Category Archives: -Jon Reed

Hiking Isle Royale

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 My father, brother, and I climbed Isle Royale’s 1,394-foot Mount Desor in June of 1959 in the process of hiking the island’s length. That first night, we were half-sleep in a three-sided lean-to with distant flashes of lightning reflecting off a dark, wind-rippled lake. A sudden storm was sweeping in and the loon calls were eerily sorrowful. An eight-foot moose waded offshore, almost invisible in deepening dusk. Quiet campfire flames had died to glowing embers as I drifted off thinking about the day. 

Earlier that afternoon, atop the island’s highest mountain, I could see Canada fifteen miles away in the distance across Lake Superior. We were exhausted and soaked to the skin, having hiked and climbed five hours through rain from Windigo Bay on the island’s western tip. I had never gazed across such a great distance. This was my first mountain hike into primitive wilderness on hallowed ground only Native Americans and fur-traders once traversed. There were no humans for miles. We had been told to avoid a pack of fifty wolves and several-hundred moose roaming about, but how one does this was never clear. 

My father was rummaging in a backpack, my brother and I crouching with aching limbs, out of breath, facing opposite directions. I had never heard Dave so deeply tired exclaim, “Hey, you won’t believe this, but there’s a coyote or fox, or maybe a wolf-pup, staring at us only twenty yards away. Take a look.” I was too worn out to turn around. Wolves had crossed from Canada on an ice sheet years earlier. We weren’t in a hurry to come upon wolves, or moose, armed with only jack knives. But a wolf pup might belong to a wolf pack. I finally turned around to see what it looked like, but it was gone. 

Unclipping a canteen of water purified with Halizone, I took a gulp, forgetting I had also added a fizzy grape-flavored Kool-Aid tablet to kill its taste. The result was something between grape juice and battery acid. I poured a bit into a cupped hand, discovering flakes of metal. Either the Kool-Aid tablet or the Halizone was corroding the inside of the metal canteen, but I needed water and didn’t care right then. 

After Boy Scout camping, hiking the length of Isle Royale was a real challenge. We planned to traverse its 55 mile length on the Greenstone Ridge Trail in five days, the same distance south to the Keweenaw Peninsula across Lake Superior. Two days before, we had departed Copper Harbor crossing the world’s third-largest fresh water lake that would later sink the ore-freighter Edmund Fitzgerald. But we were on a 40-foot under-powered launch unimaginatively named the Isle Royale. A five-hour rolling ride had us sea-sick long before the island’s eastern end at Rock Harbor. 

After setting up base camp and boarding a daily launch to the island’s west end, we headed up the trail planning to descend each night to a shelter at a remote lake. We left Windigo Bay with full canteens, but they were empty by mid-morning. Personal water-filtration systems had yet to be invented, so we planned to boil our water each night. By that first mid-morning, we gave up and simply filtered stream water through a handkerchief before adding more tablets of Halizone. Although Giardia Lambia intestinal parasites must have been in the water, they were unknown at the time. So, fortunately, none of us became ill. To carry less food and reduce pack weight, we planned to fish for dinner so our packs were heaviest before we began using canned food. Climbing Mount Desor with 65-pound loads on our backs didn’t begin well, plagued as we were by a fine drizzle and swarms of blood-sucking black flies. We hadn’t planned on a muddy trail and poor footing, trying to ascend a mountain before mid-day. We thought we had conditioned ourselves, weeks before, by carrying fifty pounds of boulders in backpacks around the neighborhood but, no, we were woefully out of shape. 

Two hours before Desor’s summit, still carrying our heaviest loads, my father came upon a moose antler on the ground, a perfect hiking memento. To our astonishment, he decided to carry the extra weight and hang it on his office wall. The black flies were driving us mad, circling just out of reach before alighting and drawing quick bites. Blood was running down our faces despite spraying ourselves with ineffectual Citronella bug spray. That was before we donned last-resort beekeeper’s hats and tried to protect our hands with gloves. 

Skidding on a slippery trail for hours in rain and growing darkness, a twisted ankle or broken leg would have been disastrous. We were days from help if we mishandled a knife or hatchet, much less burned ourselves in a campfire. We might apply a tourniquet or bind a cut before dragging someone out, but no one was coming to help. Cell phones hadn’t been invented and there was no way of sending messages. Boy Scout training never included Indian smoke signals, and there was no one around to read them anyway. The nearest a seaplane could land was Windigo Bay, weather permitting, and that wasn’t going to happen unless my father had a heart attack, in which case it would be too late. 

We were on our own now, in the first bug-infested three-sided lean-to by Lake Chicken Bone. It wasn’t all that inviting with a leaky roof and muddy dirt floor. Too dog-tired to care, we needed food and warmth, but had outsmarted ourselves with only a few cans of food to eat. We couldn’t fish for dinner because the shoreline was overhung with underbrush. By minimizing pack loads and bringing only canned food, we couldn’t start a fire anyway with wet firewood to cook nonexistent fish. Without a campfire, our father lit a tiny camp stove with heat pellets, and boiled life-restoring, dried-package chicken noodle soup. That was before everyone realized, all too quickly, soup made with Halizone-laced water leaves something to be desired. 

1930’s Civilian Conservation Corp’s boys hadn’t put much effort into Isle Royale’s three-sided lean-to construction. We spread our sleeping bags on dirt, thankful it wasn’t muddier. In the 30’s, there were only a few depression-era hikers to stay in such a jerry-built construction. Besides, there wouldn’t be anybody to complain to three decades later. Our father apportioned out our chicken-Halizone water soup and we were ready to slide into sleeping bags when a Tarantula-like spider appeared atop mine. It was hairy brown with shiny black eyes and totally unafraid. I was readying a knife attack when my father simply shooed it away. I immediately fell asleep despite knowing it might well climb inside sometime in the night. 

We awoke the following morning to more loons calling across the water and no sign of moose or hairy spiders. Scrambling into bright sunlight, we breakfasted on dry cereal and canned orange juice without bothering with a morning fire. Wanting to hit the trail for a long day ahead, we shouldered backpacks and left to ascend Mount Desor once more and gain the Greenstone Ridge. 

The path runs the length of the heavily-forested island and, from Desor’s summit, appears to be the spine of a long green animal basking in a cold blue expanse of Lake Superior.

We had been looking for semi-precious greenstones, found in only two places on the globe, Isle Royale and 180 degrees away on the globe in South Africa, but found, instead, a field of wild strawberries and feasted on them for lunch. 

Our day ended at a second lake-side lean-to and another fight with wolf spiders. This second batch were more determined to stay comfortably dry inside the lean-to, apparently thinking it belonged to them and not itinerant hikers. However, we weren’t putting up with any spider-nonsense and attacked them with sticks and knives while they scurried about. Too late to fish, we used more precious canned goods; Spam, peaches, and baked beans. 

At the end of the third day, more than 30 miles northeast of Windigo Bay, we finally caught three pickerel for dinner. Slipping them on a stringer to stay fresh, we lit a campfire to fry them. No sooner had we turned our backs than seagulls swooped down for their share. We chased them off with more sticks, before dining on a great dinner of fresh pickerel. That night, there was another moose wading offshore in purple twilight. Although we had been taking pains to hang our backpacks on overhead branches so they wouldn’t attract animals, my brother somehow left his atop a picnic table this time instead of overhead on a tree branch. When we were fast asleep, campfire long dead, a fox tore into his pack and ate everything foxes like. Dave’s candy bars must have attracted it but, with all of Dave’s food gone, the next few days meant a reduced diet for everyone. 

We finally finished the fifty-mile, five-day adventure trek to Rock Harbor, having learned how little we knew about wilderness hiking. Anything more challenging would need better planning.

 

 

 

Mount Adams

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Crouched in a blinding sleet storm on Mount Adam’s summit, I was alone and numb all over. Stranded in howling mist and 50 mph winds, it was early afternoon on what was supposed to have been a normal tranquil June day in 1989. Any thoughts of a view south 3,000 feet above the Great Gulf to Mount Washington four miles away were gone. I could barely make out a weather-battered wooden sign a few feet away in a greenish-black maelstrom. Huddled back to the storm on a tiny summit, there were only a few boulders for shelter. I was elated to have climbed to the top and worried that no one else was there. Did every other hiker in the White Mountains know something I didn’t? Was this a serious miscalculation? 

Worse, I had lost sight of a four-foot-high rock cairn a little below the summit. It was the only marker showing my way back down, since there was no trail of boot-prints in the rocks at this altitude. I needed to quell a growing sense of unease. If the rock cairn didn’t reappear soon, I was in deep trouble. Having climbed the White Mountains and the Appalachians many years, I was experienced and in good condition, but beginning to realize I might be in over my head. 

Already tired from climbing all morning, the storm was sapping my energy. Even though the wind was blowing ice pellets, I badly needed water, food, and rest to make it back down safely. A sandwich and almost-empty canteen of water was of little help. Yes, I had gained the top, but the rock cairn was the first of many I would have to find while crawling down a massive boulder field in blinding weather. Wandering around Mount Adam’s summit in this storm was inviting death from exposure or a serious fall off a precipice. 

Far below at the trail head, four hours before, the day had been promising with only clouds and spotty afternoon rain. Just an hour ago, I had decided to continue into the growing storm, to be able to say I had climbed Mount Adams rather than simply on it, a now seemingly small distinction. Caught up here, I was barely hanging on, trying to think clearly. How long should I wait for the rock cairn to reappear? I finished the soggy sandwich and took another gulp of water, my hands now too cold to hold the apple in my backpack. Prospects of finding shelter were bleak, but I couldn’t stay where I was. 

A sheltering line of weather-beaten, stunted junipers lay a thousand feet below past the exposed Knife Edge on the Durand Ridge over a mile away. The junipers were gnarled and twisted from a lifetime of constant wind and weather; the last living things at this altitude beside lichen moss. I looked around and couldn’t see any lichen growing on the summit, a sobering thought. I had no way to call or signal for help. Even finding the ridge below would be an iffy proposition if hypothermia set in. The nearest Appalachian Mountain Club shelter was far below and east in a mountain Col of Mount Madison, and there would be little chance of finding it. Without Madison Hut as an alternative, I was left descending in a blinding storm along the Knife Edge. 

With winds increasing, it was difficult seeing anything through my rain-fogged eyeglasses, so I couldn’t make out a compass reading even if I wanted. There was a distinct possibility of never finding my way down, instead laying down in exhaustion to die somewhere under a boulder. Thinking was fuzzier by the minute, disoriented as I was by Adam’s deceiving wind gusts, but an outline of a rock pile appeared a moment in the swirling mist. I scrambled toward it before it disappeared. The next quarter-mile descent would involve crossing a field of slippery boulders, trying to locate more cairns in growing black sleet. Never having been in a mountain storm before, I hadn’t realized rock cairns are silhouetted against lighter sky while climbing but otherwise disappear into a bare stormy mountainside. 

How had I gotten myself into this and would I learn anything if I survived? My wife, Joan, found a Tee-shirt on a Maine vacation that said, “Hiking is Life! The Rest is Just Detail.” I was wearing the now-soaked shirt, but a detail like not risking my life had been forgotten. I was soaked from head to foot despite two supposedly waterproof wind-breakers, one over the other. Special hiking socks were squishy-wet, no longer insulating or protecting against abrasion. Waterproof hiking boots were soggy and chafing; special hiking trousers and underclothes sodden.  

After what seemed like an hour of carefully feeling my way down through the  summit’s boulder field, often losing sight of trail marker rock cairns, I finally found a path below approaching the Knife Edge. The welcoming field of stunted junipers finally appeared, meaning a little more shelter from the driving rain and slashing wind. I crouched out of the maelstrom to take stock, no longer lost but wet, shivering, and beginning to have difficulty walking. 

I still had another three miles and a few thousand feet to descend, almost three hours to the trail head. There was no way to avoid losing my footing on occasion in the rain-swollen stream-bed that had been the rocky Airline trail that morning. Each step became slower, legs and feet afire; a beating they would feel for days. It took more than what I thought would be three hours, and I was dizzy, almost delirious, by the time I reached the trail head parking lot in late afternoon’s drizzling rain. 

I sagged against the car, glancing up a last time. Mount Adam’s summit was now shrouded in a frightening storm, no longer visible. I began unzipping soaked clothes with fumbling fingers before setting the car’s heater to maximum, luxuriating in its warmth. 

The adventure had been both rewarding and dangerous. But, where had I gone over the line; that it was too hazardous to continue? Perhaps it was time to stop solo-climbing, because it wasn’t clear when I should have turned back. I still don’t know how other climbers balance the risk and reward of summiting mountains, but many have died working it out. The question is, will I turn back next time?

Bones

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If you’ve never fractured a bone, you’re either lucky or should work on a more interesting life. Fracturing a bone is more than painful; it’s a frightful experience. My first occurred when I was 17 years-old, delivering a box of frozen deer-carcass chunks from my father to a friend in the neighborhood. Don’t ask. As I turned to leave the porch, I slipped on the icy steps, landing on my left elbow. I cradled my non-functioning, seriously hurting arm to my chest, thankful I hadn’t split my head open instead. Mind and body immediately knew the difference between a really bad sprain and a fracture, and neither the head nor heart was happy about it. 

“Dislocation fracture of left ulna,” read the report from Henry Ford Hospital in downtown Detroit. For those bereft a medical background, that’s a break in the long, elbow-to-wrist forearm bone closest to the body when, in this case, a bloody end doesn’t actually protrude from the body for all to see. A compound fracture would have broken bone fragments lacerate soft tissue and protrude through an open skin wound. Although, in my case, even with no bone sticking out, horrible thought, animal instinct told me I had been badly damaged. 

Yes, it hurt like hell. My arm was instantly numb and out of action, saying, “Don’t even think about touching me or I’ll make you pass out right where you are.” Worse, this fracture had occurred while delivering a box of frozen deer-carcass pieces, not heroically tripping while proceeding down a church aisle carrying a crucifix. The ignominy of it all. Thankfully, hospital reports don’t go into more detail. Think of it, “Dislocation fracture of left ulna while delivering frozen deer-carcass chunks.” 

A broken bone forces an owner to give up all personal preferences and responsibilities to any attending physician willing to see him or her as soon as possible. There’s no arguing with your damaged body. Whatever the doctor wants you to do, you do it; anything for relief. The first trick is to not pass out from shock and pain on the way to the hospital. Once they inhale a lungful of disinfectant aroma, some people, like me, feel queasy and pass out just entering an emergency room to visit the sick. So, in this case, I was in trouble. 

When it’s time to immobilize the limb, you’re usually doped up with so much magic juice you no longer care if the doctor walked down the hall carrying your broken part to show his associates. Various techniques are used. Long ago, a white building-material called plaster of Paris was used to coat the broken limb. The material was named after a gypsum deposit in Montmartre near Paris, France. Medical plaster of Paris is the same plaster used for coating walls and ceilings, but costs thousands more than redoing your kitchen. Mixing dry powder with water creates a gooey paste, and the hardening reaction liberates heat through crystallization. A cheese-cloth bandage impregnated with this stuff is wrapped around the damaged limb and quickly dries into a close-fitting orthopedic cast. The problem is, plaster casts become so hot while solidifying they feel like the doctor has poured lighter fluid in and thrown a match on top. 

Fortunately, Fiberglas epoxy casts have replaced plaster to immobilize broken parts, unless you find yourself in Burkina Faso’s backcountry. Epoxy casts are wrapped around the offending limb just like plaster casts, after the magic juice has taken full effect, hopefully. Just before the process of applying an epoxy cast begins, and you’re doped enough so you don’t know if you’re right-side up or not, someone playfully asks what color you want to live with for several weeks; pink, blue, orange, or green. Such colors are supposed to be cute but, really, who gives a damn except the youngest of children? 

A second fracture occurred in my mid-twenties while finishing off a well-made martini at my parent’s house over the holidays. I reentered a living room filled with relatives and attempted a Charlie Chaplin-ish pirouette, for some reason long forgotten. But Charlie did it better. I tripped, landing in a heap on the floor, fracturing a bone in my right foot. It somehow took the bloom off the occasion. A quick x-ray revealed a mild, non-dislocating fracture that didn’t require a cast but lots of explanations for several weeks. Should I have explained I simply tripped and broke my foot, or admitted to a martini-influenced attempt at a fool-hardy pirouette for which I had no training? The former, by all means. 

A third fracture, this time a right wrist, occurred in my mid-thirties, towing our two small children on a sled across a frozen pond. Is there a pattern here? I was wearing snowmobile boots and couldn’t feel how slippery the pond’s surface was as I tried to spin the sled to give them a thrill ride. An out-of-control flop to the ice broke the wrist, requiring two different casts; the first positioning the wrist upward for two weeks to semi-knit together, and the second bending the wrist down for three more, altogether an even-less-than-fun experience. It seemed I would never be shed of casts. Of course, it was necessary to hand-write a dozen work-related reports the following week, a surprising and unexpected opportunity learning to write left-handed for a while. 

My fourth and hopefully last fracture happened years later in my mid-fifties, slipping on an ice-covered wooden deck leaving for work on a dark and wintery morning. This one occurred too fast to exclaim, “Oh no, not again!” Another inelegant pratfall (are any unexpected falls elegant) broke my left forearm, leaving the arm hanging at a painfully unnatural angle. Ulna or radial bone made no difference, it still hurt. Fortunately, this one was attended to by a doctor who had never seen me before, so he couldn’t exclaim, “Oh no, not you again!” With the new Fiberglass-epoxy casts, nobody could write stupid sayings on it, including myself. 

But my timing wasn’t great. Our daughter had broken her knee in a Canadian skiing accident a week before and couldn’t drive because of her leg cast. I was elected to drive her back and forth to work for several weeks, until she knitted herself together. I suppose we would have made quite a sight if we had been stopped by the police for an infraction; a driver piloting a car with a left arm in a cast accompanied by a passenger-daughter hitched to one side with her right leg in a cast. On the other hand, if we’d been in an accident, at least our limbs were already in casts and protected.

Jury Duty

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 “Jury Summons Notice: You have been selected to serve as a Juror. Failure to report will be considered a criminal offense. Please report on your assigned date.” Receiving a jury notice from a federal court is an occasion for mixed feelings. I was never sure whether my first experience was typical, but it certainly was entertaining. I appeared at Michigan’s 3rd Judicial Circuit Court serving Wayne County and, by mid-morning, seven of us were sworn in to hear a civil suit. Since we weren’t allowed to take notes, we would need to recapture what happened afterward and agree to every detail of several days of testimony, no easy task. Plaintiff was a man in his late thirties suing Coca Cola and a truck driver for running a stop sign and smashing into his car. He hadn’t been injured at the time but, now, seven years later, was claiming his neck hurt and he was suffering from despondency as a result. He seemed listless, sitting with downcast eyes and pitiful expression.

Just as we were beginning to feel sorry for him, the defense revealed Mr. Despondent had since played several seasons of professional European football in the United Kingdom. Uh, oh. I could only wonder whether his neck hurt from soccer or he was despondent over a bad season. How can a professional soccer player complain of a sore neck from a seven-year-old automobile accident? But Coca-Cola’s attorneys didn’t have a compelling argument why their truck driver shouldn’t be held liable.

We were led to a jury room to begin deliberating, and a fellow-juror turned to me and said, “We’ve decided to elect you foreman, so tell us what to do.”

No one had said how a foreman was to get a jury to reach a consensus, so I pondered a minute. “All right, but the first thing we should do is to agree about what we heard. What I heard was the truck driver went through a stop sign and smashed the plaintiff’s car. Although he went to a hospital for examination, he wasn’t injured enough to prevent playing professional European football. Now his neck aches, and he’s despondent. Sorry, but I’m despondent even being here. But the defense didn’t give us a reason why they are not liable for the accident, right?

Since no one heard anything different, we voted on slips of paper and decided to find for Mr. Despondent’s seven-year-old bumps and bruises and his smashed car. But now we needed to decide what that meant. “We have to consider the cost of plaintiff’s car and hospital examination and, after that, his pain and suffering. My problem is I think this guy is faking his disabilities. If you agree, let’s cover his out of pocket costs and get him out of here. Maybe he’ll have a better soccer season next year if he plays for another team. Each of us should write a dollar number on a slip of paper so we can see what the maximum and minimum are we think he should receive.”

The least amount was $10,000, the most $2,000,000.  I went over the actual costs and took another poll before we decided $40,000 was an amount everyone could agree with. We trooped back into the courtroom and the judge thanked us for having decided appropriately. We later discovered Michigan law allows plaintiff’s attorneys up to 47% of awarded damages. I could only hope Mr. Despondent had enough money to buy a few soccer balls and a happier outlook on life. At least we saved Coca Cola two million dollars.

We returned to the waiting room and were called back to a courtroom to hear a criminal case. A young, tough-looking, black defendant in prison garb was charged with shooting a jewelry store owner after robbing him. He huddled with a court-appointed attorney while the charges were read and prospective jurors called to the jury box. Each was asked whether they could make a fair and impartial judgment after hearing the testimony. The defendant’s attorney asked one prospective juror whether she could remain unbiased if someone testified the defendant was seen in the vicinity of the crime. She was dismissed for having potential bias. Apparently, to prove his point, the attorney then asked the next potential juror, “On the basis the defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty, could you remain unbiased even if testimony revealed he emerged from the jewelry store with a smoking gun in his hand?”

Before the startled juror could reply, a man seated with me in the rear of the courtroom mumbled in a voice loud enough that carried all the way to the judge’s bench, “Hell No.” The entire courtroom was deathly silent; everyone turning to stare at our suddenly-mute juror ranks.

The defense attorney turned to the judge, “Your Honor, I want the prospective juror who said that to identify himself and be removed from the courtroom.”

The judge commanded, “Whoever said that, please stand up.” After a moment of shuffling feet and embarrassment, a guy meekly rose to his feet.  “Prospective juror, you are excused.  Please return to the Juror’s Room on the first floor.” There was a sigh of relief that a moment of unpleasantness had passed and business resumed.

However, the man who had actually spoken the words was still seated beside me and we smiled at each other in mutual understanding. Seconds later, he was sworn in without difficulty. After the panel was filled, the rest of us were excused and I returned to the jury room. In this case, perhaps, sleeping dogs should be left alone.

Climbing Mount Mitchell

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Our group of hikers decided to climb North Carolina’s Mount Mitchell, the tallest mountain east of the Rockies in a three-day adventure. Following was recorded as it happened.

Monday Oct 12 – Staters stayed overnight halfway to N.C. while Jerry picked up Reed at his house at 6:00 am (in the morning), and Nick and Rick arrived to drive together. Stopped in Kentucky for Liquor Barn’s two bottles of Gordon’s and expensive St. George’s, a “uniquely Californian gin with real terroir made from 12 botanicals redolent of California’s might Mount Tam, juniper, Douglas fir, Cal Bay Laurel, fennel, coastal sage, Orris root, angelica root, and other profoundly aromatic botanical ingredients all come together to create a forest in your glass.” Tasted like pine cones, echh! Arrived Black Mountain campground, Briar Bottom section, Dogwood campsite 6:30 pm in time to set tents and have a happy hour with martinis with real martini glasses. Jerry proudly hung GMI flag beside Stater MSU flag. Rick, Nick, and Doc grilled Costco steaks, baked spuds, baked beans, and special onion-garlic-mushroom compost. Rick produced Trader Joe Grand Reserve Yountville Cabernet Sauvignon. Campfire discussion regarding upcoming UM-MSU game. Harbaugh and Dantonio are intense, and we would be in tents, too. Overnight rain made midnight bathroom runs most difficult. Did everyone put the food away?

Tuesday Oct 13 – Awoke to clear dawn, and French toast with Cajun bacon (yum). Rick’s blue tub mysteriously missing but soon discovered. What could have happened? It was 25 yards away in the brush without Tupperware and two dozen ginger snaps (oh, the loss), one bag of caramel corn, a box of raisins, and a bottle of Maalox. Could only be an overnight black bear now satiated but constipated. Hmm. Decision? Place food in vehicles and keep very large knives next to sleeping bags from now on. Nick and Rick have cots (can you believe it) so they will never be bothered by bears. Jerry, Jon, and Pat decided to climb 6684 ft. Mount Mitchell and be picked up at the top. Pat hit forehead on low branch, receiving “stinger” neck and dead arms, before dropping water bottle over cliff. Pasties for lunch on the mountain. Finally summited Mount Mitchell, exhausted, to discover parking lot full of cars and curious visitors. Back at base, Nick flew Quadra-copter-don’t-call-it-a-drone from campsite launching pad with overhead videos of surrounding mountains. Totally unflappable Stanley the Southern campground-keeper, that no one could understand, stopped to say hello and was amazed at the sight. We think. Hot free showers, woo hoo. Grilled Salmon with strawberry, pineapple, orange, lime juice/zest salsa, and Cline Old Vintage Zin and Raymond Hill Chard. Midnight hoot owl screeching (maybe bobcat) but no bears TG. Held knives closer. Sometime overnight, insane ghost chipmunk invaded Jerry’s truck bed and began eating a favorite wool sweater. Pat discovered something had invaded his van’s arm-rest cubbyhole and made a nest of seat fabric and twigs. What IS it with these crazy animals?

Wednesday Oct 14 – French toast and bacon breakfast before Jerry and Reed tackled Green Knob, while Nick, Rick, John, and Pat tackled Biltmore estate and early wine tasting. Another cocktail hour by a real campfire (friggin’ firewood more expensive than ever) before dinner of Rogers City smoked pork chops, stewed tomatoes, quartered potatoes, and Plum Mkt Russian Valley MacMurray 2013 Pinot Noir with lots of appreciated John belching. Overnight temps in mid-40’s made midnight runs a challenge.

Thursday Oct 15 – Pancake and Cajun bacon breakfast, before Lower Toe River group hike. Pat relates, the “critter” that shredded Jerry’s sweater and ate various foods in van came back to Michigan. The little bugger ate an apple Tuesday night. After multiple times to let him out (window open and doors open all day and night twice), finally got him on stick’em mouse trap w/ seed mix; a field mouse, not a chippy-munk.” Thursday’s 5-year-old freeze-dried chicken and rice lunch wasn’t bad. Relaxing afternoon with showers and doctored-Cincinnati chili (mit bacon) dinner and Sangiovese wine. Packing up for early departure, had a flawless black night and Milky Way casting shadows. Fell asleep laughing insanely about the seven cuss words. No bears, TG.

Friday Oct 16 – Awoke to dark cold and wind. Broke camp and departed 6:15 am. (in da morning). Stopped in Kentucky for lunch and discovered Pat’s and John’s van sides covered with multiple bear paw prints from trying to get in overnight. Inspected inside of van and other vehicles for lurking bears before proceeding. Good weather all week and great time had by all.