Hiawatha National Forest Hike

hikers at the Roxbury Creek mouth (photo by M Fogarty)

based on a posting to the NCT Friends Yahoo group, by Ewa Roszczenko, used with permission

From June,26, 2009 to July,1, 2009 a few of us were hiking a small section of the North Country Trail in the Hiawatha National Forest in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. This was a 57.4 mile NCT section hike ( minus 3 miles, I explain later), starting at the Lower Falls Campground at Tahquamenon Falls State Park, and ending at the H-40/Trout Brook Pond Trailhead.

We hiked from 8 miles to 14 miles per day. The trail is extremely well marked and it felt like it was just for us; we did not meet any hikers. I felt like in a fabulous land where I walked through ferns almost my height (well, I'm not tall, but ferns almost 5 feet,may be called tall). Many beautiful wild flowers, grass, creeks, rivers,lakes, hills and much more ... just splendor of Nature.

campsite with the rain and bugs (photo by M Fogarty)

The weather, shine, rain, rain, shine and more rain. And the Bugs... some time more annoying some time less, but not bad as one would think. It was raining most of the nights, but I think our sleeping bags were never wet,or just little bit, but of course a few times we had to pack wet tents/tarps. So, we were busy on our lunch breaks drying our gear.

Now, explanation about "minus 3 miles." As we know, sometimes hiking NCT we need to walk on the roads. On one rainy day, we walked on the paved road, rain and almost dark, 3 miles to go... and suddenly the track stopped and a very nice man told us he can give us a ride. First, in our minds, it will be great, I was thinking to take off my wet socks, make tea and crawl into my cozy sleeping bag, I was not alone with these thoughts, my fellow hikers were thinking the same. But, we started a conversation, is it going to be cheating, do we have to come back some other time to hike these 3 miles to say we did it? A nice man, in the truck, was listening to our dialogue and said "look at, it is dark, it is cold, it is raining, just hop into my truck"... and we hopped into his truck! He gave us a ride, 3 miles.

Tahquamenon River (photo by M Fogarty)

The hike was organized by Mike Fogarty, with friends Ewa and Jeff participating.

See all their pictures at Webshots
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