Day 64: Firth Lake Segment (Part 1), Connecting Route, Chippewa County

Day 64: Firth Lake Segment (Part 1), Connecting Route, Chippewa County

Day 64: Saturday May 15th, 2021

Total Miles covered for the day: 7.8, plus 1.2 miles 'extra' hiking

Location 1: The entire 'trail' portion of the Firth Lake Segment, between 245th Ave to the west and 250th Ave to the east.  

6.0 miles of trail covered plus 1.2 miles extra hiking

We had only two days available for hiking this weekend, so we drove up as early as possible on Friday to scope out our hike. The Firth Lake segment, you see, has been undergoing some changes. Where it used to march straight east/west from Firth Lake to the north end of the Chippewa River segment, access was lost for the easternmost portion, so it is presently necessary to hike a 0.7 mile spur trail, followed by 2.4 miles of connecting route. 

Except that maybe that wasn't true anymore...

While researching the segment, I came across a web page that was part of the official IATChippewa.org website, stating that there was a brand new route for Firth Lake that now cut directly across the Krank Nature Preserve. 

Except I had every reason to believe that the new route wasn't real, or at least not yet. (Spoiler: There is no such route - yet) For one thing, even though the web page very convincingly talked about how a new 1.3-mile segment has replaced the former 2.0 mile route, how the Chippewa River segment has been turned into a blue spur trail, how the guthook mammoth tracks app now gives new distances to the end of the trail, and how all this stuff had already happened, even though all this was on the website, there was no evidence of it on the ground. The parking area at the north end of the Chippewa River segment still showed a proud trailhead sign, and the yellow blazes were still there for the world to see. 

So just to make sure - because it made MILES of difference in where we would park our vehicles for launch and target - I got out of the car at the place where the trail crosses Cty CC and hiked in until I reached the place where the trail was supposed to now exist, and even a bit farther. No trail. Not even flags, let alone blazes. It was all cyber-fiction. 

Thank goodness we found that out before we set up for our Saturday Morning hike. It caused an extra 0.6 miles of hiking, but it was absolutely worth it. 

Then we spent the night van camping at 250th Ave parking area where the 'temporary' trail comes out, as this would be our destination point for the first walk of the day. I have horrible memories of driving down 250th Ave earlier this year when it was more mud than gravel, and we had serious concerns about getting stuck. Those worries are gone now, but the road is rutted and pitted as a result of the spring abuse. The parking area is no exception, with huge holes to avoid. 

We woke early, and were soon passed by a parade of vehicles, all headed west, and all unusually curious about our two cars parked at this location. 

"I just hope we don't run into that whole mob having some kind of group activity out here", I quipped. 

Then we ate our scant trail breakfast and drove up to the parking area by Firth Lake. As we drove down the windy gravel road, I soon realized that we had found the morning caravan's destination point. The parking area was very full.

A little crowded at the parking area!

It's important to note that one must drive quite a ways down the 'road' after leaving 250th Ave. before reaching the Parking area. There's also a boat launch for Firth Lake. And a geocache close-by. But if you care about that, you probably already knew. 

We were fairly early getting underway this morning, having van-camped very close-by. By 8:45 am we were ready to hike, and started down the trail with the temperature already up to 55 degrees.

Firth Lake Spur Trail Access

The first thing we did was hike down a 0.2 mile blue-blaze spur trail, which was basically level, followed the edge of Firth Lake, and had a bit of mud on it from recent rains. There was an abundance of Trillium, which seemed to be nearly a ground-cover in the area, and quite a few other flowers as well, including Wild Blue Phlox, which was making its first appearance of the year.

Wild Blue Phlox

 

Once we reached the official yellow-blaze IANST (Ice Age National Scenic Trail) we turned left, which took us yet further around the edge of Firth Lake. 

There was even a bench to enjoy the view.

Then, just a tiny bit further down the trail, we started hearing voices. We had found the gathering. 

And wonder of wonders, what we found was a group of dedicated trail volunteers from the local Ice Age Trail Alliance Chapter from Chippewa County. These, then, were the people we needed to thank for the long hours of trail-making and trail maintenance. And the ones who needed to hear about the erroneous web page posting that led me on the wild goose chase looking for new trail that didn't exist. 

To their credit - and a lot of credit is due to these volunteers - they were perfectly horrified when they learned that they had accidentally published a web page describing the planned future trail connecting the Firth Lake Segment to the Chippewa River segment. It was supposed to be a write-up that would be published if and when the change was ever made. I have since checked back and the offending page has been removed from the site. 

We also talked at length about the frequency and placement of yellow blazes, and how important they were even on sections that followed well-established trails or logging roads, because it's all too easy to miss sudden turns. They agreed, and I have to say they mostly do a fine job of providing yellow blazes in Chippewa County. Not perfect, but pretty good. 

When we reached N 45° 11.889 W 091° 12.804 we found ourselves on one of the major wooden structures along this trail. Two fine gentlemen were hard at work replacing boards and trying to shore up the boardwalk that they described as the 'bane of our existence'. 

Apparently this particular boardwalk, a long and absolutely necessary hallelujah span across the peat bog that lies at the downriver end of Firth Lake, was built just next to or even atop a long-established beaver dam that was responsible for the water levels on the lake. 

Except the beavers are never satisfied. 

If you ever ask a beaver whether the pond is deep enough, they will invariably tell you that it would be nice if it was just a little bit deeper. They live their lives under the premise that deeper is better, and since the IAT was nice enough to build all this structure on top of their dam, they often take it upon themselves to keep adding to it, placing logs, sticks and mud under and on top of the boardwalk, creating their own version of the Winchester Mansion. 

Over the years this has had a detrimental effect on the boardwalk as it heaves, leans, buckles and rots, bit by bit, turning a once magnificent structure into an uncertain passage. 

They told me the chapter has considered abandoning the structure entirely and building a whole new one perhaps 20 or 100 feet downriver. While I think this might be a fine idea, I do wonder what the beavers will think of another opportunity to anchor in some new foundation sticks and pile mud up in a new spot, so that another nice little pond can be formed. Bane, indeed.

Shortly afterwards, we met a section hiker from Green Bay walking the other way, with only about 185 miles left to go. He was friendly, and we chatted briefly. "Now that I'm so far from Green Bay", he said, "I like to make as much use of the weekends as I can." Made sense to me, and we parted ways. I did see him once again at the Dave Obey Interpretive Center, but he was talking to other people and I didn't say hello. 

Which brings me to the description of the trail itself, which is probably why you're here, if you're reading this. Most of the trail through here is perfectly lovely and well-maintained, and eventually it leaves the one-track through the hardwood forest and meets up with a two-track logging road of some kind. 

There were plenty of bridges along the way.

Unfortunately, as they so often do, the two-track ends up going through small dips that become muddy morasses to avoid, and it was occasionally necessary to detour around. 

It was just in front of a particularly large muddy pond that the official trail took what looked like a permanent 30-foot workaround, complete with blazes, which cut a short horseshoe to the south and quickly rejoined the logging road immediately afterwards. Once past the wet obstruction I looked back over my left shoulder to peek at the puddle, then went on down the trail. 

About 400 feet later we encountered a T intersection with confusing markings. It seemed like the trail went south, although it was covered up with a blue blaze over the top of the yellow blaze, which was really weird. The trail markings seemed to indicate we should go south, but I knew that the car was waiting for us to the north. What in blue blazes??

So Theresa walked a little ways to the north, and I walked a ways to the south, trying to figure out which way to go. I eventually spotted another blue blaze, facing the other way, which made me realize we must have missed a turn somewhere. I caught up to Theresa who had walked a ways, seeing nothing, and then returned to the intersection. 

"We missed a turn", I said. "I'm going back." Which I did, while Theresa waited, and sure enough, just at the very moment when that detour around the mud puddle rejoined the logging road and I was looking at it over my left shoulder, the official trail darted off to the right into the woods, leaving the road we had been following for over a half mile. 

I decided to follow the trail, knowing that I would eventually meet up with Theresa again, and as it turned out the trail only went another tenth of a mile or so to the southeast before reaching a bridge that was effectively blocked with branches and there was a sign indicating that hikers should follow the blue spur trail to the north. 

Don't cross this bridge!!

Had I gone about 50 feet further down the blue spur the first time, I would have seen this intersection. As it was, I ended up walking in circles and piling on extra distance while we recovered from the very thing Theresa was talking to the trail volunteer about - inadequate blazes when the hikers needed them most - because along the two-track, which was easy to follow, there was a definite shortage of blazes, lulling the hiker into thinking that they only needed to follow the road rest of the way.

Which leads us to the other problem. Why had we not seen blue blazes headed north, and only seen one headed south? Because there are simply not enough blue blazes. Even though this is a temporary trail (how temporary?) They need to put up more blue blazes. We went nearly a quarter mile down this temporary spur trail to the north before we saw the next blue blaze, which is absolutely inadequate.

So once I reconnected with Theresa, we hiked the 0.7 miles out along the spur to the waiting car. It was level, straight, lots of flowers and butterflies. A nice little walk. We even saw two deer along the way, something a little bit unusual for us since we tend to chatter too much as we walk to have any deer stick around long enough for us to see. 

We arrived at the car at 10:39 am, temperature still hovering at 55 degrees. We had a short break and were about to leave for the second half of our hike when a truck pulled up, disgorging three passengers while the driver stayed behind the wheel. Hikers, obviously. 

"Are you walking the trail, or the connecting route?" I asked. 

Turns out they were total greenhorns. First IAT hike ever. Somehow they had learned about the trail, paid for and downloaded the Guthook app (which I had never heard of) and improbably managed to find their way to this exact spot, a temporary spur trail that met up with a connecting route. 

It was the two women who wanted to hike, and the two men were going to do something else while they did and meet them at the other end. I told them that the blue-blaze trail didn't have enough markings, but when they reached the blocked bridge they would see the yellow blazes headed off to the right. 

"Blazes?" came the blank-faced query.

Hoo-boy. We then told them about the blue and yellow blazes to keep an eye out for. They told us they were planning to follow the trail using the Guthook app on their phones. Then we showed them the map. 

"Hey, come look at this!" was the excited reply. Yes, a full-color map showing the trail in loving detail, and we let them all take pictures of this particular section they were about to hike. It helped, because the men didn't really have a clue where they were supposed to meet the gals on the other end. "How long will it take?" - "Well - how fast do you walk?"

We gave them estimates for distance and time, and wished them well. They were traveling fast and light, and we had a feeling we would be seeing them again a little further down the trail. 

For Part 2, we drove our launch vehicle to the place on 245th Ave where it crosses the trail (N 45 12.216, W 91 14.968) and headed south. 

It was straight up 12:00 noon, and the temperature was now 59 degrees. 

After climbing a very small hill and ducking under the "You must be this tall to hike the trail" sign (kidding), 

The trail goes downhill for a ways until it crosses a stream, 

and in short order reaches the edge of an unnamed lake, where there is a nice, inviting bench. 

Having hiked enough of the trail to know, one can never be sure when the next bench will come along. So we took advantage of it and ate some lunch while counting turtles on a log, 

I think I counted nine turtles. Sometimes I take joy in small things. 

Fairly soon we found ourselves on a long stretch of fairly new trail that was cut only about two years ago. It wound along next to a creek bed, although there wasn't much of a creek to talk about. It was obvious that a lot of work had been put in to cut this new trail, and it hadn't yet reached a state of full maturity. It still looked new, with raw dirt that would eventually grow grass and moss, and places that hadn't seen enough foot traffic to give it that worn, lived-in look. There were plenty of blazes, and even though we ended up climbing and descending several hills through this piece, the route was fairly sound with even a cutback or two to prevent erosion. 

Theresa spotted something I missed, mostly because it had slithered out in front of her after I had passed. 

We also saw a multitude of flowers, ferns, and other greenery as we enjoyed the walk.

There was also a very interesting rock that someone must have found while creating the trail. It was left behind, leaning against a 4x4 signpost for all to enjoy. Welcome to Wisconsin!

We encountered lots of nice bridges along here, too, and sure enough we passed our two greenhorns as they fairly trotted down the trail. 

"How are you enjoying your hike?" we asked.

"We love it!" came the easy and enthusiastic reply. They were making good time, and it seemed like our estimate of when they would finish would be close. Off they went, and we never saw them again.

Along the way, we passed through an interesting glacial feature called a Groove-topped Ridge, located at N 45° 12.164 W 091° 13.339. It's a large feature that seems like you're walking through a ravine, except that the hills rise up to both sides, rather than having a river cut a hole out of a flat plain. 

Finally, after what seemed like a very long time but wasn't really, we went down a long downhill stretch and reconnected with the spur trail at Firth Lake. Another 0.2 miles north and we were back at the car, arriving at 2:25 pm, 62 degrees. 

For Part 3 of our hike, we drove to the west end of the Firth Lake segment, once again on 245th Ave, and headed north, to finish the last of the 'trail' portion of the segment. 

We started at 3:00 pm, and the temperature was 62°. We started out with a rapid downhill stretch, crossed a creek on one of many good bridges, then went rapidly back up the other side. 

It was a very good trail, and there were plenty of good markings, and when the trail bent off to the east, there were plenty of logs in the way to prevent you from going the wrong way.

All this continued until we got to a bridge that had one again been built basically over the top of a beaver dam. 

The bridge itself leans a little downriver, as there has been some soil creep over the years and the footings aren't quite as sound as they used to be. But the bridge is still solid and safe to cross. The real problem is the trail markings. 

You can see from the picture above that there is a bench across the river, and there is trail that cuts to the left behind it. What you can't see is that there is also a trail that cuts to the right, downriver. And on the opposite side of the bridge, there are no trail markings whatsoever to tell you which is the correct way to go. (Go right.)

Even turning back around and looking at it from the other side, there are no markings to indicate that the hiker should cross the bridge. With an absence of blazes, hikers are left to guess which way to go. This was one of the very few failures in trail markings in this section.

Along the way we saw many flowers, including blue beads and gaywings, and we passed through one delightful small hemlock grove as we walked. 

Gaywings

There were several bridges to cross, in varying stages of stability, but all reasonably sound. 

Downy Rattlesnake Plant

Blue Bead

Finally, there was one last bridge across a very mucky swamp, that thankfully we didn't have to walk through. A tenth of a mile later and we were at our car. It was 4:17 pm, and the temperature was down to 61 degrees. Perfect.

Location 2: Connecting Route between the Harwood Lakes segment to the west and the Firth Lake Segment to the east.

1.8 miles of trail covered.

It might have been enough to have hiked all of the Firth Lake 'trail' miles, especially given that we did all that running around in the middle and the night before trying to figure out exactly where the trail was, but we still had some time and motivation so we decided to tackle the short connecting route that would lead west to the Harwood Lakes segment. 

We drove to the eastern trailhead for Harwood Lakes on County Hwy E where there is ample room for many cars to park. We took off the packs and headed down the road at 4:39 pm, 63 degrees. 

I'll be honest with you. 1.8 miles doesn't seem like a lot, but after the distance we had already hiked that day this was pushing it a bit for us. As I look back at the maps I realize that we did in fact walk right past 'Baldy Mountain', a 160 foot conical hill, and a feature on the landscape that should have been hard to miss. And yet somehow, we did. 

As we walked down that paved road, focused on putting one foot in front of the other and two more miles behind us, I don't remember ever once looking to the west and thinking, 'Hey - that's a helluva hill'. For all we knew, it could have been flat. 

Of course, the first half of the hike is paved, then as it turns east on 245th Ave it turns to gravel. We passed a couple of ponds along the way but there wasn't much in the way of scenery. Nevertheless, I did take some pictures as we walked. 

Horsetail in bloom

We finally dragged our tired, sorry legs to our waiting vehicle at 5:45 pm, with the temperature still reading 63 degrees. We covered 9.0 miles for this one, and 8.4 of it on this day. Once again, it was getting up there as one of our lengthiest hikes, and we were more than happy to call it a day.

Running Total: 445.2 miles of trail covered; 38.7 miles ‘extra’ hiking/biking. End of Day 64.

.

.

Return to Table of Contents

.

.