The Windmill Posts

Thursday

To Duluth

At a quarter to seven on August 20th. I set the trip meter and headed north to the Gunflint Trail. It’s a near legendary Minnesota highway connecting the Superior coast to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area – BWCA for short. By the time I left it was a balmy 68 degrees, so it was gonna be a chilly time on the highway. But I’ve got gloves, I’ve got a scarf and eight layers. I’ll be great.

Stopping at a rest stop to check the weather, the temperature went down to the high 50s.
It’s a good thing I stopped because radar showed rain clouds directly. So, I put the top up, and continued on.

That storm or rain moment should have been the only one of the weekend as far as I could tell by the forecast. Just cursed myself, but whatever. I’ll learn that later.

I got out of town at 6:45 and the car computer said 12:06 for arrival at Bearskin Lake. I need to stop in Duluth for a prescription, lunch somewhere, and in general was dragging my feet.

When I was little and we went to Duluth, as soon as you saw those giant granite rocks just embedded in the ground, you knew you were close. And it was a very exciting thing.

I planned to take a bit of a long-cut. It looks like a short-cut on a map but it adds time since it’s a slower highway and passes through a bunch of towns.

When you take a road like this, you know you’re going to stop or go through towns. And that’ll slow you down a bit. But it’s interesting to see the towns. Another little hiccup of these side highways is that you could get stuck behind a truck.

And I got stuck behind a truck. Now the general rule though is that eventually that truck’ll turn off. If he was going anywhere of a distance, he’d be out on the big highway. I wasn’t so sure about this guy, but he was doing a fair speed, so I just hung out with him.

It was still raining. Road’s wet. He’s throwing a lot of spray. There’s no way in the world I’m going to try and pass him. Okay, I passed the truck. It was just a very long clear area and I thought, why not? So, I floored it. I hit the kickdown and went flying past the truck.

It was the oncoming truck that was most concerning, but I got into my lane, you know, somewhat well before he got there. I’m guessing he might have slowed down a little bit. I don’t know, but it was a very exciting moment.

“The general rule is, if you use the kickdown, that’s a $5 bill. And I should explain what the kickdown is. A button under the accelerator. So when you floor it, it’s floored. But if you push a little bit more, you feel a click and that’s a button. And that makes the car go into sport mode, I guess the best way to put it. It shifts a lot faster. It in theory, changes some of the other factors of the car to make it sportier.

But it also eats gas like nobody’s business. So you don’t use it very often, but it’s fun when you do.

As I came over a rise for the long stretch of road ahead of me, nobody there, nobody behind me. And all of the trees, the pines and everything. It’s just a beautiful lonely road.

Had the top up. Opened the windows, though. Fresh air and the feeling that you’re connected. Big rocks. It must be near Duluth.

A sign announced 7.1 miles of what I’m calling wiggles. A few washout repairs made me comically bounce. But otherwise, it’s just the same old lovely twisty road from my past. I was going to go to the State Park interpretive center, office or whatever, and use a restroom but also just kind of check things out. I thought I might go over the swinging bridge, but I didn’t remember where or how far it was so I figured I’d find out about that at the center.

Jay Cooke to Duluth

First, I drove through the campground, suddenly nostalgic. The sites looked okay. They look close to each other, but not necessarily snoring close. But I’m just remembering all the times Dad and I came here when I was little and we camped in the camper. And I climbed rocks. I have no idea what else we did, but it was special.

Once again, my concept of time is completely flawed. Because I got up so early, it is early now. So, the center or whatever is closed until 10, which is 40 minutes away Which is a bummer because I really wanted to go in there.

The swinging bridge was cool, right by the headquarters. It didn’t really swing that much because it was just me, but you know, you could feel it sway. I got some good pictures and I got some good looking at water and rocks time.

I’m trying to balance watching the time and enjoying the route. Putting the top down for the twisties. I saw my only deer for the trip. It looked pretty little. I was waiting for it to jump right out in front of me. But it didn’t. Jumped into the forest.

Highway 23 is the one with all the wiggles on it. And I’ve got to say their estimations of speed for the curves are right on. When they say 20, it’s 20. I have been on this road with my father. I’ve been on this road with friends. I’ve been on this road on scooters. There are times when parts of the road have been washed out, so you can’t get to it. Other times like this, where it’s clearly been blacktopped in the last five years, though still pretty bumpy it’s quite smooth. I just love this road and this is as far as I found the very best twisties in Minnesota. Okay, I admit. I put it in sport mode. And everything was just more liquid. It was pretty cool. I wish I’d done it earlier.

Duluth to Grand Marais

You cannot go to Duluth without going to the Maritime Museum. It’s a law. They don’t enforce it, but they should. This is the best place to watch ships too. And oh look, gift shop open.

Back on the highway, top down. 63 degrees. It feels warmer than that because I have the heater on. Seat warmers too. It is 30 minutes to Iona’s Beach, which apparently sings. We’ll see.

Iona’s beach, trying to hear the music. But it’s not happening because the waves are too small. I heard a buzzing or a fuzzy fuzzy noise or stinging or buzzing. And it was the noise of the small pebbles having been raised by the water coming in, as the water goes out the pebbles settle back in because they hit each other. They make a noise.

It’s a sizzling noise. In any case, the beach is a beautiful pink stoned. They’re all round and there are so many that look like they’d be good for rock skipping. It is a big curved beach leading to some beautiful cliffs with trees on them. And of course, a beautiful view of Lake Superior.

They did sizzle. I’m assuming that when the waves are bigger, it sounds more. They’re supposed to sound like singing with a high pitched noise.

This beach was a nice diversion. It’s a little walk, although I take a longer walk because I went down the wrong path. First. It’s going through a conservation area, so there’s a lot of tree work being done and a lot, lot of tiny little flowers here and there that you come across. Like bright little things. Bright yellow or or daisy-like.

Took a nap that amounted to probably about 10 minutes total, just to fight the heavy eyelids. Off I headed, I’m almost in Grand Marais and then it’s north to the wilds. Worth noting, it’s been raining for a long time and at times, it has been raining big and heavy. So, I was interested to see how wet things are up at our campground and if they got hit or not.

Gunflint Trail

There was no way in hell I was going to do the Gunflint Trail with the top up. So I did it with the top down. It wasn’t raining hard. It’s a little sprinkle here and there. Enough to keep the wipers busy. It’s a little chilly. It’s 58 degrees. So I have the heater on on my legs. I’m wearing shorts by the way. Adds to the atmosphere.

And I had a scarf tied securely around my neck.

The only thing left is the fact that I just got a haircut. So my head was a little chilly, and none of my hats are head-keeping-warm hats.

And I was looking for a moose. I wanted to see a moose. It was actual raining. But will it could stop in 30 seconds. Or will it just keep going for the rest of the afternoon? That is the conundrum. I mean, I had 16 minutes to go. So I was just going to just drip it out.

Camp

I arrived to rain and decided the first thing I needed to do was put up a rain tarp, which I’d never done before. But I’d read enough on the internet that I was confident that I could do it. You just string it between two trees, put the tarp over it, secure the corners, Bob’s your narrator.

Except, I only have one tree. And it’s a little birch bark tree. So I ended up making this angled abomination. It’s fairly taut, but I think if anybody came in and looked at it, they would be seriously questioning whether they should call someone to come help me.

So now all I had to do is set up camp. And I needed to find firewood before they stop selling firewood. So I made that my next priority. Scored some at a nearby lodge. But my car was absolute chaos. I had taken things out and in the rain and out of the rain and there’s just stuff everywhere. So, that’ll be a chore for later.

Oops

So, I looked at my phone just for fun, knowing it wouldn’t work up there. But it worked in Grand Marais. I looked and realized I had a therapy appointment from 4:00 to 5:00. And my therapist is a little twitchy right now. So my not calling could send out the National Guard. So, here I go, driving back to Grand Marais. At least I’ve got firewood.

Got back to signal and sent the appropriate messages and confirmations, and headed back up to camp. Third run on the Gunflint for the day. Oh, and coming down there was an I can’t see anything deluge.

I was so worried about the rain and my equipment, tarp, etc. but the woods were dry.

It’s no surprise, but so many of these vehicles have canoes or kayaks on top of them. That’s kind of neat to see.

Camp

So the time was 5:38, but there was something about the clouds. It just feels darker. Darker than normal. Like, I’m thinking, oh no, I should have made dinner because it’s going to be dark soon. But it’s in theory not going to be dark soon. It’s just dark. It’s the rain.

Chair is assembled. Tent is up. Tarp remained up through rain.

My next step had to do with food, because I was hungry. But I also have a Subway leftover from lunch. I kind of wanted to eat the Subway instead of making food. But that’s kind of not the point.

In which I try to roast a weenie and end up eating a subway.

They tell you not to pick wood from the forest. And yet they give you a bundle of logs. I tried splitting one with the axe, but it didn’t really go that well. Don’t worry, I have big yellow gloves that protect me with leather. I ended up going with one fire stick, which was intended, and a couple small pieces.

The prediction is for heavy rains, but also the possibility of hail of some sort and some size. So that would be a lot of fun. I don’t know if I would want to be under the tarp or in the car watching it get smashed. Certainly not the tent. I don’t think that would hold up any big hail. I don’t think that tarp would either. Car it would be. Did not end up seeing hail.

Of course this guarantees that this fire will be roaring 15 minutes. Technically, the fire’s still starting. But I’m eating a Subway sandwich now.”

Friday

Camp

This whole part of the state is either an actual International Dark Zone, or next to one. So last night I set an alarm for 2 and got out of the tent to look for stars. If I saw clear starry skies, I was going to go down to the boat landing, as that’s where the sky is most open, over the lake. Unfortunately, it was too cloudy for stars. It was extremely dark out, and quiet.

It’s really quite beautiful here. And at night it was dead silent. But during the day, it’s the constant noise of jets. That doesn’t quite get you out of the real world.

I had a heads up from my only real source of information. Forget the Internet, Weather Radio is where it’s at! Doesn’t matter if you have cel coverage, it’ll just read out the weather and forecasts for the area in a funky robot voice. It’s pretty cool.

This morning I was going to make breakfast. Egg in a hole. You cut a hole in the middle of a piece of bread, drop some butter in a pan, crack the egg in the middle and cook. I made a test one the previous weekend and it was great.

Eggs. Forgotten. Cheese, forgotten. Kind of put the damper on everything. Well, I have bacon. I have bread. And I am going to fry the bacon and then I’m going to kind of fry the bread in the bacon grease. Cholesterol, here I come. The end result was somewhat intense, but okay. I figured I needed something, in order to power my day.

Because today I was going to attempt to summit Eagle Mountain!

Mooooose?

But first, moose! I went to the “moose viewing area,” an official National Forest stop. It’s a half mile hike to and from. For a total of 1 mile. Nobody mentioned the elevation, which I found slightly challenging. Weather is cool, high 50’s. Clammy, very humid. Which seems to make it cooler.

And what I call pin cushion rain. Not enough to count. But enough to consider. Two groups coming out of the moose viewing area. Didn’t sound like there are moose down there right now, but you never know. And it’s amazing how they’ve made this trail so that it is literally going to be uphill both ways. But it’s not snowing. Got to the moose platform and I don’t see any moose. I have my binocular with me though, so that was smart. That meant I could have a better view of not seeing moose. There are an awful lot of birds that aren’t actually there. Just like I see a lot of mosquitoes that aren’t there.

It is a satisfying trip so far. Even though it’s raining, I’m learning how to camp in the rain. Even if I haven’t seen a moose yet, I was going to keep trying.

Now on a foot that kinda hurts, and having gone up a slight grade and gone out of breath, I’m going to go climb a mountain. Well, a “mountain” that has an elevation gain of 550 feet.

There is awesome rock at the parking lot for the Moose Viewing area that looks just like a moose’s butt. It’s totally coincidental, but you know, you spend so long looking for something, you’re going to find it somewhere.

Climbing Eagle Mountain

I started to groove on the rain a little bit. On a gravel road zero dust is being kicked up. It’s keeping the mosquitoes at bay a bit. And it’s keeps it nice and cool so that it’s not too much on a hike. Hopefully it also discourages people from coming out.

I also hoped against hope that on some of the open stretches I might see a moose. But that’s not necessarily on the list of have-tos.

Really the goal was just get up, get to the top, take a picture, get down. And anything else is cake. I left the trail head at 11:37. In theory, three miles there would be an hour, and the same back, but that would be if I was walking on pavement and perfectly healthy. So I’ll be home for dinner. I was not wrong. I was back on the road by 4.

I spent much of the hike looking down because of roots and rocks when I would much rather be looking around at scenery. The trail was described as “easy,” with the first two miles flat and straightforward hiking. Except there were a ton of roots and rounded rocks. I was very glad to have my hiking stick. I was at REI with a $30 coupon. I really don’t like how poles look. Like you’re cross country skiing but there is no snow. I know they serve a purpose but still.. I saw a single hiking pole with a cool cork grip, right at waist height (adjustable.) I know my limitations when it comes to balance and coordination, so I thought this might help. It was also super cheap and on sale. Foreshadowing: I will absolutely get a better one.

I used it a bit like a cane, but also like a third limb, enabling me to get through areas of rock and root without falling down. I think it literally saved my life a few times, and for sure kept me from biffing it dozens of times.

I could describe my sights and feelings on the way, but the summary is this:

• Much introspection
• Beautiful scenery, ranging from bright green forest with fairly flat dirt path, to twisting paths of rock and root that took careful maneuvering.
• Some internal profanities
• More than a bit of worrying I bit off more than I could chew
• An appreciation for the Boundary Waters
• Other hikers from geared up (with hiking poles) middle aged folk to kids who looked like they were just out walking around. No special shoes, maybe a water bottle, no backpack.
• Grumpiness that those kids are going to do this hike like it’s nothing, and I’m going to be chugging tylenol tomorrow for the pain
• Consideration of the fact that I’m hiking a hard 6 miles when usually I can’t do more than 2 hours of anything at home.
• The excitement of ticking off a bucket list item: CLIMBING EAGLE MOUNTAIN!

Reflections on reaching the summit of Eagle Mountain.

It was fun. It was challenging. Far more challenging than I thought. But if I didn’t have my stick, I would have been done after half a mile. It was a good third leg, third arm. Besides, hearing people behind and in front of me all the time. The people I did see were very nice. And when going uphill, no matter where you are, you ask how far, their answer is about a half a mile. I don’t think they’re doing it to be mean. I think they’re just confused, given the terrain. The last “half mile” was rocks, and most of the 550 foot rise. Which I had a better appreciation for. I found the vista and took pictures, because the plaque itself is up in the woods, where there’s no view.

Heading back was hard. I was exhausted. Coming down the mountain I took a spill going down some wet granite rocks. So now my left wrist is a swollen and painful to move. Big right big toe has a blister on it, will solve with my first aid kit in the car. (Pays to plan!) And I will go change my shirt and socks at the car because I have everything with me. Then I will go into town to an air conditioned grocery market and buy supplies for dinner. Oddly enough, I had just a tiny bit of connectivity on my phone at the top of the mountain, but didn’t notice till later. Glad that Facebook notification got through.

Camp

What could be better than two zebra cakes by the fire? Two Zagnuts in the car. There’s a miracle I found them, but I did. I’m in a mood though.

I got the fire lit and now I just want to put it out. I got the sandwiches made and I just didn’t want to eat ’em. I got to the top of the mountain and I didn’t know why.

Sometimes I just don’t know about anything.

The walk back was so hard. The walk up was so hard. I should feel a sense of accomplishment and I really don’t know. That was on my bucket list. That was like near the top of my bucket list. And I’m just tired. I’m wobbling around on creaky feet and my muscles are sore and tomorrow they’re going to be even more sore. I’m going to go look at a thing that makes magnetic compasses mess up and I’m not going to know why I did that.

This is all just to say I’m tired, need sleep, and tomorrow will be better.

Saturday

Here’s where you get some relief. The voice recorder I use for notes died. So this day is going to be hopefully a bit quicker to write. Up with coffee and a Zebra Cake for breakfast.

Drove allllll the way up to the very end of the Gunflint trail. Went to a museum about the area, saw some cool boats, and a documentary on the trail. They had no magnets in their gift shop. Drove around and looked at some resorts, boat landings (to see the lake) and even saw a lake that contained the international border, so the opposite shore was Canada.

WIth an “easy” 3 mile round trip hike, you can get to a giant rock thing that confuses compasses. Those were three miles that didn’t feel very easy. The rock was interesting, but didn’t seem to be drawing in metal, but kids. So many kids. So I sat a bit of a ways off and ate my lunch waiting for it to quiet down. Eventually they all left, one small girl offering me a snakeskin she found. I said no thank you. Nice of her to offer. Took some pictures and headed out. Many lovely vistas, similar experience to yesterday.

Got back to camp and made beans ‘n weenies. They were quite good. I had RC Cola in a very cold cooler from the store in town, and had another fire that didn’t last. That was ok, as I was heading out for “dusk” as I understood it, in order to go look for a moose. At the Moose Viewing Station. By the time I got there is was quite dark. I stood by the lake listening for giant mammals – I would take any at this point. But what I got was a quiet and a stillness that was eerie. But it was amazingly beautiful, quiet, still. The stars started to come out, along with the mosquitos, but not too many of either. Walking back was full dark but slow and calm. A good way to end a day.

Sunday

Last night was cold. The car said it was 37 degrees, but that was an hour after the sun started up. I am guessing it dropped to below freezing. I had taken down the tarp the previous night, and all of the rope survived! Rolled up nicely and ready for use again some time. Packed camp in record slow time, and headed out. The East Bearskin Lake Campground served me well, and I highly recommend it.

With a Latte from Grand Marais in hand, I was in the mood to burn miles. I really wanted to get home. From Grand Marais to Little Marais, then Ely, Cloquet, Rush City (for a Burger King Whopper hankering) and finally home by 2 something.

Overall it was a good trip. I had a number of physical and mental challenges, some simply annoying, and others extremely frustrating. But at no point did I need my “emergency pills” and I managed to do more distance than I ever thought. I walked 38,981 steps, which may equal almost 18 miles. That’s 10.6 lengths of the Golden Gate Bridge.

I learned how to put up a rain fly, survive in the rain, didn’t see a moose, climbed a “mountain” and walked on a singing beach at apparently intermission. But I gained the confidence in all of those too. Actually, climbing Eagle Mountain checks the “highest point in the state” and sitting at the waters edge of Lake Superior checks the “lowest point in the state” too.

I am still sore and walking on tender feet and legs, but my wrist is back to 99.9% just time. I am happy to be home and even happier to finish this travelogue.

And now, back to the irregularly scheduled “Dulcinea” trip…