Isle Royale Forums

September 12th Wedneday

We got up around 5:30am. After getting out stuff together and eating a granola bar, we headed out at 7:00am. We arrived at Lake Richie around 8:15am. We bumped into the other group that came to the island with the eight people that stayed with us at Three Mile and Moskey. We warned them that East Chickenbone wasn’t all that great of a campground, but I still think that they planned to stick to their agenda. After a ten minute break for water, we were on our way again at around 8:25am.

Along the way we bumped into two guys from Mississippi and the three guys we met on the voyageur who were dropped off at McCargoe Cove. I thought they were canoeing for some reason, but as it turns out, they were fishing and on foot. They told me that they had some luck and caught a couple of fish along the way near some of the off trail lakes, but passed on the idea of fishing at West Chickenbone because it was too reedy to do any onshore fishing.

We got to the West Chickenbone/Hatchet/ East Chickenbone intersection marker at around 10am. After a short water break, it was on to Hatchet Lake. There isn’t much to the first two miles of the hike toward Hatchet. It’s mostly flat and easy. About an hour into the hike is when you really start hitting the incline and rise in elevation. Shelly hated this part of the hike and needed some breaks in between hill humps, but I was unbothered by the extra energy that was exerted. I’d like to take a pause here and say that I am thankful to still be in my thirties. I know I said I wish I could go back in time to my twenties, but really a moment should be taken to be grateful for still being able to conquer any and all parts of Isle Royale without much strain or short windedness. I know as I get older, eventually my heart will have difficulties oxygenating my body due to its inefficiency to pump as many quarts of blood through my heart as it once was able to do when I was younger, something we all experience with age. In turn, things will become more difficult and I may not always be able to conquer the things with ease that I am able to now. Eventually, and taking matters even further, there will be a time where I will not be able to tackle certain things that I was once able to, never mind with ease. So with that said, I am thankful to God for having the healthy body that I have been endowed with. I am thankful to my parents, especially to my father, for inspiring me to live a healthy and active life. I am thankful for all of the things that I have been able to enjoy while being on the island, let alone life in general. My hope is that if I continue to take care of this body that I will still have many years to come where I am able to travel about the island and be a witness to the many beautiful things it offers. We are so lucky with every trip we get to take to the island, and even though I may seem to realize how lucky I am, I know with age it will probably seem as though I took things for granted. I feel as though you can never really appreciate something to its fullest extent until it no longer exists. I know this may sound pessimistic and melancholy in essence, but at least for now; it is these thoughts that allow me to appreciate every second on the island. Perhaps, in the future towards the days of my twilight, I will be comforted by the fact that my kids and their children will still be taking trips and touring around the island when my body does not allow me to make such visits. It will be their experiences and pictures that will rekindle the flames of joy that the island once brought me. I know that was completely off topic, but I felt compelled to share my thoughts as they entered my mind in my moments of reflecting on my last trip. Not to worry, I don’t believe I will be going off track again as I continue with my trip report. Now where was I?

Oh yes, so Shelly hates hills and huge rises in elevation on the trail. The Hatchet Lake path did not get exempted off of her hated list, but she did it. She always does. She pushes through hills, blisters, pain, tears, I am not sure if blood yet, but ya, pretty much almost anything you can think of. She is a much stronger backpacker than myself mentally.

About a half hour after leaving the trail marker that is at the intersection of Hatchet, West Chickenbone, and East Chickenbone; we bumped into a bearded gentleman with a camera. He said he had just come from Hatchet Lake and that two of his buddies were trailing behind him a ways back. He said that on his way into Hatchet on the previous day, he came upon a cow and her calf. It was a 26-minute encounter and they seemed comfortable being in his presence eating. The time was 10:32am when we departed each other’s company. The guy said he was headed to Moskey and his friends were headed to Chippewa Harbor. He was going to spend an extra day there and wait for his friends to meet him at Moskey.

Once we did get to the top of the ridgeline after doing one of Shelly’s least favorite hiking parts of the island, we took our packs off, drank a little, snacked on some trail mix, loaded up on some gummy hydration sharks, and then set off after taking a 20 minute break. Eventually somewhere down the line a little after 11:30am we bumped into the bearded man’s friends. We got to talking about the cow and calf they saw and the wolf at Siskiwit Bay that the guy we had met earlier forgot to make mention of. With further conversation, it was mentioned that I was Rafiki from the Isle Royale Forum boards. Then out of nowhere the guy with the black beard told me he knew who I was and saw my posting about my solo trip report in May. His name of the board is “dominate the trail”, and while he doesn’t post much, he told me that the guy we met earlier does and that his name on the forums is “tightlines”. I made them aware of the fact that I’d definitely seen the name tightlines floating around the boards before. Shortly after we headed on our ways, we bumped into a couple who also recently left out of Hatchet Lake. They seemed like they had a tough first day and did not get into South Desor as early as they wanted to. I forgot where they were headed, but I think it was West Chickenbone.

We got to the Hatchet Lake marker at 2:15pm and by the time we made it to the junction that pointed to the direction of the campsites and to Todd Harbor, it was 2:25pm. We made it to site #2 at 2:30pm. While setting up our equipment we noticed that site #4 was taken by a couple from New York (the Andirondacks). We are not sure if site #5 was occupied at the time, but eventually it would be when we went to scope out the campgrounds.



Here is a view towards the top of ridgeline looking down the path leading to Hatchet Lake:






Here is the map of Hatchet Lake Campgrounds:









In the process of dealing with setting up our tent, we met Dave from site #4 as he passed out campsite towards the trailhead. Five minutes later, he passed our site again as he headed back to his site. We thought that he went to use the toilet. However, two minutes later, he was passing our site for a third time with his wife. I wondered what the heck he was up to, and as if he could read my mind, he stopped to inform me that there was a cow and calf on the trail that led back to the ridgeline of the Greenstone trail. Shelly and I dropped what we were doing and followed quickly behind. Unfortunately, Shelly was not able to keep pace with her sandals, and for fear of losing where Dave and Sue (his wife) were headed; I pushed forward at a faster rate. I thought I almost lost track of them before I got a peak of one of their jackets as they scaled up the hill to the ridgeline. I finally caught up to them as they laid still staring at what was in the forest ahead of them. I couldn’t see anything until they pointed out the cow and calf a far way off. I tried taking some pictures, but they weren’t coming in good with how far the moose were from us. I wasn’t helping matters much either with all the noises my camera was making with each shot I took. Thankfully, I would eventually figure out how to turn off all the digital sound effects that sounded during each picture I took so I would not draw attention to myself in the future.



Here's Mommaz and Babyz, while not the best pictures ever, I like the last one most:
















After about 10 minutes Sue and Dave threw in the towel at trying to see if the animals would come closer to us for a better shot. It turned out to be a good idea, because I probably waited for another 20 minutes after that, but the moose only continued to get further and further away until I could barely make them out. On my way back to the campsite, I saw a naked girl from the back, I thought it was Shelly and went to go talk to her. However, I soon realized that the person I was coming upon was not my girlfriend and that the naked girl was talking to another naked girl. Luckily, things became evident before either of them saw me coming their way. And once again, thank god I learned how to turn off the digital noises on my camera if you get my drift Just kidding!!! The two of them were staying at group site #3. Even though there were only two of them, I guessed they liked that site compared to the #3 individual site. I encountered them earlier when I was trying to catch up with Dave and Sue. They were talking about who farts more or something to the effect, I interjected with a joke about their debate only to leave them bursting out into embarrassed laughter. I never got to introducing myself formally, but you could tell that they were enjoying themselves throughout the evening with their girlish laughter that could be heard at random moments.

After Shelly and I had the site set up, I took a tour of the campgrounds. After exploring the area, I hung out with Sue and Dave at site #4 for a while. We talked about how this was their first time to the island. We talked about how we both liked Granite Gear backpacks. We talked about lightweight backpacking and how low we were able to get the weights down in our packs. I think Dave said his pack was 26Lbs and Sue said hers was 20Lbs for a one-week trip. It was nice exchanging thoughts and ideas on how to get even lighter by using different strategies. It was definitely a very enjoyable conversation for me. I have not bumped into many people as eager as we are to lighten our loads and constantly try to think outside of the box with how things could be done better.

On my return to the campsite, Shelly was still half asleep. Once she fully awoke, we made dinner. Shelly’s foot was sour so I took the liberty of washing the dishes and filtering water. Usually our system involves me pumping of the water and her rinsing off our dinner pots. Unfortunately, I had to do my chores in the dark, because we had a late dinner. It did not help that my batteries were starting to die and make my headlamp dim. Shelly laughed at the matter when I got back to the tent, because as we looked at the map to see what our hiking conditions would be like for tomorrow, she asked me why I didn’t turn my headlamp on so our combined light would show the map better. I told her it was on and she said I needed to put in my new batteries, which I did on the following night. It was around 59 degrees when we went to sleep at around 9pm. We would set the alarm early and get up at 4:30am so we could make it to Malone Bay by noon.



Guess the little guy was after our nuts, but granola crumbs would have to do:

Sweet I made my posting 7 minutes before the end of the day and still managed to qualify at keeping my promise to post one day of my trip each day for the next several days Sorry for the delay.

September 13th Thursday

We woke up at 4:30am. After eating our usual granola bar each and getting everything packed up, Shelly left ahead of me at 6:03am as I worked on tying my boots. It was a good idea on her part, because whole the .2 miles leading out of the campground wasn’t difficult, the .3 miles scaling back up to the ridge was something Shelly was dreading. I caught up with her about half way up the side of the ridge. We made it to the top by 6:30am. While Shelly needed to begin with her headlamp on when leaving from out campsite, somewhere along the way on me catching up with her, probably around 6:15am, it was obvious that the light was no longer needed. We took a ten-minute break at the ridge marker, took off a layer, and marched towards Malone Bay.

We got to the Ishpeming Tower at 8:30am. We took a ten-minute break. Now would be a good idea to take a pause and mention an idea that popped into my head while staying at Hatchet Lake, which Shelly and I discussed the prior evening. It was an alternative plan we were considering instead of our initial one. So here it goes. We knew that at this time of year the Voyageur II was running a Wednesday/Thursday route. Wednesday the Voyageur left Grand Portage, MN and got to Windigo at 10am Central. From there it circumnavigated its way around the island to Rock Harbor. Thursday (today) it would be making its way around the other half of the island. It would stop by Daisy Farm, Chippewa Harbor, and Malone Bay (provided there were people that wanted to get picked up or dropped off there that booked in advance.) Malone Bay is the focus behind bringing this whole matter up. We figured that if the boat happened to be paying Malone Bay a visit on the chance that someone wanted to get dropped off there or scheduled a picked up there, we would get on the boat and have it take us to Windigo. We figured that we’d still be able to scope out the campgrounds and get a general idea of what Malone Bay looked like, so why not?

There were also more important reasons for selecting our alternative. #1 It would provide us an extra day of rest in case it was necessary to have one while we were canoeing should we experience bad weather and not feel safe canoeing. #2 It would allow us to avoid rehiking the 7 mile path that we took to get here from Ishpeming Tower. #3 We could avoid staying at South Desor which is one of our least favorite sites due to the water being on a steep decline from the campgrounds, the fact that there is no shelters, the fact that in a huge storm the dead birch trees in the area could collapse and crush your tent with ease, and the fact that you have to hike an extra .3 miles to get to and leave a site that we didn’t really care to go to in the first place. #4 We could do the Feldtmann Loop counter-clockwise which is what a lot of the veterans on the forms suggest doing, because it is supposedly easier. #5 We could see if a Ranger would hold our extra food for the remainder of what would be left of our trip while tackling the Feldtmann Loop. In turn, our packs would be lighter while doing the Feldtmann Loop. If the Ranger said it was against policy, we could leave a dry bag of our extra supplies and food in a shelter at Washington Creek with a note on it until we returned.



Let's take a pause in the story to show some pictures of the Ispeming Tower and some weird box that is located near it which is hidden between trees:













There were also more important reasons for selecting our alternative. #1 It would provide us an extra day of rest in case it was necessary to have one while we were canoeing should we experience bad weather and not feel safe canoeing. #2 It would allow us to avoid rehiking the 7 mile path that we took to get here from Ishpeming Tower. #3 We could avoid staying at South Desor which is one of our least favorite sites due to the water being on a steep decline from the campgrounds, the fact that there is no shelters, the fact that in a huge storm the dead birch trees in the area could collapse and crush your tent with ease, and the fact that you have to hike an extra .3 miles to get to and leave a site that we didn’t really care to go to in the first place. #4 We could do the Feldtmann Loop counter-clockwise which is what a lot of the veterans on the forms suggest doing, because it is supposedly easier. #5 We could see if a Ranger would hold our extra food for the remainder of what would be left of our trip while tackling the Feldtmann Loop. In turn, our packs would be lighter while doing the Feldtmann Loop. If the Ranger said it was against policy, we could leave a dry bag of our extra supplies and food in a shelter at Washington Creek with a note on it until we returned.

So with all of these great ideas floating around in my mind, there was a problem with our secondary plan that I did not take the opportunity to grasp. This whole time, I thought the Voyageur would stop at Malone Bay around 1pm, just like how it stops at McCargoe Cove at 1pm. This was a big mistaken on my part that I would only come to realize as we were descending down the Ishpeming Trail in a hurried pace. I made sense of my error when I though about how when our time would come to leave the island two Saturdays from now, the boat was scheduled to depart Windigo at 1:25pm. If that were the case, there would be no way the Voyageur could be at Malone at 1pm. When this became apparent, I wanted to hope that the Voyageur would come to Malone at 12pm, which would still give us time to catch it. As it would turn out, we would get to Malone Bay at 11:45am. We of course found out that the boat comes at 10am and the sad news was, it did indeed come today to drop of some canoers. Unfortunately, no matter how we angled it, it just would not have been possible to catch the ferry today. It would not have been possible for Shelly to maintain a 3mph pace without any breaks and I myself would not have wanted to rush so speedily with the chance that it would come early and we would still miss it. Furthermore, getting up earlier than 4:30am was out of the question. So no matter how we diced it, it wasn’t meant to be.



Some pictures taken on our way down to Malone Bay, all of which overlook Siskiwit Lake:

















Now that we knew we were staying here, it was time to find a shelter. The area we first ventured into contained Shelter 3, 4, and 5. Shelter 5 was taken by a man named Reese (not to be confused with the guy I met on the voyageur with the last name Reese) and Randy. Reese as I would come to learn built his own kayak. George coincidentally spoke of him while we were on the voyageur together, not that he had any expectations or clue of seeing him on this particular trip. Initially we snatched shelter #4 because it was set back further away from other shelters. However, when we found out that George was staying at shelter #2 and that shelter #1 was right next to his, it was easy to rethink our shelter #4 decision. One thing to make note of regarding the shelter #1 is that it rests on a rock shelf near the water. We would eventually learns that this was an obstacle when trying to gain access to filtering water, because you would really have to lay flat on your stomach if you were to get your standard length filtering tube to reach the water. After George returned the stuff that we gave him at Rock Harbor, he filled us in on his secret and for the first day allowed us to use a pot of his on a string to scoop up water. I would eventually design my own similar device with one of our pots so we did not have to bother George every time we wanted water.



George's Pot-on-a-Rope idea:







For lunch that day, we kept things simple and enjoyed some soup. After lunch it was off to fixing up some showers. It took a while to determine a good spot to hang the shower from, but we ended up deciding on a tree behind out shelter. I went first for what reason I forget, but I do remember that the tree limb that I decided to hang the shower from was a real pain in the butt. In order to get the string over the limb, I had to break a few of the small braches that were sprawling from it and tie a rock to the string so I could get enough force to flip the string over the other side of the tree limb. This all proved difficult because I had to do all of this while standing from the slant of our shelter roof, with slippery wet sandals, and a ten liter bag of water in hand which weighed 20lbs. Not only did all of these things prove to be working against me, but there was also the fact that the tree limb was about 3ft out in front of the rear tip of the shelter, so I had to be very accurate with my string throwing capabilities and not lean too far over the edge of the roof. Oh and then there was the fact that once I finally did get the hang of what I was doing, my arms were exhausted from holding the pocket shower for so long that I could barely lift it high enough to give me enough slack in the string to tie it properly. Things proved to easier the second time around when setting up Shelly’s shower, but it was still a physically draining task.



Me getting a good workout before hitting the showers; reminiscent of a typical day at the gym:







For the rest of the evening we hung around the shelter and at some point Shelly went off on her own to check out the group campsites. They do not have individual campsites here, just five shelters and two group sites. We eventually got to making dinner shortly after she returned.

Before continuing on, there were two things I forgot to mention up to this point in the story. These things may be random and unnecessary to mention, but since it is written in my journal, I thought I’d stay true to sharing everything I wrote rather than omitting things. Every night of the trip, I have been taking two Aleve pain relief tablets. I even took a couple of these while in Bloomington, MN for Mall of America because my foot arch on my inner left foot had been bothering me for at the past week. My foot has been tending to get swollen when walking for lengthy periods of time and being on Isle Royale obviously would not assist helping that matter. The Aleve seems to help and give me a fresh foot in the morning. I am not sure what things would be like if I did not take the Aleve, so I have not risked going without it. (It turns out, almost a year later; I still have a problem with my arch on my left foot. I have had xrays and an MRI shows nothing negative. I have worn a cam boot, flat feet orthotics, a cast, and will be starting physical therapy soon. If physically therapy does not remedy the issue, I may have to go under the knife. I am really hoping for my sake that this does not turn out to be the case especially since the doctors don’t see anything wrong on the charts. I don’t want them prodding around in my foot if they have nothing to go off of, seems like a big waste.)

The other thing I forgot to mention is that I secretly bought eight snickers bars before getting off the Voyageur on Monday. Shelly and I ate one each on our ride from Windigo to Rock Harbor. I know Shelly really enjoys her sweets, so I thought it would be a good idea to buy several of them for those days Shelly was dreading on the account on having a couple of long days. I surprised her with her first one at Hatchet Lake since it was a pretty long hike that day. She looked pretty excited about the unexpected treat. I notified her today that I stashed 6 more in the bag that George held on to for us so we would have something special to enjoy after other long days that we would experience in the future.

Before we went to bed tonight we got to see the lighthouse for the first time as it shined its light our way. We could see it earlier today, but obviously not with its light on during the day. George said the US Coast Guard keeps them maintained and operational. Them meaning all of the other ones surrounding Isle Royale. Shelly headed to bed around 9:30pm. The temperature is still nice at 62 degrees, but I don’t think it will stay like this for the rest of our trip.

Figured while I was at it, since I was only 7 minutes away from posting today's part of my report in time, why not wait the 7 minutes and take the time to post tomorrow's (which is now technically really today's) report so that I don't pull another close call later today and leave you hanging until 11:53pm like I did yesterday. Enjoy. Hope that all made sense too

Yep I was "the bearded guy". Cool read so far. Your trip reports are making me realize I need to find a way to discuss the forums here. I had no idea I was talking to you when we talked for a bit. I'm sure I've talked to others and I didn't know it.

Cool read about the cow and calf at Hatchet. I'm sure those were the same two I stumbled across on my descent into hatchet. When I went down the trail I was the first into Hatchet that day and they were about 10-15 yards from the trail. Spent 29 min very close up watching and photographing them. As long as I stayed still they around and just fed.


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Hugh small world #2. I think you mentioned a couple of guys I know (Randy and Reese). We're them a father son with a couple of other siblings on their trip.


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September 14th Friday

I woke up at 6:45am. Shelly slept until about 8:30am. I wrote as she enjoyed the warmth of her sleeping bag. At around 9:00am we started doing laundry, this would entail washing everything except for our sweatshirts. We used our rain gear to cover up in while our clothes got washed and dried off in the sun. After completing our chores, Shelly and I had a couple of freeze-dried breakfasts that were nothing special. At around 12pm following the filtering of some water, I decided I was going to take a dip in Lake Superior and see how cold it really was. With camera in hand, Shelly took some snapshots of the affair. She told me that I was in for barely five seconds and that she did not get more than a single picture. Needless to say, I guess the water was pretty cold. Just the same, I decided to go for round two. This time around Shelly got a few more pictures. There would be not third a attempt on my part, I learned my lesson after my second fail.

Once I was dry, we took a walk over to Siskiwit Falls which is about .5 miles away from the campgrounds. Siskiwit Lake was really stirring. The wind must have been blowing in a southernly direction because not only was it making Siskiwit choppy, it was also making it really frigid over there. The good news about all of this was that it made the Siskiwit Falls, at least the mouth of the falls, very active. You could tell that in spring this area must really fill up as opposed to fall where much of the lower part of the falls down by the boardwalks near the campgrounds and by the ranger station were currently pretty empty and dry.



Some pictures over at Siskiwit Lake near the mouth of the Siskiwit Falls:











On the way back, it was becoming very clear that Shelly was not looking forward to our hike to South Desor tomorrow. She kept talking about how she didn’t know if she could make it and how going up the trail to the Ishpeming Tower was going to be a real killer. Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t looking forward to the hike that would end up leaving us at South Desor, my least favorite of sites tied with only a few others. Just the same I knew that before we knew it, we would be done with our hike and out of South Desor in no time. In any case, Shelly would not let things ago and it began getting on my nerves ha ha ha. In the end, I told Shelly that I would try to see if I could convince the Ranger to give us a ride to Siskiwit Bay when he returned since I was under the impression that he monitored Malone Bay as well as Chippewa Harbor and Siskiwit Bay in combination with the paddling sites that were located near the area like Hay Bay. I knew it was the longest shot ever, most likely not permissible, and probably not going to happen, but for the sake of brightening Shelly’s spirits, I told her I would see what I could do. We saw his boat leave earlier so I knew he was making a run.

While we hung around and waited in our Shelter, I noticed we had a lot of flies, and being frustrated with all that was going on, I decided to take my anger out on killing them. The previous day I had killed six and freed one. Today, I killed another six and freed two. At the current moment, I went into things with the mindset of taking no prisoners, but when it came down to trusting my accuracy or opening the door to let out the two that landed in the vicinity of the doorway, I knew well enough not to be stubborn on matters. Some of them were really fast and small, I did not stand a chance against this particular type. These types usually hung out on the ground and took me at least five attempts to get a book on top of. In the end, my efforts seemed pointless, because as soon as I would kill a couple of them a few more would be found crawling on the screen or flying about.

Eventually I heard a ranger boat pulling in and raced from our shelter to go meet the boat at the dock. When I got there, it turned out to be Buzz and his chainsaw maintenance crew. They thought I was Jeremy the park ranger at first even though I was not wearing a ranger uniform, but quickly realized I was just an island visitor and ignored me to turn back to what they were doing which involved six men getting off the boat, one with a push car, all headed towards where Jeremy’s residence was located. By this point Shelly had made it over with our books, map, and journals. We sat on the deck of the miniature visitor center and I told her I was looking into matters. Some of the guys made their way back with propane tanks on the cart. I asked one of them what they were up to and they told me they had just finished clearing down trees off the Island Mine Trail (good news for us, because we would eventually be walking on that section). I talked to the next guy and mentioned how I heard they were clearing trees on the Island Mine Trail and asked if they were headed back to continue with their work, He told me that they were done for the weekend and were on their way back to Mott Island Ranger Headquarters. That eliminated them as being possible drives for us.

To pass the time, Shelly and I hung out at the visitor’s center located near the dock. I looked at some of the clippings from newspapers involving stories from back in the day about the Isle Royale Lighthouse and about ticket fares and schedules for the America Ship that sank near Washington Harbor. I read a story about four people that took a boat out of Grand Marais Harbor in Michigan. I initially confused it with Grand Marais Minnesota since we passed through the town while on our way to Grand Portage. It was about a man who took his friend, friend’s wife, and friend’s father out on Lake Superior just five miles from the coast to do some deep water fishing. The man, friend, and friend’s wife were all in their late 50’s or early 60’s. The father was 90. Both of the engines on the boat died and they began to drift further and further into sea. They tried radioing in someone for help, but no ships were located in the area to pick up their transmission. Not before long, the boat flipped over and the friend went to go chase after his wife who was on the verge of drifting away. Neither had life jackets on and neither would be seen again. The 90 year old man did not last much longer and eventually did not have the strength to hold onto the boat any longer and drifted down below to his shadowy grave. The owner of the boat would eventually be rescued after fourteen hours of being in the water when his wife did not hear from him and contacted the authorities to conduct a search. The father and son’s bodies would never be found, but the wife’s was found two weeks later on a Canadian shoreline. Dental records proved it was her body. This was not something Shelly and I needed to be reading about before going on our first canoe trip in a couple more days. Yikes! We’ll definitely be wearing our life jackets now, but then again I think that was already something that was in our plans.

When I was done reading things, I went to work on journaling until the ranger finally arrived. While Jeremy was refueling his boat, I approached him and asked if I could pay him money to cover gas and expenses to take us to Siskiwit Bay. He told me that it was against policy, but the he could call the Voyageur station and see if they would allow us on the boat this coming Sunday. I brought this idea up to Shelly, and while she was entertained by the idea, we both were hoping just to get dropped off at Siskiwit Bay. I thanked Jeremy and he told me he would stop by our shelter later tonight to give us the news on whether or not there was an opening on the boat.



Some pictures on the dock. I love that tree in the last picture which peeks out at you in the distance:











Before starting dinner, we took down our dry laundry and put on fresh sundried clothes since we were still in our rain gear. Just when we got finished doing this, kind old George stopped on over and checked up on us. He was under the impression that we were leaving tomorrow and wanted to say his goodbyes and offer to take our trash so we would have less weight to carry. He is so cool and good to us! We informed him that we were either going to get a ride to Windigo or leave a little later than planned so we would get some extra rest time. He told us that he already knew that Reese, Randy, and Pam were scheduled to be picked up on Sunday so he knew the boat was coming her; it was just a matter of whether or not they would have space for us. With all made known, he bided us a good evening and went back to his shelter.

We began dinner, but not before Jeremy stopped by to tell us that he could not get in touch with the voyageur offices to see if they had space available. He told us that he would radio the boat when it got into Windigo tomorrow at 10:30am and get back to me by noon tomorrow with an update. We thanked him before he left and went back to preparing dinner.

Shelly drove me a little batty today and things continued into the night time hours, but I still love her. When Ranger Jeremy left our site after telling us the news, Shelly began thinking maybe we would just walk to South Desor Ha Ha Ha I told her I couldn’t deal with her wishy washidness and that we already put Ranger Jeremy through all the trouble of looking into things for us and that I did not want to be gone tomorrow without a trace when he came back to inform us about things. She asked that I go get him before he got back to his headquarters. I was angry and she said she would go tell him. I told her I would. I went looking for him at the other shelters because I knew he was doing rounds, but could not find him. I told Shelly this and got even more aggravated. I asked her to please figure out what she wanted to do once and for all before I went over to his residence. We decided in the long run that we would attempt trying to get on the boat and if that didn’t work out we’d hoof it over to South Desor. That was finally the last of things and our minds were set. We went to bed around 9:45pm after taking some pictures with the lighthouse and discussing how taking the Voyageur would affect our plans.

September 15th Saturday

I woke up early around 6:45am. Shelly was still sleeping and I did not want to bother her so I headed over to the visitor center to do some journal writing. When I got there I looked around the place one more time and checked what it would cost to take the ferry from Malone Bay to Windigo. It said $50-$67 depending on where you got picked up from while the boat circumnavigates the island from Rock Harbor to Windigo. I knew our stop was the one just before Windigo so I figured $50 plus some type of fuel surcharge fee.

After I estimated things out, I looked at the books they had available to all of those visiting the center. There was about a dozen of them, even one written by John and Ann Mahan, the ones we met at Chippewa Harbor a couple of years back. They were the people that kindly took to helping bandaging Shelly’s blisters with second skin. Ann used to be a nurse so she offered her special care and touch to Shelly’s foot.


Shelly's blistered foot at this point in our trip:









As I looked through the books, besides that one catching my eye, a journal written by Dorothy Simonson, the school teacher in charge of the school house at Chippewa Harbor during the 1932-1933 school year also interested me. I began reading it for quite some time, almost two hours before I thought I should go back and check on Shelly. She of course wondered where I was and I told her how I began reading the school teacher’s journal from Chippewa Harbor. I told her she should too so we could finish it before we left Malone Bay. She told me she had wanted to read that book and looked all over for it at our local libraries to see if she could find it, but none of them had it.

Once she got out of bed, we headed to the visitor center. Shelly read up to where I had left off, the November 1st entry. while I journaled. After spending a couple of hours at the visitor center we headed back to the shelter to drop off our journals and pens. We moved out shortly afterwards and headed to Siskiwit Falls. George told us the wind had shifted last night so Siskiwit Lake should be calm as could be, while Lake Superior was going to become somewhat choppy as the winds continued to reverse. At the conclusion of our conversation, we took a look over at Lake Superior, and it definitely was not as smooth as yesterday. It turned out George was correct. Things were as calm as could be. However, this meant that the falls were not as active as they were yesterday and thus not making the falls as entertaining as they were yesterday. When we got back to our shelter we had some lunch and were about to take some showers when Ranger Jeremy arrived. He was suppose to come at noon, but did not make it until 3pm on the account of it being a while longer before the expected time that he thought he would be able to connect with the Voyageur. He told us the Voyageur had room for us so Captain Mike cleared us to board the ship for tomorrow’s departure.

With things set in place for tomorrow morning, Shelly and I went to check out the group campsite area towards the end of the afternoon. When we were checking out Group Site #2, we bumped into a solo hiker. His name was Mike and as it turns out, he was the other single guy that got dropped of with us as Rock Harbor at the beginning of our trip. I forgot what he said his itinerary consisted of, but I know the couple that got off at Rock Harbor coincidentally was with him throughout much of the way because they just so happened to have the same hiking route that he did. According to him, they were very nice and made it a point to check in on him once he or they arrived at the campgrounds they’d both be staying at together. One thing that caught my attention about Mike was that he was wearing an Avis Car Rental Hat. I asked him if Avis stopped by the Voyageur on the morning we headed to the island to do some advertising, because George had the same hat as him. He laughed and told me that while he was on the boat ride to the island, he lost his hat and George offered him a new one for his trip saying that he kept half a dozen with him. Mike said he thanked him for his offer, but said he would survive without one. As it turns out, Mike bumped into George down here at the campgrounds and they got to talking for a while and somehow before their conversations were finished, George managed to give him his hat. So there was not any Avis advertising go on, George was just being the friendly person he always is, to us and to others.

It was getting late, but before we headed back to our shelter, we snuck on over to the visitor center so we could sneak the journal out of the place and read it before we went to bed. We figured that since it was getting dark out and that the visitor center was technically closed at dusk the book would not be missed if we borrowed it for an overnight read. However, I will admit, there was some rule breaking going on with regards to not following the guidelines of keeping all items in the visitor center Sorry.

When we got back to the shelter we had some dinner. We were in bed by 8pm. With Shelly and I being at the same part in Dorothy Simonson’s journal we decided to alternate between reading aloud months of the journal. Shelly starting by reading all of the November entries as I snuggled against her listening to the harsh winter that was beginning to unfold over at Chippewa. I took over when the month of December rolled around as Shelly burrowed into her sleeping bag. When Shelly began reading January’s entries, I began to feel myself getting sleepy. By the time she got to the January 22nd entry the heaviness of my eyes would take their toll on me and I drifted away to sleep. She being very into the story, would not figure this out until she got to the February 10th entry and realized that perhaps she should give me a turn to continue since she read into the month that I was suppose to read. At that point we stopped where she left off, split a Snickers bar, and went to sleep.



The suns rays fading away on our last night at Malone Bay:

I did another double post before going to bed tonight because I know I won't be around the house too much this weekend so this covers me for today and tomorrow. Stay tuned, I have the rest of report posts throughout the course of next week

One a side note. we never attempted to bushwhack over to Wood Lake. I knew Shelly was not game for doing it, and quite frankly, neither was I. Shelly's small toes were beginning to blister and we had plenty to do at Malone Bay. Plus is was nice to take a shower and know that we would not be drenching ourselves in sweat on our rest days. There would be plenty of time for that when we were back on the trails.

September 16th Sunday

I awoke at 7am while Shelly laid in her sleeping bag until 7:30am. During this time, I took the opportunity to catch up in the reading I fell behind in as I passed out while Shelly was reading yesterday night. It turns out I read about six pages ahead of where she left off by making it all the way to the March 1st entry. Whoops.



Some loons swimming around our front door as we were departing our shelter:







Once Shelly was up and moving, we raced to get ready and saw George leave his shelter for the dock. We got to the dock around 9am as planned, because the Voyageur was scheduled to come in at 10am, but was told by George that it would probably be a little early on the account of it being late in the season and not so much going on. We raced to try to finish our school teacher journal readings so we could be through with the book by the time the Voyageur arrived. It turned out that George was correct about the boat arriving earlier than planned due to it arriving at 9:40am. We did not get through the journal completely. I was about 13 pages away from finishing and Shelly was about 16 pages away from being done. Luckily we were both able to read at our own pace, because the book was photocopied and we could separate the journal into sections from the binder is was placed it, but none of that turned out to make a difference. We halted reading the rest of the journal and quickly signed the Malone Bay guestbook before heading to the boat with our backpacks. We also took the time to have Reese take a picture of George and us with the promise that we would not post or share his picture to anyone on the forums. By 9:45am, we were off and on our way. If you are reading this, thanks again George for being so kind to us on the first half of our trip. We also appreciate you allowing a picture of the three of us to be taken. While Shelly and I love going to the island each year to revisit its beauty, we equally love crossing paths with like-minded kind-hearted people who are generous and warm in their ways. Being able to share a conversation with you on the boat and having your presence around Malone Bay for a couple of days was the cherry on top of everything regarding this trip. We miss you and look forward to seeing you again on a future trip. Love and warm wishes being sent your way in the meantime.



A random wild flower Shelly took a picture of near the dock of Malone:







I would like to take a pause here to make mention of something that I forgot to include about yesterday’s day of events (the pause is written in my journal, and I’d prefer not to skip over it just as I choose not to while writing in my journal.) In the middle of the day yesterday a visitor came on his own private boat to see if he could do a little paddling on the Siskiwit Lake via the entry to it by Siskiwit Falls. His name was Rick and my first question to him immediately after he docked his boat was if I could pay him to give us a ride to Siskiwit Bay. His answer was no, because the National Park authorities frowned upon private boats taking money from visitors to drive them around the island. He went on to say that it was illegal for anyone but the licensed boats like the Voyageur and others to give rides to visitors. With that I thanked him anyways as he went on foot to Siskiwit to see how the water was looking. I went back to tell Shelly the news before we both headed back to the visitor center to do some reading and writing.

Before we made it around the corner to the visitor center, while I was at the door, Shelly turned her head to say hello back to a guy that called out a greeting to her. It was Rick. He introduced himself and as I came around the corner he was inviting us on his boat for cappuccinos, which he quickly said were really espressos because he didn’t have a steamer for the cream. We hopped on his boat and learned that he lives in Grand Portage and runs a bed and breakfast in Grand Marais. He docks his boat in Grand Portage right next to the Voyageur. He has been running the bed and breakfast for the past thirteen years. He told us that his business really started booming when someone from the Minnesota Star newspaper wrote a story about his place on the back page of the paper. According to him, the Minnesota Star is like the Chicago Tribune in terms of in popularity in Minnesota. Ever since that point, he has been booked 6-9 months in advance and has several people that refrequent him yearly. He said about 80% of the people that come are returning guests. He said he was also a certified massage therapist so this along with his establishment being pet friendly helps attracts a lot of guests. It is also a single occupancy bed and breakfast, so one does not have to worry about sharing the space with other individuals. Although he does have a dog, but supposedly it is hypo-allergenic and does not bother people who do not opt to bring animals themselves. He charges $150 a night which is to be expected for a bed and breakfast, definitely more so than Best Western charging us $160 for a night which there was no way I could find good reason to pay. Most of our conversations focused on the bed and breakfast as well as some views that he witnessed while paddling around Chippewa Harbor before we took a picture together and headed our own ways. The cappuccino/espresso drink was a nice treat in the middle of our trip. Neither of us our coffee drinkers, but we did enjoy this out-of-nowhere surprise.

On the way to Windigo via the Voyageur, we bumped into the guys that I thought were canoeing, but who were actually fishing; the ones that got dropped off at McCargoe Cove. We spoke out on the back of the boat for much of the trip and they told me how their friend caught a Coho Salmon on their last night at Chippewa Harbor. We arrived at Windigo around 12:30pm. I double checked with Captain Mike that we were still good to go with the Canoes on Wednesday and he told me he had everything documented in his manifest and that we were set come Wednesday. The canoe would be left in the pavilion for us to be picked up in the afternoon once we returned back from tackling the Feldtmann Loop.


A snapshot of Grace Island as we passed it:







We waited until the deck cleared off and everyone gathered their belongings before we decided to approach a Ranger to see if he/she would hold a dry bag of food for us until we got back on Wednesday, so that we did not have to carry the extra food and items that we would not using until we set off to canoe. The ranger said that we would usually be required to check our stuff in with the store at a rate of $3 a day just as would be the case when people send themselves drop boxes but are not around to pick them up for a couple of days. However, since the store was closed and it was a slow time in the season, the Ranger said he/she would do us this favor. Horray! It was probably almost an extra 10-12 pounds of unnecessary weight. We really lucked out on this trip with George holding our food for us at Malone Bay as we made our way from Rock Harbor and Ranger Smith (not really his or her name, just don’t want to mention it because I am not sure if his or her’s superiors would frown down upon him or her doing this favor for us. Ha Ha Ha Sorry if that was a bit confusing) holding our food for us at Windigo as we hiked the Feldtmann Loop. If in the event Ranger Smith said that he/she was unable to help us out, I planned to put our extra food in a dry bag with a note on it in one of the shelters at Washington Creek. I would hope and imagined that no one would touch it while they occupied the shelter if they indeed decided to use the shelter at all with so many other ones being available during this time in the slow season.

By 1pm we began our hike on the Feldtmann Trail starting at the entrance location by the ranger station, which takes you counterclockwise around the loop. We thought the one downside to taking the Sunday boat out of Malone to Windigo was that the Saturday boat would have dropped several people off at Windigo who’s intentions it were to hike the Feldtmann Loop. This in turn may lead to some overcrowding at the campsites. Only time would tell.

Shortly into our Feldtman Loop Hike, it became obvious that I was going faster than Shelly wanted to pace the hike. I made a joke and she got sensitive about the matter. Then I got mad. Basically all hell broke loss Ha Ha Ha. It got to a point where we broke away from each other for about 15-20 minutes to hike at our own pace. Eventually I calmed down and waited for her. We agreed that she would lead so we could maintain the same pace and so that she did not feel rushed. I suggested this at the beginning of the hike, but Shelly didn’t care for the idea when it was first brought up. With the new idea in place, both of us turned out to be a lot happier and we made it to Feldtmann Lake by 5pm. Not bad considering it was an 8.5-mile hike and we still kept it at 4 hours averaging just over 2mph.


Some views that were seen along the way:










Once we got there we set up our campsite as quickly as possible so we could check out Rainbow Cover before it got too late. We stayed at campground #5. #2 was already taken and obviously the best site because it was right on the water. The other sites are all off the water, just not directly next to it as is the case with site #2. Once we got everything laid out and deployed, we headed to Rainbow Cove, but not before saying hello to the people at site #2. As it turns out, Brad and Cindy would be the only ones that stayed with us at Feldtmann Lake that night. They came over on the Saturday boat, and if I am not mistaken, they told me they stayed at Washington Creek during their first night before heading to Feldtmann Lake earlier today. Surprisingly enough, they said not many people were on the Voyageur, which was not what I heard was going to be the case on the forums. So that was good news. Brad was suffering from some tenderness in his ankle. He is a runner and thought he did something to his foot before leaving. The way he described it reminded me of what I thought was tendonitis from my last trip in May. We talked for a bit more about other things before Shelly ad I were on our way to Rainbow Cove.

We brought the water filter to pump water, the stove and pots along with some dinner, and our headlamps in case we had to walk back in the dark. We got some great pictures of Shelly as we made our way to the cove entrance. The pink clouds shimmering off the water with Shelly as its centerpiece could not have made for a better snapshot.


My beautiful girlfriend:







After we admired the scene for a while. I saw a boulder in the middle of the water a quarter of a mile away. I thought it might make for a nice place to eat dinner, but as we got closer to it, it was obvious that the waves were crashing water on top of it. Regardless, I still thought that it would be a nice place to filter water from since it allowed me some depth to hang the water filter tube into rather than filtering water from the shoreline. Once I was through filtering, I made my way back to Shelly and as I was doing so, I dropped a lid to one of the pots I as carry in the water off the side of the boulder. I went to hang myself off of the side of the boulder so I could grab it, but my arm was not long enough and in the process of finding that out I also ended up losing the spoon that went with the pot. I had to do something fast before I lost sight of both items so I climbed down the boulder and quickly tried to scurry over a couple of rocks that were lodged in the bed of the sand but still above water. Of course, my luck did not get any better and my feet slipped on the wet rocks and my right foot got submerged in water. My left food did not get it as bad. While my right boot got soaked on the account of the water going above my ankle level and inside the top of my boot, my left boot only had water go half way up it. The left boot had a dampness that had somehow seeped into it near the bottom, but was not drenched like my right boot. It felt like a sweaty foot after a long day of hiking whereas the right foot was so wet that I could feel the water squish around within my boot with every step I took. We quickly came to the conclusion that we should go back to the campsite for dinner since I was such a clumsy fool.



My brilliant idea:







The wave that took our spoon and lid:







Me looking down and wondering how my stubby little arm was going to reach our cookware:







As we made our way back, it began to start getting dark outside. Bringing our headlamps turned out to be a good idea, not only was there not much light left, but it seemed as though the .8 mile hike back to our site took longer than it did beforehand. Perhaps that was because we had to be careful with our footing in the dark or because it was not as fun hiking with my soaked foot. We got back to our campsite around 8:15pm and cooked up some dinner in a speedy fashion. After we finished dinner, we cleaned the pots and brushed out teeth. We made it in our bags by 9pm. After a little reading and writing, we were asleep before 9:30pm

11:58pm barely got this post up in time! Stay tuned for the next one tomorrow.

I absolutely love how honest you are.

September 27th Monday

Today we woke up at 4:30am. When we woke up, it was drizzling pretty consistently outside. It wasn’t a hard shower, but it wasn’t a light pitter-patter either. This could have turned out to be a pain, but just as we were wrapping up cleaning things in the tent and deploying outside into the rain, it stopped. We took advantage of the opportunity to get our bags packed and to roll up the tent in case it decided to start up again. We also threw on our rain gear. In order to keep our clothes and other important items off of the wet ground as we packed, I threw everything in one of our backpack rain covers and bundled things out of the elements until we were ready to placed everything in our bags. We left Feldtmann Lake at 6am. Cindy and Brad were still asleep by the time we left otherwise we would have wished them well on the rest of their trip. I put fresh socks on this morning, which is out of the ordinary for me, but they were soaked from yesterday so I needed a new pair to start the day. Just as I assumed, my soaked wet right boot turned my dry sock into a wet sponge while the left sock absorbed all of the dampness that still remained in it. I wasn’t sure if my right foot was going to get blisters due to it being so wet and us walking 10.2 miles today, but I wasn’t concerned about the matter, wet feet or not, I was bound to get through the day.



A friend we made on the way out of Feldtmann Lake:















We left at 6am with our headlamps on. I do not recall how long we had them on for, but I think it was for the first 20 minutes of our hike. It was not that it was all that dark out, but more so the trees which canopied out the sunlight. I would say about an hour into our hike is when we had to scale our first and only major hill on the trip. It wasn’t anything that was too troubling for me, but I knew it was a bit steeper that some of the others we tackled. Thankfully for Shelly, it was as steep as it was short. Nothing comparable to the ascent made up the hill towards Hatchet Lake in terms of length. The reward at the top of it was fantastic. The lookout included views of Feldtmann Lake and the trees that laid below in the deep valley. I got close to the edge to try to take a picture of how far down it was and Shelly freaked out at me. I went even closer when I was not satisfied with my first attempt to secure some decent pictures. This led Shelly to get even more angered with me Unfortunately, no matter how hard I tried, it did not seem as though it was possible to capture just how far above the valley we were. As not to frustrate Shelly any further and for my own safety, I gave up on my thrill seeking.


Some pictures at the peak of the hill overlooking Feldtmann Lake:












The part when Shelly wanted to kill me for looking over the cliff too far:









At around 8:30am, we saw the lookout tower within our view. Actually, Shelly saw a glimpse of it about a half hour earlier, but when I asked her to point it out so I could see it too, she was unable to relocate it because she could not get a perfect angel on it with the trees blocking her new point of view. I thought she was imagining it and even she was not certain of her sighting. If I had bothered to look over the map at all last night, it would had been obvious that she saw a tower, because a tower is shown on the map.

When we got to the tower, I checked out what was in the wooden supply chest since it was unlocked. It contained nothing more than some flammable solvents and gas cans that were corroding away in the metal containers that they were stored in. I don’t know what purpose all of the stuff served, but whatever it was used for, it did not appear to have been touched for a couple of years. While I climbed the lookout tower, Shelly decided to take a break at the bottom of the steps. As I made my way up, I made sure to focus my eyes forward and not look down, since I have a thing about being afraid of heights. To my surprise, when I reached the top, the floor door was unlocked and wide open. I took the opportunity to go on top of the tower all the while making sure to direct my attention forward and not look down. It didn’t matter, even with my efforts to avoid looking beneath me; it was still scary realizing how high I was. I took several pictures of all different angles. While I had never been one to take a panoramic picture, this scene would have been perfect for one if only I wasn’t too frightened to think of the idea at the time. Before coming down, I checked to see if the tower quarters were unlocked, but my luck would stop there. The padlock remained intact and fastened on its hasp.



On top of and around the tower between Feldtmann Lake and Siskiwit Bay:































On my way down, I shut the floor door, but did not lock it. I don’t even think the lock was anywhere to be found. The reason I remember taking note of this was because I was curious to know if the lock rusted off its chain or if it was clear that it had been accidentally left open. By the time I made it down and we were on our way, it was going on 9am. Shortly into our hike we came upon an old lookout tower that must have existed before the large metal one was built; the one that I climbed to the top of earlier this morning. This one had seen better days and I would not even call it a tower anymore. It was completely collapsed and rotted. I’m not sure, but it may have been burned too. If I am not mistaken, the blackening that I observed on the wood was either done intentionally by man or perhaps the tower was struck by lightening, it was not brought on by rot alone.

After we took a couple of pictures, we continued on our way to Siskiwit Bay. While it had not rained on us throughout the morning as we made our way along the path, there was the constant wonder on when the clouds were going to be ready to release their payload of water. The sun had not made that bright of an appearance all day, and with the dark gray sky stretching across all four corners of the sky, one could not be certain how long the rain would be kept at bay. During the last hour and a half of our hike, we encountered very tall grasses elbow to shoulder length in height. Wearing our rain pants and jacket proved to be a wise decision. While it had not showered on us all day, the large narrow grasses that we walked through collected heavy amounts of water on their blades from the sprinkles that fell last night. Our other layers of our rain pants were soaked. If we had not worn our rain pants, we would have been drenched.

We arrived at Siskiwit Bay at exactly 11am. There was some confusion on my part as to where the campgrounds were located. The marker we came across said Island Mine was to the left of us and Feldtmann Lake was behind us. However, it did not suggest that the path leading straight forward was to Siskiwit. I was not sure if that meant the path in front of us led to Siskiwit or if it was just a path to look out at Lake Superior from and that we had to turn left to Island Mine at to which point we would encounter Siskiwit Bay very shortly. It was decided that Shelly would walk forward and I would walk to the left for a couple of minutes and we would meet back at the trail marker to fill in each other on what we saw. It should be mentioned that Shelly had a strong feeling about the campsite being straight ahead while I was weary about the matter with no type of acknowledgement being given to hikers that Siskiwit was located in that direction. It turns out Shelly was correct and I was my normal overthinking self while Shelly’s calm mind took us the right way.



The trail marker, the beach front just right of the dock, and our view from the shelter:











Now was time for the big moment. Would we get a shelter? The answer was Yes! I was so thrilled and excited. Shelly thought I was bonkers. Not only did we get a shelter, but we got our pick of the two shelters that were there. We choose #5 for a couple of reasons. Shelter #4 had roofing supplies stored within it, which took about a third of the available space that the shelter provided. This would make bringing in our picnic bench not possible especially since the area where we usually place our picnic bench (right by the door) was where all of the roofing supplies were being stored. Shelter #4 also did not have as good of a view of the bay as Shelter #5.

After we brought in the picnic bench and took care of setting up everything, we enjoyed a couple of cups of soup for lunch. Following lunch, Shelly napped for a while and I checkout out the rest of the campground once I was through cleaning dishes and filtering water. It was misting on and off as I looked around. At times for a few seconds, it would even seem as though it was about to down pour when the misting turned heavier and raindrops became consistent. Lucky for me, it never got much worse as I walked around, so my sweatshirt did not get soaked. It turned out to be a smart idea to keep my rain pants on, because while the vegetation was not that thick or tall, the stuff that would reach up to the tops of my ankles could have easily soaked my pajama pant bottoms.

At around 1:30pm, Cindy and Brad came along to claim Shelter #4. They would be the only other people that would join us that evening. I felt bad for Cindy and Brad when I initially saw them come. Cindy looked soaking wet, at least the pants she was wearing. They did not think to wear their rain pants. Once they were situated, I swung on by to say hello while Shelly napped and stayed in the warm confines of her sleeping bag. We talked about our gear and how we both like Western Mountaineering sleeping bags. We also talked about what we were eating and how Cindy dehydrates their meals, which is something I would like to get into doing.

After about an hour and a half, I thought it best that I go check on Shelly. What I’ve come to find out is that when its cold out like was today, right around 48 degrees, Shelly really enjoys her sleeping bag. It does not matter if she’s been in it all day or if it’s time for dinner. While she might not sleep in it all day, she definitely likes to snuggle herself in it and think warm thoughts. Outside of coming out of her bag for dinner, to brush her teeth, and to pee; Shelly really did not enjoy leaving the warm confines of her bag. The good news was that she finished her book with all the reading time she had while in the bag.

On the note of chilliness, it was turning out to be a very cold evening, the coldest yet. I took care of dishes since Shelly was feeling like a popsicle, but decided I would pump water tomorrow since we were staying here to enjoy a rest day. We were in bed and off to sleep by 9pm.

Just a quickie. I have a lot going on today (Wednesday) so I am not sure if I will get around to posting another entry until Thursday. Sorry guys. Have had some issues with my car which will inevitably suck up much of my day tomorrow.

September 18th Tuesday

It got down to the 40 degree mark last night. It also rained heavily all night, but there wasn’t any thunder or lightning to make for an awesome display. I was kind of cold; at least my feet were because I did not have any dry socks. I tried wrapping a shirt around my feet, but that did not work too well. Shelly and I slept in until about 8am on the account of it being so cold out. It drizzled all morning. I felt bad for Cindy and Brad, because they were making it a point to hike to South Desor today and this was the worst morning we’ve had so far on our trip with regards to rain and temperature.

Today Shelly and I just sat around for most of the morning waiting to see if the weather was going to get any better and listening to the pitter-patter of the raindrops. Around 12pm, the rain stopped and the sun started to show itself. The day was still cold, but the sun brought the temperature up to 54 degrees as opposed to the borderline 30-degree weather we had woken up to. Shelly took the opportunity to lay our boots out to dry in the sunshine as well as to wash our socks since mine were wet anyways. We thought about a shower, but we found it to be too cold outside to bother with the idea. After we laid our clothes out, we took a walk on the beach shoreline and finally removed ourselves from our campsite.

We eventually started up lunch and shortly following our meal, Shelly noticed a fox in front of our shelter. I raced out and made way with the camera to do a fox photo shoot while Shelly stayed back to relax in her sleeping bag. I got a couple of cool shots and even took a video of the fox. Apparently, foxes like to eat grasshoppers because this one was prowling them out left and right. I realized this when he darted for one of them and as he did so I must have caught his attention, because the grasshopper fluttered out of his mouth. Most of my pictures were taken outside of shelter #4 until the fox started wandering along the trail towards the campsites in the hunt for more grasshoppers. He would eventually go to campsite #1 and then make his way back out of Siskiwit Bay.



Click the first picture that is displayed to watch a video of the fox and enjoy the rest of the pictures that are found below it:



















This last picture of the fox reminds me of a scene from the movie Predator click the link and then compare the video to the picture:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gb_gho1eGM







When I returned to the shelter, Shelly and I hung out for a bit lounging around in the tent. Around 5:30pm, a couple arrived to the campgrounds. I was surprised anyone would come this late and almost was on the verge of assuming that for the first time on our trip, Shelly and I would be the only one staying at the campground we were holding up at. After about an hour of letting them have their own personal time to setup their gear and do the basics things you do when you get to camp, we noticed that they were at the dock sitting at the community picnic table. We cooked dinner and let it rehydrate before going down to visit them. We would come to find out that they were Kara and Phil. They came in late today because they came all the way from Malone Bay. They asked if we were Tim and Shelly, which caught me off guard. I never met these people before and I don’t recall having the expectations of meeting anyone else from the forums on the island besides Mark (Inca).Things all came together after they told us that George said to say hello to us. George knew our itinerary and thought Kara and Phil would eventually bump into us. They said George was kind enough to offer them a poptart and boil them some water since Phil did not have faith in the safety of his stove due to some o-rings being cracked on it. We talked about all of the other typical stuff like itineraries and gear before it started getting dark out and we realized that we had left our dinner about 45 minutes ago. We said goodnight and went to go enjoy our meal, which surprisingly still remained warm.



Some picture of the sun setting at Siskiwit Bay:











After we ate, I filtered water while Shelly did dishes. On a side note, before we said hi to Kara and Phil, we brought our socks, rain pants, and boots in from drying. My boots and socks were still damp, but at least not soaked. When we were through brushing out teeth, we were in bed by 9:30pm and this time I developed a better shirt wrap for my feet so they would not get as cold as they did last night without socks.



My shirt wrap system to keep my feet toasty at night: