Isle Royale Forums

Dumb question from a first timer. Is there any good reason why there is no trail connecting Malone Bay campground with Indian Portage trail at the south end of Lake Ritchie? Is there no reasonable ford across the stream? A loop trail around Siskiwit Lake would seem to be a natural.

A trail connecting Chippewa and Malone and/or Siskiwit Bay and Malone has been discussed in the past.
I know people have bushwackd both.

Can you give me a hint to help my searching for that discussion? Unfortunately the aerials I have available from USGS have no better resolution than Google Maps. So, it's a little hard to lay out a route. It looks like most of the way along the southern shore from Malone to the Wood Lake - Whittlesey portage is exposed shield with little vegetation. (What is that stuff like to hike on?) Along the south shore of Whittlesey, between Whittlesey and Scholts, crossing the Whittlesey - Chippewa portage. This is where it gets dicey. Cross the wash and bushwack to the NE following available open ridges. Ford the stream near where Indian Portage turns to the NE and you're done.

Don, the discussion was with NPS staff. I know a person who went from either Siskiwit to Malone or Chippewa to Malone. If you are intersted, I will let him know you would like to discuss his trip. I know they got pretty beat up on their trip.
I can tell you from bushwacking around Malone, the shorline growth is very dense, in a lot of cases, cedar fir and spruce.

The shoreline growth does appear very dense but it often looks like a few hundred yards inland is much clearer.

I would like to hear from him. Particularly to know if he used imagery to plan his route or just headed off in the general direction. Normally, whenever I take off bushwacking in a general direction, I get pretty beat up. I know it's probably not a good idea for a first timer and most likely would not do it. But I do believe that trail would be a good addition to the park.

In a word: Don't do it. I remember being at the Ranger Station at Malone in 2003 or 2004 and watching 4 guys making their way along the shore from the direction of Chippewa Harbor. When they got to the Ranger Station, they were cut to ribbons, blistered, dirty, and exhausted. They'd just bushwacked from Chippewa. Their comment? "It didn't look that far on the map."

Nick wrote:In a word: Don't do it.

Sounds like good advice. My question was really about why this trail does not already exist.

This is pure speculation on my part, but it probably comes down to money. Each of the trails has to be surveyed, marked, and maintained. Also, there is the environmental impact and I've seen or heard of some trails on the island either moved, i.e. from Daisy Farm to Moskey Basin moved inland or abandoned, i.e. East Fedman, West and East Desor. You do the best with what you got.

For good satellite imaging I always use Terra server, much better then the other free stuff out there (google). The only down side is that most images are black and white and not always up to date
http://terraserver-usa.com/

Unfortunately about the best resolution imagery I've been able to find of I.R. is about 1m. It seems pretty much the same for Google, Terraserver, ArcExplorer and the scanned raw photos from USGS. It's like they've never run any low altitude photo missions over the island. The raw air photos would have better resolution but they have not been digitized to that level yet.

I'd be suprised to find sub-meter imagery for place as remote as IR; at least for the public. I'm not aware of any Pictometry flights or anything scheduled by the NPS.
I did meet a guy this June who backcountried the hike; he tended to stick next to the bodies of water/shorelines and fished his way over. He did say that the toughest part was toward the East.
I carry a Delorme GPS that allows me to load aerial and sat imagery into it, and I've used it when hiking off trail with some success. At least I can see where the larger clearings, etc are. Most of that imagery is 1m, for the most part.

I'm playing around with the available data for I.R., as a way of learning Quantum GIS http://www.qgis.org. Since I've retired I no longer have access to ArcGIS, except for their free ArcExplorer. (Who could afford the $$$ for ArcGIS on his own?) So far, I have figured out how to convert NPS's *.e00 files to shapefile format and have the basemap, streams, campsites and trails loaded. I'll try loading the USGS topography next.

The Delorme sounds like a cool GPS. My eTrex allows loading maps but not imagery. I can see how having the image on the GPS would be very handy. I guess the ideal (for a geek like me) is a PDA/GPS that allows directly loading GIS and imagery data.

Try "Backcountry Navigator" on a Windows Mobile PDA/Smartphone w/ GPS, does aerial and topo maps!

http://www.backcountrynavigator.com/

Don, not sure if you made a trip to the island this summer; however, I noticed that your profile shows 0 trips to the park. My humble advice is to make at least 1 visit to the park before you plan anything too adventurous. Especially if you have no prior experience hiking in what is known as the Canadian Shield. Most first-time hikers to the park are humbled by the difficulty they encounter in simply traversing the marked trails. Not that you're not up for a bushwack on Isle Royale; I just think that proper planning and preparation will entail a "scouting" visit to get a taste of the off-trail experience on the island, as satellite imagery is obviously no substitute for having your boots "on the ground". Best Wishes.

DonNewcomb wrote: I would like to hear from him. Particularly to know if he used imagery to plan his route or just headed off in the general direction. Normally, whenever I take off bushwacking in a general direction, I get pretty beat up. I know it's probably not a good idea for a first timer and most likely would not do it. But I do believe that trail would be a good addition to the park.

Don, I know for one of the trips, they relied on the experience of paddlers, park staff, 7.5 quads, and I think Google Earth.
The detail available then from GE was not sufficient for help in planning their trip.