Day 200: John Muir Park Segment, Connecting Route, Marquette County

Day 200: Sunday, June 26th, 2022

Total Miles hiked for the day: 10.8; Net Miles 0.4 

"How long did it take you to walk that far?" We hear that question a lot. When we tell people we have walked over 1000 miles on the Ice Age Trail, they want to know how long it took. When we tell them we did most of it over the last 15 months they are awed. And yet, when you go back and look at the numbers, it's not all that impressive.

We have been out hiking a total of 188 different days on the trail, including today. Twelve of our 200 days have been biking-only, so I'm not including those for this count. That means we have averaged a little over 5.6 miles of hiking per day. The most impressive part of that is that we've done 147 of those days over the last 15 months. It's the persistence, not the distance, that makes people amazed.  

Location 1: The new portion of the John Muir Park Segment north of the old loop trail. 

0.4 Miles of trail covered

Our furthest point remaining on the trail, made even more remote by where we have been hiking over the last three days, was the John Muir Park Segment. We had hiked this section in its entirety back in 2013, but since that time they shut down two tenths of a mile off of the loop trail and added four tenths of a mile on the north, extending the trail to the road. While we technically wouldn't have had to walk that new 0.4 miles to count towards our thousand-miler status, that would have meant walking 0.5 miles along the road instead, and that just didn't make any sense at all. So we chose instead to do a short crisscross hike, walking the 0.4 miles of new trail and the 0.2 miles of blue spur that got us out there. 

I started from the park, and Theresa drove to the end and hiked south. I decided to grab a few shots at the Kiosk before I got started. 

I started walking at about 12:55 pm. This was the first piece of actual footpath I had walked on since May 22nd in St. Croix Falls, and that was 194 miles ago. My feet were practically singing as I danced down the trail. 

The skies were blue, the clouds were a puffy white, and the earth was green. It was a warm and breezy summer day. What more could an IAT hiker ask for? No wonder John Muir loved these hills. 

All too soon I reached the end, where there was more signage next to the protected ruins of an old farmstead. 

I would have stayed longer, but we had many miles to hike. 

Location 2: The Connecting Route north of the John Muir Park Segment to the intersection of Fawn Court and 9th Avenue 

10.4 Miles of trail covered

After picking up Theresa and getting dropped off again at the parking area with the kiosk and ruins, I started walking north, and quickly encountered this snapping turtle in the middle of the road. 

She wasn't moving, and she was just over a hill, so I did what I could to help her cross the road. Let's just say that with the assistance of a stick and a scare that left me feeling happy to still have all ten fingers I managed to encourage her to leave the pavement. 

Next time I'm going to get a bigger stick. 

I took several photos as I walked. I'll let most of them speak for themselves. 

Standing by this field I was mesmerized by the way the wind was blowing through the grasses. I tried to take a video but couldn't quite capture the moment. 

So I tried taking another video, and this time what I got was something showing just how fast the clouds were moving that day. 

The route was actually quite hilly, though they were relatively low hills, one as high as 40 feet.  

We followed the recommended path north past Gem Avenue, then off of map 56 on 10th Road. But when we got to Gale Avenue we decide to take a different route. 

The official recommended connecting route goes an entirely different way now than it did when we came through in 2013. So instead of turning east at Gale Avenue and trundling off obediently to Montello, which would have added five miles to our trip, we chose instead to take the old route leading to... 

Keeping in mind that Theresa and I were crisscrossing our way along the road in 1- to 2-mile chunks, I keep writing as though this was continuous, which it was not. It's just too tiresome to keep talking about all the stops and starts along the way. 

Instead of turning east at Gale Ave and heading off to Montello, we continued north on 10th Road, turning left at County Hwy D. That's where we saw the sign above. Yet it was still quite a ways from the Fox River, which we still had to cross. 

It was a 70 foot climb on Hwy D, which had a little traffic but not too much, before dropping 100 feet in elevation to the water's edge. 

A gentleman pulled over when he saw me walking this way, and he told me about his current involvement in the land conservation effort for the trail. I wish I remembered more about what he was telling me. Apparently there are long-range plans to add trail in the Page Creek Marsh State Natural Area, or at least that's in the discussion stages. What that would to to the direction of the Connecting Route, I'm not sure. 

He's now a Snail. 

The crossing of the Fox River, wide enough here to also be known as Buffalo Lake, is accomplished by way of a causeway, whose first iteration was built in the 1850s. 

The causeway is wide enough today to allow for parking on both sides of the road, and people take advantage of that, often coming out to go fishing along the edge. 

The old route through Packwaukee headed north and east through town, headed to County Road C, which turns into ZZ and then 9th Ave. We passed this charming fellow on our way through town. You can't really tell from the photo, but this guy stands about 10 feet tall. 

Another turtle, on the way to Lake Emery. 

Apparently the people of Emerald Lake Estates  on Lake Emery are opposed to someone starting an Airbnb there. 

By the time we crossed Hwy 23 we had about two more miles to go to get to our end point for the day. 

We could have saved even more miles by walking out of Packwaukee on Liberty Street and walking the rest of the way to Westfield on County Road M, but that way was really, really busy, so we opted for the safer route. 

We reached the intersection of Fawn Court and 9th Avenue at 6:30 pm, which was the end of our hiking day. Nearly eleven miles was plenty. 

According to Theresa's schedule, we have ten hikes to go. Ten more times to go scurrying off after work or on the weekend to walk a few more miles. Ten more road trips, plus the one at the very end. Ten more days of pounding down the roads, step after step, ignoring the blisters and bugs. Ten more opportunities to meet new people and give away Snail patches. Ten more hikes until the last day - the last hike - the big finish line. Just ten more hikes. 

The tally:

• 1 new Snail today
• Completed the John Muir Park Segment (again)
• Completed maps 55 and 56
• Converted 10.4 miles of biking to the 'hiked' category
• 75.4 miles to go. 

Running Total: 1212.6 miles of trail covered (1061.6 hiked), 357.0 miles 'extra' hiking/biking. End of Day 200.

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