Along the East Chickenbone Trail: A well-built bridge headed uphill towards the escarpment. See the millions of mosquitoes? Probably not. I took this photo from inside my mosquito netting.

“Ow-woo-oo, ow-woo-oo” A wolf’s howl echoes across the clear water of McCargo Cove as I rise at dawn, looking across this finger of Lake Superior from the cozy comfort of my camping shelter. When I arrived by water taxi the day before, I had time to explore an abandoned 1800s copper mine before cooking dinner and watching beavers swim across the placid waters. As the sun began to fade, a moose strode into the shallows, browsing aquatic plants. Loons set up a cacophonous symphony. If it weren’t for the mosquitoes, rivaling quantities seen on a summer’s day in the Everglades, I might have stayed up later for the parade of wildlife. But I was glad for shelter away from their buzz.

My backpacking trip was the first solo I’d done in nearly a decade, and it only took a few hours to remember why I haven’t soloed since. I missed the company. Sure, there were other hikers at the campground, but we didn’t connect over dinner, didn’;t share much time. The moose was the only moment to bring us together. Cooking dinner from behind my bug net, I envied my fellow writers back at the lodge.

Ninety-five percent of visitors to Isle Royale National Park are backpackers in search of solitude, and given less people visit this 45-mile-long island in Lake Superior each season than go to Yellowstone in a day, they find it. Most folks head straight for a primitive campground such as Moskey Basin or Daisy Farm and stake a claim on a shelter for a night or two: the view is worth so much more than the $4 per day park use fee, and you can day hike a loop or two out of most of the campsites.
Words can’t do it justice. It takes a slide show to showcase what wilderness hiking on this arboreal island is all about. I saw several species of orchids, especially the yellow lady slippers, nodding beneath the ferns. Birchs stood sentinel above the well-trodden track. Mosses and lichens covered the rocks and tree trunks. I heard several moose, and saw two. Dropping down off the escarpment, I walked while lulled by the gentle lap of Lake Superior against basalt.

Had I not gone solo, perhaps I would have played another day. But cold rain soaked me to the skin as I clambered across slick basalt boulders, and I fell and hurt my knee. Alone, it was frightening. I pressed on, reaching each campsite and making a decision to keep hiking, remembering the key buried in my pack. I had a carrot at trail’s end: a room at the Rock Harbor Lodge. Tucked away in a cove along the southeastern shore, Rock Harbor is the island’s hub. Here, ferryboats dock, tour boats depart, kayakers launch, camping supplies are sold, and hot meals served. After 15 miles crossing slick rocks and rugged (for this Florida hiker) terrain, half of it in the rain, I was thankful for the steak dinner and hot bath at trail’s end.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 15th, 2006 at 9:30 am and is filed under Diversions. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.