Day 156: Kewaunee River Segment (Part 3), Kewaunee County

Forestville Segment (Part 1), Kewaunee and Door Counties

Day 156: Sunday, April 10th, 2022

Total Miles covered for the day: 8.0

Location 1: The western third of the Kewaunee River Segment, between Clyde Hill Road and the west trailhead on Sunset Road

4.5 miles of trail covered

It's Sunday, and yesterday was a really long hiking day with lots of miles covered, but today feels very much like the beginning of the week, rather than the end. Mostly because it is. This is the first day of eight consecutive days of SnOTT Hikes, during which time we hope to cover a large part of the nearly 100 miles we have left out here. With 10.7 miles completed yesterday, we're feeling optimistic. 

Especially since we had such a great place to stay. The location wasn't absolutely perfect, being all the way down in Mishicot, but the accommodations were phenomenal. My older sibling, Beth, owns a timeshare condo that happens to be in Mishicot at the golf course. Seeing that she was unable to use the condo this year she offered it to us, and what we got was a two bedroom suite with a large kitchen and living room to boot. We would be meeting up with Jan Hincapie later today, and she and another hiker would be sharing the condo with us, taking up residence in the other bedroom. 

Today the plan was to meet up with the other Snail Hikers at the north trailhead of the Kewaunee River Segment, located on Sunset Road, then shuttle people around as needed before dong our typical short hike. The groups broke up into the 4-milers (us), the 6-milers (those doing half the segment), and the 12-milers (those doing the whole segment). 

Meeting time was 10:00 am, and it was 41 degrees and sunny. We were delighted to see eleven people waiting for us when we arrived. We handed out patches to those who needed them, and took the obligatory group photos. 

Though it was on the cool side, you could see from everyone's mid-weight attire that we were all looking forward to a beautiful sunny day on the trail. 

Theresa's 'May the chorus be with you' T-Shirt was purchased at one of the interpretive centers. 

As it turns out, Theresa and I were the only ones doing the four and a half mile short hike. This did not come as a surprise. Rather than breaking up the hike into shorter parts and leapfrogging our way, we decided to uncharacteristically head to the place we left off yesterday and do the whole 4.5 miles in one go. So we found ourselves at the Clyde Hill Road tunnel, once again ready to take on the Kewaunee River bike path. 

We started hiking at 10:25, and the temperature was right at 41 degrees with the sun shining merrily. There was hardly a cloud in the sky today, and it really made for a tough decision on what clothing to wear.

In short order it became apparent that even the small number of layers I had chosen was too many, and I had to shuck a couple as I hiked. 

The foliage along the edge of the trail is consistent and not overly pretty. There's lots of honeysuckle, sumac, cherry, green ash, cedar, birch, and a whole bunch of scrubby little things I haven't identified yet. Standing water on both sides of the trail make for a lot of cattails and green slimy mucky stuff.

On the east side of the trail we saw raw cut rock whenever the railroad bed cut through the close hillside. Looking at those exposed rock layers you can see that what's there is flat pancake limestone rocks that look and act almost like shale. And, occasionally, these made for charming small waterfalls, the trickle of spring melt making its way to the Kewaunee River not far to our left. 

As with the other pieces of this segment we've been on, there are essentially no yellow blazes. It's disappointing, because you have to know - KNOW - that you're in the right place. If you are walking through here hoping to see yellow blazes, you will be sadly disappointed.

At the tippy top of the trail, as it bends south and heads towards County Road C, there's a nice bench and an easy way to get down to the water's edge. 

I went down to the water's edge, to stand atop the exposed rock surface and watch the water rushing merrily on its way to Lake Michigan.

I took a picture in this spot, because it was literally the first blaze I remembered seeing so far today.  

Here, I also saw more of the wet, mucky green slimy areas that would be spectacular incubators for frogs, dragonflies, and yes, mosquitoes, as the weather continued to warm. 

I had been traveling with a small moose-bear companion, intent on dropping him off on one of the geocaches along the trail. I was disappointed to find that one of them had been washed away with the spring floods, but we found another one that was suitable. Good-bye, little red Love-bear-moose thing!

At the place where the trail crosses the Kewaunee River, there is a large bridge, and to the south a mowed area that looked like a great camping spot. Unfortunately, it's private land, and I'm sure the signs down there make it off limits to anyone but the geese who were hanging around down there. 

After crossing the bridge, we came out into the open, where we stayed for a long time. 

In one of the trees we saw this large, hanging bird's nest. I have not been able to identify the species, but there is a possibility that this is an unusually large Baltimore Oriole's nest. 

When we approached County Road A, I spotted to the left of the trail a very large tree in the Populus genus. It was either a very unusually shaped and placed cottonwood tree (very likely) or the biggest aspen tree I had ever seen in my life. I believed at the time that this was indeed a trembling aspen, and I made my way down the hill to be photographed next to the trunk. 

I took the opportunity to look up the state record for the largest known Aspen tree. If this is a quaking aspen rather than a cottonwood, it would be a state record. By a lot. I submitted the paperwork. Who knows? Maybe I found the biggest one in the state.

We eventually reached Sunset Road at 1:12 pm. Neither the six-milers nor the 12-milers had caught up to us today, a genuine surprise. 

But, when we went to pick up the car at Clyde Hill Road we saw the 12-milers just north of where we started. We honked the horn and waved, and they waved back. 

It was still early and we were feeling ambitious, so we took both cars and headed north to the Forestville Segment. Like yesterday, where we knocked off the middle third of the Kewaunee River Segment so as to make our other hikes easier, we wanted to hike off the middle third of the Forestville segment. 

Location 2: The middle third of the Forestville Segment, between the Forestville Dam parking area and the Blahnik County Park parking area

3.5 miles of trail covered

It was a bit of a drive to get to the Forestville Segment, but not too far. We decided it would be best to hike north to south, so we dropped off a car at the Blahnik County Park parking area and made our way north to the Forestville Dam parking area. Both were large, with restroom accommodations to boot. 

Before starting south I decided to walk over and admire the Forestville Dam, and I have to say it's quite a structure. 

I find water mesmerizing, especially when its moving. Add to that the geometry and symmetry of the dam and the ingenious way it allows so much water to flow through such a small span, while still preventing large fish from being drawn through with the current made for a fascinating short study of the place. 

The time was 2:30 pm, and the temperature had risen to 47 degrees, but the cloud cover was now almost complete and the sun only a distant memory. The chill wind caught us square in the face as we were hiking south. 

This portion of the Ice Age Trail follows the Ahnapee River on the Ahnapee Bike Trail. In that regard it is almost exactly like the Kewaunee River Segment to the south. It is flat, fairly straight, and makes for an easy stroll through the woods. 

I asked several locals, and 'Ahnapee' is pronounced like the word 'honesty'. The first two syllables are stressed slightly, and the last syllable just fades away. 

I found the interpretive signs along the trail to be interesting and educational. This one, for example, talks about the continuous problems faced by the A&W Rail Line due to the harsh Wisconsin winters and the cranberry marsh we were walking through. Because of each, trains were frequently delayed or even derailed, and stranded passengers had to pass the time playing Sheepshead. 

Below are a couple shots of the cranberry bogs.

There she is! You can tell how windy it is, because at 47 degrees she would normally just be in a t-shirt. 

Many people don't realize that as aspen trees grow, they switch from bark that has lines wrapping around the tree to deep gouges that run up and down the trunk. Here is one tree beginning that transition. Eventually the whole trunk will look like the smaller gray area. 

We were feeling pretty cold when we reached the bridge that crossed the Ahnapee River, but there were two people there fishing when we arrived. They had landed a fairly good sized brown trout, in the 10 to 12 pound category. I was not aware that you could fish and keep trout this early in the year, but apparently the regulations have changed since I last cared about such things. I looked it up and early trout season started on January 1 in selected waterways, and this must have been one of them. These weren't the only fishermen we spotted that day. Oh - it was the woman who caught the trout, not her boyfriend. They told us it was her first fish ever. 

Nice.

Where there is no dirt, they brought in crushed white stone to pave the way. 

And off to the side, we kept running into hints of the boggy spots left behind by the snow melt and spring weather. 

The trail was level and flat as only an old railroad bed can be, but surprisingly we encountered very little standing water. Even so, there were places where the water ran over the top of the trail as it made its way to Lake Michigan, and there were a few scars left in the trail from the gouged waterway. It made no challenge hiking, but they could have been a little surprising on a bicycle. 

As we made our way through the last of the swampy area we ended up chasing two geese down the trail for nearly two tenths of a mile. We walked - they walked. And they wouldn't step aside. Fully aware of how fierce an angry cob can become we chose not to try and chase them off. They just became rather funny-looking mascots who escorted us down the trail for a while. 

Eventually they did peel off to the side to let us by. Judging from all the goose grease we found on this part of the trail I'd say they spend most of their time sitting up on that tiny hill that runs through their marsh. 

Past the marsh things started getting woody again. 

And there were more interpretive signs. This one told us that rather than throwing away or salvaging the giant steam boilers that existed on the old wheezy locomotives, the boilers were repurposed into culverts to allow water to flow freely underneath the trail. 

Well, son of a gun. Train parts. 

Sometimes we just stop and enjoy the beauty of a place. 

Rabbit ears don't work from behind. 

And on the far side of this lovely stretch of evergreens was Blahnik Park and our waiting car. 

It was 4:35 pm, and though we could probably have hiked some more we decided to call it quits and head back for the Condo in Mishicot. We had a lot of hiking to do over the next week or so, and there was no sense overdoing it this early. 

Running Total: 1053.9 miles of trail covered, 151.2 miles 'extra' hiking/biking. End of Day 156.

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