11 Things I Wish I Knew Before I came to Isle Royale

1. All the campsites have latrines, usually stocked with toilet paper. You don't need to bring a whole lot of paper unless you plan to poop between campsites.

2. If you go in the spring bring double the number of socks you think you need. Your feet WILL get wet and muddy.

3. Don't bother trying to avoid mud...it makes your hike much longer and more difficult.  If you hike straight through the mud, things are much easier. (Although your feet are much wetter...see #2)

4. Bring camp shoes so your feet can dry out at night! This was in the recommended list but we didn't listen. Oops!

5. M&M's are worth their weight in gold.  Take at least one pack for each day because those "energy pills" get you through the tough hikes.

6. Most campsites have shelters which is much easier than setting up a tent every night.  But a tent is good to have for the few campsites that don't have shelters! (East/West Chickenbone, and I'm sure there are others.)

7. Don't filter water in the dark the first time you do it.  You won't know if it's brown! (Ours was!)

8. Build up your fitness so you can carry a little extra weight.  Extra items (like M&M's, dry socks, Gatorade powder packets, etc.) will make your hike much more enjoyable!

9. Stay away from a female moose if she has a calf. (Gavin's advice - this didn't actually happen to us.)

10. Make sure you bring a weather radio that has enough power to receive signals and doesn't run out of batteries before the end of the week! (Again, oops!)

11. Be sure to add enough "no hike" days to truly enjoy the scenery and nature that Isle Royale has to offer.

June 22, Isle Royale to Houghton to Glen Arbor

Nothing too exciting about this day. We were nervous we would oversleep and miss the boat but Victor's watch and phone managed to have enough "juice" to last through the night and wake us up in time for the boat.  In fact, we were the first ones there.  Not very Alvarez-ish!

Before boarding the boat, we asked the rangers about Lillia's eye.  She had been bit by what we believe was a black fly, right on her eyelid.  They assured us it's nothing to worry about and the swelling will eventually go down.  But for now, she looks like she was punched in the face!


We had an uneventful 6 hour boat ride on the Ranger III back to Houghton, MI. When we arrived, the kids played on a ginormous slide while we packed up our rented camping equipment to send back to Outdoors Geek.

We stopped at the Shipping Shop to mail our box back to Colorado and then we hopped in the car with the Homestead Lodge (in Glen Arbor) as our destination. At 1am, we pulled into the hotel and were thrilled to be sleeping in a real bed for the first time since last week!

June 21: Foods we miss

Sister Shubert's dinner rolls

Beef jerky

Pretzels

Pizza

Baked Ruffles

Ice cream

Popcorn

Fruits and Veggies 

Smoothies

Non-freeze dried food

Gogurts

Pirates booty

Fruit crisps from Nana and Pap 

Waffles

Spaghetti

Pancakes

Jubilee jumbles (cookies)

Fast food

Easy elegant

Stir fry

Tacos

Pretzels and applesauce

Steak

Chicken nuggets

June 21, Three Mile to Rock Harbor

Victor and Jared woke early this morning to hustle into Rock Harbor and reserve a shelter for us. Meanwhile the rest of us packed up camp and got ready to hike our last 2.7 miles. (it's not quite 3, despite the name!) While packing up we had a fox wander into our campsite. I couldn't find my camera in time before some other campers scared it off. When we were packed up I tried to use the radios we had taken to reach Victor but I wasn't able to reach him. So Alisia, Lillia, Gavin and I headed off on the trail in hopes that they had a good shelter for us. Lillia couldn't stop talking about the pretzels she was about to eat!

Some wildlife along the way:


On our hike, a bird was singing a beautiful tune and Alisia echoed it by whistling. They went back and forth about 10 times "talking" to each other! (It's a bumpy video because I was trying to catch up to my speedy kids!)

I told the kids that I had this vision of daddy and Jared driving up on a boat with a pizza in their hands. Not two minutes later, we spotted a boat. Next thing we hear "Lillia! I've got pretzels!"

Victor and Jared had rented a motorboat and came back to pick us up!!! We had already hiked 0.6 miles but we gladly turned around to head back to the dock at the Three Mile Campground so they could pick us up. The scene was reminiscent of the rescue boat on Naked and Afraid.





Victor had bought pretzels, beef jerky and Oreos for us to share. The kids were beyond excited!!

Since we had the boat for half the day, we headed to Edison Island to explore an old fish hatchery Here is where they dried their nets:

Then we climbed up the Rock Harbor Lighthouse. Here is the panoramic view from the top:

Before leaving, we decided to hike about a half mile to the Wolves and Moose of Isle Royale headquarters where we saw some pretty cool moose antlers and other bones. 

Then we piled back in the boat for the easy drive back to Rock Harbor. Check out Jared's sweet scratch from one of our hikes!


On our way back the Ranger III pulled out of Mott Island and we had to race it back to Rock Harbor so it didn't run us over!

WE MADE IT!!!!


We actually weren't as tired as we look in that picture...we were mostly proud and excited about the real food we were about to eat! (Jazz hands!!!)

I didn't get a picture because it was a bit of a hike away from our shelter and I hadn't taken my camera, but the three youngest kids set up a shoe cleaning station where they thoroughly washed mud out of everyone's shoes (for a fee, of course!) Jared wasn't there because he was off on a trail run to try and find his favorite hat that he lost earlier that morning. (No luck.)

Here we are walking along Rock Harbor eating ice cream we just bought at the local store and looking forward to buying some pizza at the restaurant. (Note the bag of pretzels in Lillia's hand...that's the second bag!)

We bought some souvenirs and headed back to our shelter for one last sleep in the wild. (We did price the hotel but for $385, we thought the shelter sounded just fine!) Just before reaching our shelter, Lillia spotted a fox. 

We happily paid $6 for a 5 minute shower and cleaned ourselves off as best we could in such a short time!  Then Alisia decided she would pretend she was Ariel to comb her hair since we hadn't brought a brush along.

Lillia and Gavin had a fun time playing with their new toy from the souvenir shop:

One more sleep until the boat ride back to civilization!

June 20, East Chickenbone to Three Mile

We were very thankful that AJ had suggested bringing contractors garbage bags along with us. Our tents were small and we couldn't fit us plus all the gear inside so we had put our backpacks under the rain tent but wrapped inside the contractors bags. At one point Victor told me (ok, screamed at me since we couldn't hear each other despite sitting about 4 feet away from each other!) to look outside. There was at least an inch of water and our shoes were floating around outside of our tent! But our contractors bags were keeping our packs dry!



And, thankfully, our tents that we rented from Outdoors Geek were also keeping us dry. (I thought I had a leak in the corner but then I realized that one of my water bladders was leaking!!)

By the time we woke up, the skies were a gorgeous blue and we had a beautiful day ahead of us. The kids were insistent that we hike 10.1 miles to Three Mile campground so that we would be close to Rock Harbor and closer to real food! I was skeptical that we could do it and kept trying to talk them out of it! But they set a quick pace and off we went. (Starting around 2pm--we aren't early morning hikers!!!)

After 4.2 miles, we had to make a decision to continue to Three Mile or turn to go a shorter route to Daisy Farm. Of course, the kids were ONLY going to go to Three Mile! So off we hiked, along the Greenstone Ridge. Victor's famous comment that he repeated all week long told us "it should be pretty flat". It wasn't flat, but it wasn't too bad compared to some of our other hikes. 

We stopped at Mount Ojibway, a tower on the highest point of the island, to enjoy the views and cook some dinner. It was windy but beautiful! The kids got nervous as they climbed up the metal stairs because the wind was whipping around! They all managed to enjoy the views for a few minutes before heading back down. (Can you see them on the tower steps?)

After a quick dinner (as quick as freeze dried food can be!), we took off along the remainder of the Greenstone Ridge Trail to try and make it to Three Mile before sundown (10pm).

About a mile in, we came across a felled tree that we had to climb over. It looked pretty fresh and we think it might have fallen the night before during the storm. Then we came to another tree...and another...we had to climb over SEVEN trees that had fallen across the path! That was one of the most challenging sections of the hike! We thanked God that trees fell here and not at our campground last night!! 

After navigating through the trees, we came to a pretty flat stretch of trail. Here is where we saw the sight that made the whole entire trip worthwhile:

A moose!! A male with huge antlers who was grazing on the path in front of us. We even got to see him poop (a highlight for the kids)! And that cleared up some of our misconceptions about the scat we had passed on our earlier hikes! 

The final peak we came across was Mount Franklin. Again, we were thankful for AJ's suggestion to bring along M&M's. These gave the kids fuel when they were beat and run down. That plus the Gatorade packs we brought along were crucial during these difficult climbs!  At Mount Franklin we took a short break to enjoy the views and Lillia pretended to hold the lion cub over the land while singing the Lion King song. 

Mount Franklin afforded a gorgeous view of Canada to the north and Michigan to the south. This was our final peak before heading downhill toward the campground. 

On our way down we passed a beaver home...

...and then the Beavers Dam. This was larger than I imagined! 

We made good time on the last part of our hike and arrived at camp around 9pm.



We snagged the last shelter at the site and set up camp. The girls and I went to fetch water for dinner and try to clean our legs off. Lake Superior's water was FREEZING! We managed to clean our legs and feet as best we could which felt pretty good after all the mud we had splashed through during the last two days!

We ate a late dinner and headed to sleep, excited for the real food we expect to eat tomorrow!!

June 19, Moskey Basin to East Chickenbone

When we woke up this morning, Alisia realized that it was Father's Day so we sang happy Father's Day to Victor to celebrate. Unfortunately his gift was too large to bring along on the trip so he will have to wait until we are off the island.

We saw some baby loons swim by as we were eating our breakfast:

We started off on our journey much earlier today at around 12:30. We are such morning people!! We prepped ourselves for the rain that was forecast (check out Alisia's awesome getup!), but it held off until later that night.

A man at Moskey Basin had warned us of the mud in the direction we were heading, but we quickly realized that the mud was nothing compared to our hikes thus far! We made it to Lake Ritchie pretty quickly and took a nice long lunch break along with some fishing. (Check out the size of that HUGE fish!)

I finally found the food Gavin loves: plain chicken plus ketchup! I'm so glad I found ketchup packets at the hotel we stayed in before our trip!!

We packed up and continued on our hike to East Chickenbone. This was a mostly uphill journey that was extremely difficult! I think I was the one holding up the group today! Victor carried Gavin's pack again for some of the way. I offered Lillia but she is adamant that she wants to leave the island proud of the fact that she held her backpack for the entire trek! We are more than halfway so I think she will make it! Here are some hiking pictures:

Holland clogs flowers:

Upside down flowers:

Catching butterflies:

Break at West Chickenbone to fill up our water and play mancala:

When we arrived at East Chickenbone, I dug a hole for Lillia. She was very excited not to go in the latrine and had the best view around for doing her business! 

Gavin got the spa treatment while I tried to wash off his filthy legs:

Gavin loves to enjoy the scenery:

Filtering water for our dinner:

We started setting up the tent and making dinner until we realized it was about to storm! Victor and Jared worked hard to finish staking tents and the rest of us threw everything into the tents. It turns out that the storm held off until we were completely set up. Thank you, God!! 

I'm sitting here inside the tent cuddling with the boys while the girls and Victor are next door in the tent. The lightning is extremely bright and, Gavin would say, scary! Gavin keeps saying "I'm too young to die!" as he recites Hail Marys! Hopefully we will get some sleep tonight! 

This is definitely an adventure! I've never camped in the rain before!!

A little back scratching finally got Gavin to sleep:

Now for the rest of us...