Day 8: North Man

Walking the Coast Guard Road.

He stood there by the roadside – solid, tall, unmoving, studying our approach.

We’d been briefly lost before arriving at the Two-Hearted River campsite the previous night.

We had hoped this gent could help.

He wore a black coat that stretched from his neck down to the top of his black boots. It was almost a poncho, but more like a long, cloak-like cowboy duster worn by, say, Wyatt Earp in the streets of Tombstone.

A tall, thick fur cap – round like a keg and also black – covered his head less than an inch from thick eyebrows.

But it was the face that grabbed our attention. Below his broad nose, above thin lips, was a vertical mustache, also black – much like Charlie Chaplin’s, but narrower. A toothbrush mustache, it’s called. Immaculately trimmed.

And then there were the eyes: steely blue, cold, tightly focused. Nordic, or Slavic.

Putin-esque.

He seemed a Mountain Man but more tidied up, cultivated and handsome, like he could lean against the bar at Grand Marais’ Dune Saloon, order a whiskey, neat, and calmly watch every woman in the joint clamor to buy him another.  

He’s the true North Man, I thought as we drew near. This dude could talk a bear out of his coat.

We walked up to him and, apparently, his son and father as they were putting fishing gear into a truck.

“We're looking for a campground nearby,” I said. “Is it down this road?”

His eyes took us in, bemused.

“Don’t know of one down this way,” he replied slowly.

What must he think of us? I thought. We were three exhausted downstaters who clearly had lost our way. We were grimy, smelly and looked a bit desperate. For all of our heroics the prior six days, I now felt as tall as a turtle.

I also worried he was toying with us.

“Nope, don’t know of one that way,” he repeated.

Another long pause.

“But, there’s a campground up that way,” he said finally, pointing to the opposite direction.

Grateful, we turned and soon found our campsite. Not so bad a guy, I judged.

It was at that moment that I realized another truth about the Upper Peninsula.

We might have been on the federally sanctioned North Country Trail, in the great state of Michigan, in the great United States of America.

But this was not our land. The Upper Peninsula is really its own island. And it belonged to North Man, his progeny, ancestors and people like him. We were mere tourists … “fudgies,” we’re called up here, or “trunk slammers,” or “trolls” because we live below the big bridge.

We visit for 10 or 11 days, then we’re gone; North Man lives and breathes this territory year-round, 24/7. It’s a hard land, often a deathly cold land. North Man seemed as hardened as the glaciers that carved it.

I mention last night’s encounter because the farther east we went along the peninsula, the more isolated I felt.

Sure, as we cooked our biscuits and gravy this morning, on our eighth day, occasional pickups and four-wheelers sped by our campsite headed out to the peninsula’s far reaches.

They contained camouflaged hunters. One hunter’s pickup barreled by with two coonhounds howling in the back, both with GPS antennae fastened to their collars. We would later hear the dogs baying deep in the woods. 

The drivers seemed friendly – they tipped a few fingers up from their steering wheels in greeting as they rolled by. But they were of a different culture than I. I’m not a hunter, first of all. I shot a rabbit once when I was little and almost puked.

Seeing these guys – these durable Yoopers – didn’t make me uncomfortable. Just more aware of our differences.

I can be here, I decided. But never be of here.

***

Fortified by extra sleep and extra food, we broke camp, took our eight-fingered selfie, and set out to find the nearest blue blaze.

Easier said than done. As mentioned, Reed and Green Campground was a quarter mile or so south of the North Country Trail. We knew which road we would take to find the path – it would intersect with the Coast Guard Road – and supposedly the trail would be nearby.

But when we arrived, we again found no trail.

We decided to stick with the Coast Guard Road; the map indicated it would connect with a side road to the shoreline in a mile or so, and surely we’d find the trail near the water.

The landscape changed dramatically. This area had been clear-cut, so trees were sparse. The sun was bright and warm, the skies cloudless. We shed a layer as temperatures rose.

The road was easy to follow but less easy to hike. The sand in spots was deep and loose, but the road was wide enough that we could forego our single-file line.

Checking both map and GPS, we guessed which side road we needed to take north. And sure enough, we spotted a blue blaze to our right when we reached the shoreline.

I can’t overestimate the feeling of comfort I got when back on the trail. Like finding your way home. Not only were we then confident of direction but also of distance. We’d learned when we first got lost that a missed turn can add a mile or more – and maybe hours – to a day’s trek.

We took a quick break along the bluffs and beach of Lake Superior, happy to again hear waves. We then found our blaze and marched on. Here the vegetation seemed sparser and more closely cropped. It was apparent that a forest fire had stripped much of the area of greenery; tree trunks rose starkly to the sky like picked bones. Huge branches, still black from the fire, stretched across the trail in spots.

The lake’s winds had made the path even more perilous, toppling the weakened and dead trees so that we, again, had to bushwhack around the fallen timber.  

At the same time the terrain turned hilly, extremely so in some spots. These were tight hills, jammed so close that the minute you went down you had to go back up.

We reached the pinnacle of these hills at a place we dubbed Mount Baldy. The view of the lake through the skeletal trees was breathtaking. But it was here where we suffered our most frustrating loss of direction.

At its top, there were dual blue blazes indicating the trail went to the right. Bill was in the lead, and he turned right … we followed. But there was no follow-on blaze. The trail simply disappeared.

We spread out in search of it, going up and down the steep hillsides. The fire and resulting layers of dead branches made the walking nearly impossible – like tiptoeing through a field of open bear traps.

Still no trail.

As I delicately walked across the width of one sheer hill, my trekking poles steadying me, I caught my foot … again.

I tumbled hard, swearing on the way down. I crashed on a heap of branches and, once more, landed on my back looking skyward. I cursed the blue blazes.

Fall-on-your-ass score: 3-0-0.

This time I unclipped my gear rather than wait for a hand up. Otherwise I’d be turtlin’ in misery until the guys missed me, because they were scattered across the hillside.

By this time, we wondered if the right-hand turn should have been a left-hand turn – that maybe the blaze painter had dyslexia, or was a prankster. (Trail humor, don’t you know.)

Sure enough, Bill battled his way to the left and rediscovered the trail down the hill about 20 yards.

We all cursed the blue blazes then, but eventually followed the trail off the hills and into deep woods that somehow had been saved from the fire. From there we followed a two-track to Two-Hearted Campground, where the Two-Hearted River spilled into Lake Superior.

This time a bridge over the river awaited us – a beautifully constructed wooden span just wide enough to accommodate one person at a time. We found a picnic table on the other side and took our lunch.

***

By now we had covered more than 6 miles of the day’s 10-mile trek. Collectively we could all sense a turning point in our journey. Figuratively, it was all downhill from here. We’d walked 104 miles; we had but 40 to go.

We also would bid good-bye to our companion of the past six days, Lake Superior. The trail would now take us southeast and then east, toward our final destination, Tahquamenon Falls.

We would miss the lake – its continual shifting of moods, its waves, its sunsets and sunrises. Sure, we would not miss the damage and havoc it could drop on the trail. But it’s the lake that really brought us here – to Pictured Rocks and beyond. There’s a reason the Lake Superior coastline is considered among the best stretches – if not the best stretch – of the 4,000-mile North Country Trail.

The path out of Two-Hearted Campground was well marked. A large kiosk announced the trail, with a big map and some history. Also, in a box, was a notebook where hikers could write their greetings. One in particular, from June 28, caught our eye – a Dennis and Brenda, who warned not to pick ferns because “they will slice your fingers!!”

Apparently Dennis had grabbed a fern in hopes of using it to flog mosquitoes. But in so doing, he put a gash in his hand that eventually required an emergency room visit and 12 stitches to close.

Brenda, who wrote the note, still could gush: “Love it! Lake Superior is awesome!”          

I have to admit I felt a bit smug in reading the note. We’d settled on an early October hike precisely to avoid mosquitoes, which can be thick and suffocating in the summer. I can’t imagine covering this same distance surrounded by those foes. 

The trail meandered along the coastline for just a half-mile before bending south and climbing some low-slung hills. We encountered, again, woods devoid of green. Another forest fire. The barren, burnt trees stood thin, gray and stark against the deep-blue sky, like petrified sentinels. Only the ferns and other low growth showed off autumn’s colors.

It was good it was sunny, I thought; it would have been spooky if not.

Interestingly, and despite the forest fire, the trail was extremely well marked here, with blue blazes every 100 feet or so. Better yet, since we were moving away from the lake, the path was clear of debris. The walking became easier.

We speculated that the trail was so well maintained because it’s a popular hikers’ route from the falls to Two-Hearted and back.

The sunny skies also were producing the first true, warm day of the trip. We shed another layer; I put away my stocking cap after wearing it for five days straight.

This isn’t to say that we were feeling bouncy of foot. Hardly. The morning’s trek had been tough – the most difficult 6 miles of the entire trip, it seemed. It was also the third straight day of fighting debris on the trail, and the battles had all occurred during high-mile stretches.

So we were the walking wounded. Yes, the worst of it seemed over. But we all were still in pain, still exhausted – things that biscuits and gravy and a few hotdogs can’t fix.

The trail descended into a flatter, forested scene south of the fire devastation. It was a cooler, welcoming valley that followed the Little Two-Hearted River. Within an hour, we arrived at Culhane Lake – our home for the evening.

It was there that I had one of those incredible, divine moments – the kind that you remember until you, well, die.

As we arrived, we sought out the best campsite near the lake. The campground was empty save for the caretaker couple camped midway along its stretch.

We settled quickly on a spot, and I unclipped my backpack and leaned it against a tree. And like a moth to light, I headed straight down the slight hill to the lake’s thin beach. The guys hung back, unpacking.

And I took it all in – the lake’s immaculate waters, the robin-blue sky, the thick, unbroken wall of evergreens that hugged its shores, peppered by the reds and oranges of oaks and maples. Geese flew across the expanse, their low honks muffled by the light winds of early dusk.

A flood of awareness poured through me as I absorbed the scene’s purity, its quietness, the total absence of a human presence. Nature at its incredible best.

I realized, sure, that our journey would soon be over. But also, I think, I discovered a question I’d not even posed to myself: Why, really, did I do this hike? Not the flimsy “why” that generates a flimsier “because it’s there.”

But the why that goes deep into your soul and turns you inside out in search of an answer.

The answer was here, I thought. You did this in hopes of living this … to see it, to smell its smells, to hear its hallowed sounds. To have all of the senses collide in such a penetrating, profound, unforgettable way that you’d never, ever, be the same because of it. 

Yes, that’s why, I told myself.

And I cried.   

***

The tears were brief. North Man wouldn’t approve, I thought.

I brushed my eyes clear and quickly returned to my gear to set up my tent and prepare for dinner. Turkey Tetrazzini tonight.

I vowed that I would soak my feet in Culhane Lake before eating. So once camp was settled, I returned with fresh socks and soap.

I pulled off my boots, stripped away my socks, rolled up my pants and walked gingerly into the shallows. The water was cold and bracing – perfect. And there I stood, I’m sure with a stupid grin, as my feet soaked up the comfort and my eyes enjoyed more of the view.

“Well, Doug, are you starting to feel ambivalent about the rest of the trip?”

It was Bruce. He’d wandered down. He remarked how he’d never thought he would accomplish such a journey – so many successive days of heavy-duty hiking with full packs in a setting like this.

I agreed. And I agreed about the ambivalence – that we’d traveled eight days, they’d gone by so fast, and they were all splendid despite the challenges – and yet, home was starting to look pretty damn good.

We speculated that we could do, at the most, maybe a 14-day trip in similar conditions. But that would be it … that would test us to our bones and maybe even kill us.

North Men, we weren’t.

But right then, with my feet planted like roots in Culhane Lake, I felt one with the North.

It felt good.

###

Sweet P's Log - Day 8:

Next, Day 9 - Yo, Pain

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