Day 67: Southern Blue Hills Segment (Part 2), Rusk County
Day 67: Friday May 28th, 2021
Total Miles covered for the day: 6.5
Location: The Southern Blue Hills Segment, between Yuker Road to the north and Old 14 Rd to the south.
Theresa and I woke early today to a bright and cheerful morning full of sunshine and birdsong, staying at our airbnb located in Rice Lake. After suffering through the misery of the north half of the Northern Blue Hills segment we were looking forward to knocking off the rest of the Northern Blue Hills and just being done with it. Neither of us was particularly looking forward to going right straight back into the same trail conditions we had encountered the day before, but we were out here to get it over with, so that's where we were headed.
"Follow me", I called to Theresa as we headed out of the driveway and down the road. I had set my GPS by picking the location on the map and saying, 'Go there'. And, dutiful electronic servant that it was, my GPS led me to the exact place where I told it to take me. Except that it was wrong, or rather, I was wrong.
I had been studying maps quite a bit in preparation for this trip, and in my haste to get going this morning I had inadvertently selected the southern end of the Southern Blue Hills segment rather than the southern end of the Northern Blue Hills segment.
As we rolled up to the parking place I got out of the car to walk back and talk to Theresa. What we had left of the Northern Blue Hills (NBH) amounted to a 4.6 mile hike with an extra 0.3 miles tacked on because of the spur trail. What we had to do on the Southern Blue Hills (SBH) was 6.5 miles, cut short of the full 7.3 because at one point we had hiked the 0.8 miles of Yuker road in preparation for minimizing the distance of the SBH that had to be covered in one stretch. As it turns out I was very glad for that decision.
Had we intended to hike the longer SBH segment today, we would have prepped a little differently, and Theresa's knees were hurting from slogging through the mud all day the day before. The longer distance, with no opportunity for bailing out, was not what we had planned for. But always game for the task, and with grim determination, Theresa opted to just tough it out and go for the longer hike today, since we were already in place.
So we shifted our gear around a little, making sure there was adequate supplies in both cars, and drove up to the long gravel roadway known as Yuker Road, though it doesn't actually appear on my Garmin GPS as a 'road'. In fact, it doesn't show up on my GPS at all, making me wonder if maybe some guy named Jeff Yuker lived at the end of this thing, and we were all just using his driveway.
We parked our car back there next to the trail, got our gear in order, and started the Southern Blue Hills adventure at 9:45 am, with the temperature just hitting 42 degrees. Unlike the day before, it wasn't raining, and for that we were very grateful.
The choice to hike the Southern Blue Hills Segment north to south was an intentional one, since the elevation at the northern end is 1640 feet, and the elevation at the southern end is 1340 feet. However, since Theresa's knees were giving her so much grief, this is the one day where that may have been the wrong choice. Going downhill is much harder on knees than going up, especially when you're dealing with mud and rocks. That knowledge is more retrospective, though, and didn't factor into our decision-making like it should have.
The first part of the trail, from Yuker Road to the first time we crossed Moose Ear Creek, about 8/10ths of a mile, was a two-track logging road that was muddy, not overly hilly, and had been rutted by occasional travel by what I can only assume was a truck passing this way for hunting access.
This was the first of many, many creek crossings that day, quite a few of them on Moose Ear Creek itself, and there was a charming little bridge that took us over the softly babbling brook.
Naturally, after going downhill for so long and crossing a creek it was necessary to go uphill for a while, but even that wasn't very extreme. The path led uphill until we had gained about 40 feet in elevation, then dropped right back down again on the other side, though at a gradual pace.
This next piece, about a half-mile in length, featured a surprising number of creek crossings (there are three on the Resource Map, but in actuality there were a couple more) with absolutely no bridges to go with them. In defense of the makers of the IAT, yesterday had been a day of deluge, and it's possible that many of these streams were intermittent, but the simple fact was that intermittent streams are occasionally very, very wet, and can present quite a problem as far as getting across. It was here that Theresa employed her new method for getting across creeks. She just plowed straight through them, marching along with a determined step and daring the water to penetrate her Gore-Tex defenses. And it actually works. She keeps her boots laced up tight, and her leg gaiters strapped in place, and except for the tiny amount of water that leaks first down, then up all the way to the edge of her sock, her feet remain pretty dry. I'm impressed, but I haven't tried that method yet.
On one of those creek crossings a tree had recently fallen, creating a canopy barrier and a swirling multi-channel mess. Theresa plowed through while I took out my saw and cleared many of the branches, though I left one strategically placed over the creek. Anyone who wants can use it as a partial bridge, allowing them to get across dry and in-stride. I'm sure it will crack someday and give some poor hiker and unexpected and undesired wet foot, but I tested it a few times and decided it would serve many a hiker well, so I left it there.
 |
| Soldiering on |
The next half mile past these multiple creek crossings was very, very muddy, and more hilly. After going up one hill we broke out onto a broad, open hilltop which we enjoyed for a while before plunging into the thick forest again. There was a steep downhill stretch and we had two more creek crossings, but these, thankfully, had bridges across them. The second of these two crossings was Moose Ear Creek again.
 |
| Blue Beads |
 |
| Down, down, down the hill |
After crossing Moose Ear Creek for the last time (the one where there is actually a sign that says 'Moose Ear Creek') we had to go up a very steep hill that gained us over 100 feet in elevation. There was a bit of erosion on this hill, but not too bad considering the rain. Then, thankfully, we walked along a long flat zone with only one mud puddle that was easily avoided. Then the trail dropped down another 60 feet in elevation again, and ran along through the woods with fairly easy walking.
While many of the wildflowers seemed done for the year, giving way to the ferns, the wild geraniums seemed to be enjoying the sunny day today far more than the rainy weather from yesterday.
About one mile past Moose Ear Creek, we came to a gravel road and thought, 'No way could this be real. A road? An actual ROAD?" Sure enough, the IAT had a sign that told us to turn right, and after several miles of hiking, that had been more muck and water crossings than I have actually recounted above, we were happy to take the next stint on an ATV trail. We took the opportunity to have a little bite to eat before we headed down the road.
Sadly, that happy thought lasted just over 100 feet. No sooner had we taken the first few steps than I spotted the sign that said, 'Turn here', in the form of a little brown and yellow arrow. Oaths were uttered.
"How are your knees?" I asked. "Terrible", came the reply.
We actually pulled up the satellite map at that point to evaluate where this road went, and if we could use it to bypass some portion of the trail, to preserve our health and ability to keep hiking. Even though it looked like we could follow it east and eventually loop around very close to the trail down at North Lake, we decided we would just stick to the IAT like we were supposed to.
"Let's just go," Theresa said. I followed. In hindsight, I'm not sure that was the right choice.
The next four tenths of a mile were miserable. And they were avoidable.
The official trail heads south off of that ATV trail and goes along at the base of a wooded hill, hugging the edge of an intermittent creek that remains wet enough to support bog plants and a copious number of flies and mosquitoes. You know the kind of trail I'm talking about. The soil is black, peaty, organic and spongy. The leaves on all the plants in the area glow a bright yellowish-green. The only trees that grow there are tag alder, river birch and black spruce. The roots of these trees grow almost on top of the soil, making for the double-edged sword of somewhere to put your feet to stay as dry as possible and accursed obstacles ready-made to trip you up and place you bodily into the muck.
Which is exactly what happened.
Theresa has been hiking for quite a while using double hiking sticks and has credited them repeatedly for saving her from falling down and getting hurt. Today, she wasn't quite that fortunate. As we were making our way across this ridiculous piece of trail, glopping along and questioning whatever sadistic soul had decided that walking through the muck for a half-mile would be fun, compared to hiking through the perfectly normal and accessible forest that lay just five feet uphill, Theresa took a spill and cratered into the mud, banging every major bone and joint on the way down.
We are sometimes vocal in our evaluation of the trail as we hike, sharing our thoughts with one another on how we might have done this or that differently, how there could be more yellow blazes here, or a switch-back there. We sometimes discuss trail building or maintenance at length. And yet most of these discussions are meant to stay between us, only later to be recalled and placed here in the blog.
Not so this time.
The 'polite' conversation we shared at that time was shared openly, to the world at large. Had anyone been within a tenth of a mile, I'm pretty sure they would have been party to our conversation and known with clarity exactly what we thought of that particular section of trail. Theresa has suggested that if we want people to really know what it's like out here on the trail, I should take video of her at moments like this and "Put that in the blog!". Out of kindness to our readers and no small measure of self-protection, I have chosen never to commit such moments to video.
Once we finally got past this hellacious section, which has unseated the western half of the Indian Creek Segment in my mind as the 'Worst Trail Ever', the trail finally went up a hill and got sort-of OK. We were approaching North Lake, which was a refreshing change of pace considering all the mucking around we had been doing so far through the Rusk County Forest.
On the southwest corner of the lake we had to cross a beaver dam. The lake was full to bursting due to all the recent rain, but this beaver dam was old and well-established, and so crossing it wasn't too difficult a task. A short while later we finally found what felt like a decent log to sit on and took a break to have our lunch. We had been hiking for hours, and while this trail boasts an abundance of mud and muck, it has surprisingly few trees that would serve as a place to sit, and absolutely no benches. It wasn't perfect, but it would do. And there was a nice view, too.
After a bit we packed up again and started walking. The trail around the lake was very pretty, and is really about the best thing I can say about the Southern Blue Hills . Then about a tenth of a mile or so further we crossed another watery area on a rickety boardwalk, and a small bridge (if I remember correctly), then discovered what is truly a spectacular camping area, complete with a picnic table.
Had we but known that there was a picnic table two tenths of a mile from where we sat and ate our lunches on soggy logs, we certainly would have held off a bit. On the other hand, if we had stopped and eaten at the picnic table, it may have been a lot harder to get up and get going again.
As soon as we reached the campground, the trail went through another change of mood and became a wide two-track that started out by walking past a failed beaver pond. I'm saying 'failed', meaning that it is no longer holding water, but I get the distinct impression there were people involved in helping it to fail.
What you see in the area is a ring of dead trees sticking up out of a bleached bed of leaves, creating a ghosted grayscale bowl that defined the upper reaches of the water. It was clear that the water was threatening the road, and the dam that once held back all this water had a massive hole in the middle, looking for all the world like dynamite had been used to blow the dam and drain the pond. Downstream from that point you can see the effect of all that water rushing out at once. The draining of the pond was clearly a violent event and the soil hadn't yet been exposed long enough to start greening up. It was a very interesting effect.
The two-track went on for another eight tenths of a mile with reasonably good footing and nothing major to report. Shortly after we crossed the stream, we climbed a stile over a fence and entered a stretch of private land.
But don't despair. These cows have more pasture than any pasture I have ever seen. There is so much room that you don't have to watch your every step to avoid the problem piles. But you do have to be... aware.
And we did eventually see the cows. They saw us. They didn't care, so neither did we.
Actually, walking across the pasture was a really nice change of pace considering everything we had gone through recently. But as I looked around I did have to ask myself, 'Where are all the rocks?' When someone goes through the effort of clearing a farm field, especially in glacier country, there are always rocks. Either they litter the ground, poking up and creating random obstacles for the cows, or there are great piles of them along the edges of the fields. We saw neither.
We walked across the top of the hill, then through the woods again on a broad road that was obviously, by evidence of the hoofprints, a frequent passageway for the entire herd of dairy cows. These were truly free-range cows, and it looked like they had the run of about 640 acres of land, and used a surprising amount of it during the day.
There were two more creek crossings through this area, and for a large portion of the trip through the woods we were walking along this fast-moving creek.
The second major creek crossing was extremely pretty, falling just below a beaver dam that was overflowing with all the rain, so there was a generous flow of water coming though that looked clean and fresh. Except that I know for a fact where it came from. Beavers, cows - you really need to be careful where you're getting your water from.
We were nearly all the way through the farm when we came out of the woods and up onto another clearing, where the trail took a very sharp right turn that wasn't very well marked. Or maybe we were just completely distracted because of the very odd - well, let's call it a sculpture - that graced the top of the hill. I think it had been placed there to greet hikers as they approached from the south, rather than those of us coming from the north, but it was an impressive - thing - no matter how you came upon it.
Yes, those are cow bones. Skulls, sure, but also hip joints, and spines, and scapulae. It was - weird. It was like a prop from a creepy movie. Something the main characters walk past without smiling, and then never speak of again so as not to invoke the curse of the cow, or whatever.
When we went down the hill to depart, we found ourselves facing one more spot where there was a lot of water, and this one smelled even more like cow urine. It was genuinely impossible to get through unaffected, and we just chalked this up to one more experience on the trail. Then about 50 feet past this barrier we were faced with a barbed wire fence across the trail.
I could see where people had gone to the side and climbed over the wires, but I also noticed that the barbed wire gate had been rigged with a release, and it was possible to remove the post holding it in place by unfastening some wire. I unhooked it, we both went through, and I put it back in place. There will be many, many hikers who get here and won't notice the way to get through. The IAT should really do something about putting in a better crossing.
Back on the two-track, we thought we were off the private land until we arrived at the second stile crossing. From atop the hill we had a lovely vantage of the distant Pickerel Lake. It was very easy walking through here, and as the trail took a severe turn to the west we saw the rusty shell of a 1964 Impala that had gone to its grave here at some point in the past.
As we went south from here, we had hilly, reasonably easy to walk trail, some of it two-track and some of it single trail, with no muck, going generally more downhill than up. Just as we reached the edge of the railroad tracks, we had one more stile to climb up and over. In the absence of any benches along this entire segment, we took the opportunity to sit for a while on the stile, and had a little snack before embarking on the last six tenths of a mile.
 |
| Star flower |
You would think that after all we had gone through, a railroad tracks wouldn't present that much of an obstacle. You would think so, but you would be wrong.
Picture a deep trough, about 40 feet wide, and ten feet deep. Then in the middle of that trough, build up a railroad bed so that it sits like a hot dog in the middle of the bun. Then you make sure there is no drainage to either side of the tracks, so you get a long, narrow lake on each side of the tracks, but not so narrow as to be able to jump across without putting in some logs or stepping stones. Then picture the railroad coming through with some sort of monster implement and digging out both sides of the rail, making the waterway even wider, with muddy sides, and throwing all that helpful stuff up into the woods, making it completely inaccessible and totally useless. That's what we faced.
From the point of view of the railroad, I get it. You can't be having a bunch of logs and stuff getting in the way. But come on, fellas! We gotta get across somehow!
And we did, of course. I did the best job I could putting in rocks and sticks in strategic places so I could get across, and Theresa mostly just did her power stride thing, and we clambered up the ridiculously steep embankment on the other side to get to the point where I knew the trail to be, but it wasn't because I could actually see any signs or yellow blazes. In either direction at this crossing, there is a nearly total lack of signage. Hikers must go on faith that the trail goes straight across, because there is almost nothing to confirm it.
Then we climbed up a small hill to see one more lake view off to the west, before turning east again and following the single-track trail all the way to the car. The last tenth of a mile or so was a gradual hike uphill, but at least there were no more surprises for us.
We ended our hike at 5:25 pm, with the temperature all the way up to 63 degrees. The thermometer had climbed 21 degrees during our hike, and by the time we were done we could truly say it was one of the most wonderful days yet to take one of the worst hikes of our entire IAT journey.
Running Total: 464.2 miles of trail covered; 39.6 miles ‘extra’ hiking/biking. End of Day 67.
.
.
.
.
No comments:
Post a Comment