altad jeepsta 2009

  In early summer Gerk asked if I had some extra vacation time available. He had some extra time and wanted to know if I wanted to go to Boundary Waters up on the Minnesota border. I said I would love to go there but didn't think I had a whole week available. So we decided on a long weekend.

Thinking of a place a bit closer I looked at Michigan, and then the Upper Peninsula. Big Island Lake Wilderness looked good on the map. West of the great Seney Wildlife Refuge, the wilderness area is about half way between lakes Michigan and Superior. It was actually everything I was looking for. The place is surrounded by forest and marsh, deep in the Hiawatha National Forest. No motorized craft are allowed in the wilderness, and in fact, nothing at all with a wheel. Four feet of winter snow pack feed the twenty-three lakes of Big Island, nine of them connected by portage trails. A thick second-growth of hemlock, spruce, paper birch, aspen and tamarack cover the low hills. Whether on the land or in the lake, plants cover everything.