Seepage

Put a map in front of me and I'm happy for hours.

Considering my love of maps it's surprising that it took me so long to realize that on the way back from my parents-in-law's place, if I don't go too directly, takes me to (or within sight of) five lakes.

They're all small lakes varying in size from 9 to 19 acres with a max. depth of around 20'.  With Lake Superior (20,288,000 acres and max. depth of 1,333') less than 30 miles away they're pretty small potatoes - but they're also quite lovely.  These are all seepage lakes in the sandy soil so they don't have streams flowing in or out.




John and I took off for a ride and by the time we got to the second lake he thought it was about time to head for home while I continued on to our place.

As far as I know there's no road/trail down to the lake...which is really quite intriguing. It seems like everything these days has to be accessible by a motor vehicle and when they're not it piques my curiosity.

On a day like this (mostly sunny, warm, and oh-by-the-way the saturday before memorial day) I'm sure the beaches on the Big Lake were busy.  Not so much here.

The managers of the CNNF love to log.  I understand that it's their job and national forests are tasked with this.  I just like big old trees and it bums me out that when I ride (or hike through) a nice stand of old trees in the CNNF I know that before too many years go by they're probably going to get the ax.  And to be fair there actually are a number of places with decent-sized trees that have been there for a while.  But there is also a lot of weedy  regrowth where they've cut things down and the pioneer species is aspen - and so there are a zillion 2" diameter aspen in a year or two - almost a monoculture.

I came to this lake a few years back to do some fishing with my friend Bill Heart.  At that point it was a short drive from the main road on a closely wooded two track and the lake was ringed with nice trees.  Now that two track is mostly open and the ring of trees is mostly gone.  Maybe there's some regulation that they can't cut right down to the water but the hillsides above the lake were sure cut.  

A few weeks back I got a Spot GPS tracker.  The thing has a GPS unit it it and four buttons.  One tells your specified recipients that you're OK. Another notifies them that you need help, and another notifies emergency services that your life is in danger and they should come and get you.  (The fourth one is the On/Off switch).  Anyway that's a little background about how I came upon this scene: I was riding along a paved connector road when I saw a little unlabeled two track leading off into the woods.  I'm curious by nature but being a family man I hesitate a bit to go off into the woods by myself where chances of anyone finding me, if things go south, are slim - my family needs me to be around.  But with the Spot I tend to go for it more.  And that's how I ended up riding my bike down a crumbling, overgrown stretch of what I presume to be the old road bed.  I had ridden by this stretch dozens of times and despite this stretch being close, and running parallel, to the present road I have never even had an inkling that this old roadbed is here.

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Get Going Already! Bikepacking, Beaver, and Barbecue

For an embarrassingly long time I've wanted to do more bikepacking - but for some reason I have not...at least not much.  I've really got no excuse: public land (and free camping) just a few miles away, a flexible schedule, supportive family.  I really don't have any (good) excuses.  I finally got my act together enough to get me out the door for a quick overnight.

It was threatening rain all day and though I took my raincoat and tarp (which I would have even if it weren't threatening, in case you're wondering) it only sprinkled a bit the next morning and so lightly I didn't even bother to put my raincoat on.  But we all know that if I hadn't taken rain gear it would've poured.

I was heading to a small lake in the CNNF so first thing I had to do, besides packing, was climb the hill.

The majority of this hill is not steep (and past the pines there you can see it dips a bit) but from the Tri-County Corridor at the base of the hill it rises about 400' up to most of the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest (CNNF) north of HWY 2.

Nearing home for the night.

Several weeks ago I made some Barbecue Spaghetti to dehydrate for bikepacking sorta following this recipe.  Here it is on my alcohol stove starting to heat up.

This is where I cooked and ate supper but then moved a few hundred yards to the place where I'd sleep.  I've only ever seen a handful of bear and the ones I've seen have just about turned themselves inside out putting distance between us (this is bear hunting area) - but still I'd rather not have a solo, up-close, after-dark encounter - so I took some precautions.

While supper was festering/rehydrating I had some time to kill so I wandered around and took a few pictures.

...and gathered some water from the lake to sterilize for drinking.

...and checked how things were going in the pot.  Pot cozy design patent pending.

Thankfully once things have finished rehydrating/sponge-ing up the hot water it looked much more appealing.

View from my campsite.

As things were getting dark I was fiddling with something on my hammock when a large sploosh sounded behind me.  A beaver was letting me know that she didn't appreciate me hanging around.   

My nifty little solar light hanging from the ridgeline for the tarp (that I didn't put all the way up but if I had been awaken by rain it'd be much faster to drape my tarp over the ridgeline than start from scratch) lighting up my bed for the night.

I slept well during the night.  There aren't yet many bugs.  I saw two mosquitos - the very fact that I could count them is testament to how few there were.  Despite it dropping to around 40* F my feet stayed warm.  My feet almost always get cold - but this time I took an extra pair of thick wool socks and zipped my down vest over my footbox - that worked.

The lake is not very big (you can see almost all of it in the previous picture) so soon after I woke up (or, more accurately I should say "when I got up" because the hammock was so cozy I stayed there a while after I was awake) I took a hike around the lake.

Even if I hadn't seen the beaver the night before there was plenty of evidence of them being around.

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When I got back from my quick circumnavigation of the lake I cooked breakfast down by the lake and sat there long after I had finished eating just being at ease with the wild-ness of things.  While cooking I noticed a loon out hunting for breakfast and watched for a long while.

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After loon-watching I packed up to go.

Bike loaded and ready to rock

There are some trails nearby here that are made for horses but (as I had seen no horse trailers and had seen no horses) I went ahead and rode on them.  For the record: 1) I'm not a fast rider (and these trails were rough which slowed me down even more) and was never close to going so fast that it would have been unsafe if I had seen a horse on the trail (and there were no blind corners or hills) and 2) I'm not going to ride them again and I'd encourage other bikers not to ride them at all - if you need another reason besides that it's not a trail for bikers they're too rough - it's not a pleasant ride.

The ATV trail as it nears the Corridor and home.

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Mayday, Deadfall Lifts, Fire, and Blueberries

For various reasons I hadn't ridden since the first of May when I went out for a ride yesterday.  The weather back on Mayday was a mix of snow and rain - snain for short.

Snain is the worst.  If it's cold, dry snow it doesn't stick much and brushes off when it does - and so a -10* ride is more comfortable than on one 45* warmer.  A warm rain is no problem, Captain Obvious has this to say about that, "you'll be wet but warm."  30-something degree rain is a whole different beast: if it's coming down hard you better put on your rain coat - but anything that's waterproof doesn't breath anywhere near fast enough to keep up with the sweat you're putting out even if you cut back on intensity alot.  So you're soaked - it's sorta warm from body heat but you also lose heat fast.  That sounds like no fun but if you don't put a raincoat on you already know what happens - you get soaked by the cold rain.  Body heat may keep you warm while you're riding but you lose heat fast.  I haven't yet found a good solution.  I'm curious to try a rain cape - anyone used one?  They look a bit dorky but if they keep you dry then that's worth it.  

I'm not particularly proud of it but I have to admit a little smugness in situations like these.  You can see in the bottom of the picture some tracks where an ATV had to turn around, unlike a bike, you can't just lift an ATV over a fallen tree.  Not that I'm too smug about it, there are many things ATVs do that bikes can't, but in a society that largely sees the limitation of bikes and not their potential, I'll take my victories where I can - even if I have to reach a bit.     

 The ride started off rather dreary (weatherwise) and so I decided before I left that this would be a hot cocoa ride - so I brought all the stuff for that - or thought I did.  I left the fuel for my stove on the kitchen table.  Whoops.  I do stuff like that.  Luckily for my hot cocoa consumption I had a woodburning stove and I was able to find a stick or two.

It has been rainy here for days or otherwise I could just use dry twigs - but since everything was wet I had to split the wood to get at the dry insides.  Perhaps I had subconsciously "forgotten" the wood to burn on purpose because I had inexplicably remembered to bring a knife and a saw - which is all I need to process wood for this stove.   

The stick that the knife is leaning against was my baton that I used the hit the back of the knife to force it through and split the wood.  

Batoning 

When I finished with drinking the hot cocoa I left my stove and setup to cool and hiked off up the hill to the north.  The trees here were fairly big and the walking was open and easy.  I hiked to the top of the hill, meaning to turn around there, but when I got there something a little farther on looked curious.  So I kept going and then when I got there there was something that looked curious a little farther on - and so on.  I ended up hiking a ways and took a few pictures on the way.  But mostly I just walked and appreciated the gorgeous spring day which had gone from dreary to sunny and beautiful.

These flowers mean that there will be blueberries here this summer.

Anyone know what this is?

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