle. I would figure out later at Russ’ sauna that my feet were pretty swollen and puffy. I unlaced the top lace and kept on going. We found the camp site at the south of Parent Lake well before dark. It was a great spot, but the ground was full of roots and stones. Finally we found two spots big enough for our tents and set up camp. After setting up, we found a big smear of what hopefully was chunky peanut butter on a rock by Aras’ tent. We laughed and insisted it must have been left by the grumpy campers. From that point on we referred to them as the "no talking, Volkswagen driving, birkenstock wearing, peanut butter smearing . . . " people. Of course we have no idea if it’s the same people. Aras scraped most of it off the rock and flung it into the woods.

We felt a lot better as know we knew with confidence that an on-time Tuesday exit was within our grasp. Oddly enough when I got back, Jeannie, my wife, indicated she wouldn’t even worry until Wednesday, which is pretty good. Pam, Aras’ wife, might not have been as sanguine.

 

Fire with a nice sunset. (tb)

There was a lot of very dry wood at this campsite. While Aras pumped water, I built a nice little fire. It was so easy to build the fire that I had my food cooked on the fire before he had finished filtering the requisite six quarts. We saw another fire across the lake at approximately the spot where the other camp was. It could have been a funny reflection, as we didn’t see any other signs of humans. This campsite came complete with easy to saw, large logs. Unfortunately, we couldn’t keep them going as they were a little too wet. We kept a nice blaze going with finger sized sticks. The whole day we had hiked with socks on the outside of our packs. We got them almost dry. I tried to finish mine by the fire but that didn’t help much, as I became concerned about setting my only almost-dry set of socks on fire.

The end was in sight.

Tuesday: When can we start celebrating?

In the morning I pumped water and a loon and a fisher came within 12-15 feet. It was still and beautiful. Other than my sore back, feet, knees and groin muscle I could have sat there for hours.

Impressive beaver dam. (tb)

My feet were still plenty sore, and my ankles still chafed my shoelaces a bit. On the way out we went past a private clear cut, and a large beaver dam complex that included 5 dams and at least two houses. There were some hill climbs but they lacked the summit views found on Jasper Ridge. The part of the map labeled "Man Love Meadow" was apparently a jaunt along a ridge that had been clear cut in 1997. It’s still a mystery as to what that designation means.

The forest service had erected several signs extolling the benefits of clear cut-ting. These were informative but a bit one–sided. I would have preferred a more honest sign. Something along the lines of, "This was once a beautiful wooded path, now instead you have a nice view and some clean toilet paper, deal with it." At this point anyone offering toilet paper would have had my gratitude. Now you can clearly can see why I am not employed in marketing.

We had a few more logs to cross, including a steeple cross like section. I found a lot of ways around the logs as my groin muscle was hurting anytime I lifted my knee up past normal walking position. That had started on Sunday and gotten steadily worse. I also had a technique of swinging under logs, which worked pretty well.

We took a few breaks but made excellent progress as we both could clearly see the goal. Aras kept taking GPS coordinates and it was fun to watch the numbers trend down towards a half a mile.

Just before the end of the trail, the road became visible. I asked Aras, "Can we start celebrating." Needless to say, this comment set in motion our closest brush with disaster for the whole trip. I swung under a log, lost my footing, and almost fell over on a huge rock, barely catching myself on a birch trunk. Once Aras stopped laughing he suggested we wait until we actually got into the car before beginning any celebration. Sage advice.

We found the trail led out to with in 45 feet of the car. We proceeded to shove our stuff into the car so we could collapse. We headed back to Smitty’s to point out that we had made it and buy some snacks to show our gratitude for his good advice. We pulled up and sure enough Smitty was in the store. We told him our story. He asked about animals. Aras explained we saw lots of bear scat. Once Smitty explained the differences between bear and wolf scat Aras decided we had seen lots of wolf scat on the trail. I asked about our missing campsite on Grub Lake and Smitty said he would tell the Kek trail club. Then he grilled us about where we had stayed, we became very vague and gestured at the map and grunted a bit to throw him off. I doubt we fooled him. We bought soda’s and candy and listened to Smitty tell us about how terrible traffic was in the Twin Cities.

We headed back to Ely. We stopped at Russ’ to make sure the sauna in Ely was on and called our wives. From there we hit Cranberry’s on Sheridan for food, even though Russ offered delicious t-bone steaks. I guess Aras is not the meat eater I thought he was. At the restaurant, I waited until our sandwiches arrived to note that we were both in need of a hand-washing and should probably wash up. Poor timing on my part. Aras gave a lot of thought to eating with grubby hands but relented at the end.

We then showered and sauna’ed at Russ’ place. Evidently Aras is not Finnish as he could barely stand the sauna when I had just started to pour water on the rocks. He gasped, "Can this hurt my lungs?" After changing into clean clothes, we were off on our way back to the cities and work. I was surprised to note that my feet had really swollen, and my right big toe was fifty percent larger than it’s normal size. It did explain why my shoelaces had been rubbing me.

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Notes

Items I didn’t "need."

• The Big Knife

I do sleep better with the knife nearby.

Items which might have been better for conditions.

• Hiking poles

The guide book shows a nice flat trail. The reality is quite different. If conditions had been any worse I might not have been safe. As it was I had to slowly pace myself in a lot of spots picking just the right foot placement. I also had to borrow Aras’ poles several times to complete a stream crossing confidently.

• Light-weight rain gear & pack fly

This is more the Ray–way described in the "Ultimate Backpacker." The poncho just didn’t cover my pack well, and if there had been driving rain I could have gotten a soaking.

• Ibuprofen

I should have brought this instead of Excedrin for it’s anti-swelling proper-ties. Vitamin "I".

• New bite valve for water bag

I shudder to think how much water went down my leg instead of inside me thanks to a leaky bite valve.

• More toilet paper

I ran out on Tuesday morning. I made it out alright, but I was not looking forward to leaves.

Items which I forgot.

• Garbage Bags
• Green Scrubby

Item I almost forgot.

• Tent poles

Forgetting this would have been scary as I am not good at whittling.

Items I wished I had not brought.

• Nikon Camera

It was too heavy and bulky for conditions.

Items Aras wished he had brought.

• More toilet paper

He was close to running out but had several squares.

• Parmesan Cheese

• Exact cooking instructions for spaghetti

• Garbage Bag

He would have like to have used this to wrap our food bag in, when hanging it at night.

Things I enjoy about civilization.

• Don’t have to filter my water.
• Latrines are almost always in easy walking distance no matter the urgency
• Warm bed
• Don’t have 35-40 pound pack on my back

Things I enjoy more about the woods.

• No phones.
• No stock quotes.
• Clarity of priorities, i.e. shelter, water, food which makes for simpler planning.

Funny things Aras would say.

• "Oh, cool that’s how it works."

I would frequently hear Aras saying this while fiddling with his own gear, that he has taken out in the woods before. It gives the listener a lot of confidence in whatever bit of gear he was "discovering."

• "My one luxury is . . . "

Each time he said this he was referring to a different piece of gear.

• "That’s an interesting idea . . . "

I figured out that Aras, always the diplomat, actually meant "That’s crazy —It will be interesting to see if you survive . . . "

Additional Trail Information

• Smitty’s on Snowbank

A wealth of information. They also offer camp setup services and lodging.

(218) 365-6032

(800) 950-8310

• Parks & Trails Council of Minnesota

John Leinen (651) 433 4456

• Minnesota Rovers Outing Club

Pat Ryan (651) 699-9800

• Kekakabic Trail Club http://www.kek.org/

This club does a lot of work keeping this and other trails cleared. Hat’s off to them for their hard work. Join and become a volunteer.

Total Hiking Distance: 23 miles

Credits

• All text is © 2002, Tim Burlowski.
• Photos noted with (ak) are  © 2002 by Aras Kriauciunas
• Photos noted with (tb) are  © 2002 by Tim Burlowski