Kayaking trip to Apostle Islands, WI July 1 thru July 5th
Over the 4th of July weekend, I decided that I
had to do a camping/kayaking trip up in the Apostle islands on Lake
Superior. The plan was to drive up
there, kayak to Stockton Island, camp and hike for the weekend, kayak back to
the mainland and drive home. Seems simple right?
I left work early on Wednesday, July 1st so that
I could get a start on the 10-hour drive up to the Apostle Islands. I was hoping that I could make it about
halfway before crashing at a rest stop for the night. I took off around 6pm with all my gear and
the kayak.
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| The Jeep and my trusty kayak |
I made it all the way into
Illinois before my mom called me to chew me out. Why do
you always have to do these things by yourself?
Why do you always have to go so far away? Are you trying to be like that girl from the
movie “Wild”? I made it almost
through Illinois before she was finally done scolding me! After that, things were going ok, but when I
finally stopped for fuel , I noticed that the cover on my kayak had blown
open. Luckily, nothing had blown out,
but the front cover clip had snapped the bungee rigging on the top front of the
kayak. I just tied it back together and
secured the cover again. No biggie I
figured.
Finally, around midnight or so, I was getting really tired,
the road had shifted to a 2-lane and there were no rest stops in the
area. I decided that I would just have
to suck it up and pay for a hotel for the night. I pulled off somewhere in mid-Wisconsin, got
a room for the night and crashed.
The next morning, I got up early, got around and started
driving the last 3 hours before getting to the islands. Before I left the hotel, I checked the kayak
and made sure everything was secure. I hadn’t been on the highway very long, when
all of a sudden the rope that ties down the front of the kayak to the front of
my jeep came loose and started blowing around.
I quickly pulled off the highway to fix it. Thank god I didn’t lose the rope or the
hooks! One of the knots had come loose
on the hook. I tied things back up and
set off driving again.
At some point, I drove through this little town called
Minocqua, WI. I had to stop and get a
picture of this giant statue of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox. Super cute town right on a lake.
Finally, around 2pm or so, I made it to Bayfield. I stopped at the park headquarters in town to
pick up my registration for camping. The
DNR guy gave me my camping license and was asking me what my itinerary was for
the weekend. When I explained to him
that on the second day I was going to hike through Stockton Island to camp on
the other side, he said that that trail wasn’t very well maintained and that I
would be better off kayaking around to the other side. He told me that one of their rangers had actually
gotten lost! I did not want to chance
it, so I figured kayaking around was ok.
Also, I just happened to look around the little park ranger store and
asked him if they had a map. I did have a
map, but it was one that I had printed off the internet it wasn’t that
detailed. He pointed one out to me that was
water proof and he said that all the kayakers use it and stick it to the front
of their kayaks. made my purchases
and headed up to Redcliff to launch my kayak.
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| Park headquarters |
In Redcliff, my plan was to park my Jeep at this campground
and launch there. When I got to the
area, I realized that the campground was connected to this casino. It was kind of funny because I had to go into
the casino to check my car in at the campground.
They also had campground bathrooms and showers connected to the
casino. I was super excited because I
knew that when I returned I would be able to get a nice hot shower to clean up
before heading home!
So, I drove down to the launch, dumped my stuff, parked the
Jeep and walked back to the launch. In
my head, I an idea of how I would be packing the kayak to get all of my camping
equipment over to the islands, but in actuality, I really didn’t know exactly
how I was going to do it. I had most of
my stuff in dry bags and shoved as much as I could into the dry hatch and some
of my gear around my seat in the open hatch.
The rest of my stuff I packed inside my backpack. I tried to protect my backpack with the rain
cover and a trash bag, then I strapped the whole thing to the back of my
kayak. It really must have looked like a
sight. A couple of guys who were just
ending their trip for the day asked me about where I was going and what I was
doing. They said “You have a lot of
equipment; you must be going out for a while”.
I told them that I was heading to Stockton Island to camp and hike. They looked at me like I was crazy. They said, “You’re heading there
tonight?”. At the time, I honestly
thought that it was only a couple of miles from the mainland to Stockton Island,
so I really didn’t think much about their questions. Soon, I would figure out otherwise. Those guys probably had said a small prayer
for me!
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| Kayak all packed to go! |
Around 4pm I finally took off. The water was very calm that day. I knew the general direction I needed go, so
I started heading towards the north end of Basswood Island to kayak around
it. As I got around it, I could see all
the other islands a lot better. The
confusing part was that I could see way farther then I realized. I got really confused about which island was
which. As I got around Basswood Island,
I really wasn’t sure which way to go.
And the islands were way farther apart than they appeared to be because
you could see so far. Even though Basswood
Island appeared to be a stone’s throw from shore, it took me at least 45-60
minutes of constant kayaking to get to the north end of the island. It was then that I realized that I had a lot
more kayaking to do that evening then I originally thought!
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| Just reaching Basswood island. |
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| Heading to the North side of Basswood to go around it. |
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| Pretty much all the scenery looked like this. |
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| Balancing Rock north of Basswood Island |
Finally, I turned on my Google maps, hoping
to God that I could get a signal so that I could figure out which island was
which that I was looking at. I couldn’t
believe it, but I got a signal and figured out which island was Stockton. From that point, I paddled my butt off as
fast as I could because it was getting late and I had a long ways to go. My plan was to get to the Stockton Island
Visitor Center and camp there. However,
after about 3 hours of constant, hard paddling, I figured that there was no way
I was going to make it before it got dark.
So, I changed my plan and decided to camp at Quarry Bay instead. Around 8 or 8:30, I finally made it to the
bay! I could see that there were a few
boaters docked there and a few kayaks on the beach. It was so good to see people finally! I beached the kayak and turned on my phone to
let everyone know that I had landed.
Before I could read all 15 of the panicking text messages wondering
where I was at, I was being attacked by a million mosquitoes. They were relentless! I tore
into my gear desperately searching for the deet! After I drenched myself in deet to the point
that my lips were tingling, I texted everyone back to tell them that I was
alive and I walked around to find an open camping spot. Luckily, they were not all full. They had a really nice set up there. They had wooded boardwalk from the beach
right up to the campsites, there were picnic tables, bear lockers and even pit
toilets. What luxury! Haha. I got all my stuff set up, ate my dinner and then
retreated to my tent to watch part of “American Sniper”.
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| 1st campsite on Stockton Island - Quarry Bay |
At some point in the middle of the night, my shoulders were
aching so badly that they actually woke me up.
I also noticed that my first finger on my left hand was doing this weird
twitching thing. I obviously over did it
during the day. After a while of tossing
and turning, I finally got up and looked through my bag for ibuprofen. I was so worried that my shoulders would hurt
for the rest of the trip, that I counted how many ibuprofen I had so that I
could ration them out for the next couple of days! I could not sleep at all until the ibuprofen
finally kicked in. As I laid there in
there dark, starting to fall asleep, I had this sensation that a little critter
ran under my tent….almost like I could feel it.
I figured that because my tent was on a platform, the little guy must be
on the platform but under my tent running around. However, I realized that the sensation that I
was feeling was this critter actually running over my body inside my tent!!
When I had gotten in my backpack to get ibuprofen, I had forgotten to zip up my
tent and a mouse had found his way inside.
I turned on my head lamp and saw him running around. So, it’s 3am….my shoulders are stiff with
Rigamortis and super achy …..and I’m desperately trying to shoo a mouse out of my tent. After that scene, the rest of the night was
pretty uneventful.
The next morning, I got my stuff organized and packed back
up on the kayak and headed out for my next camping location on the backside of
Stockton Island.
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| Ready to leave campsite 1 and head around to campsite 2 on the North side of Stockton Island |
Shockingly, I wasn’t
too sore. For the most part, the water
was not too choppy, but enough to make me nervous. I really enjoyed kayaking along the coast,
but I really really hated crossing the open water. It was a bit more nerve wracking then I had
expected. It also seemed to take forever
because your perspective is way off since you can see for a long ways. I would kayak for 30 minutes and the coast
would appear not to be any closer.
On the east side of Stockton Island, the coast was really
cool. There were a lot of places where
the rock was carved out by the water to form these caves. At one point, there were these 2 large birds
flying overhead. I tried to snap a few
pictures of them. I wasn’t sure if they
were 2 majestic eagles or 2 turkey buzzards circling my body waiting for a
snack.
As I was rounding the North side of the island, I started
looking for the spot that I was supposed to stay at for the night. The DNR guy had told me that “I can’t miss
it”. He said there would be some kind of
landing or something specific to let me know that it was a camping area. As I was going along the coast, all of a
sudden I saw 2 people pop out of the woods on this bluff. I shouted to them, “Hey, is this the Trout Point
Trail head?”. They were like, “yeah!”. I swear, if it wasn’t for them, I would have
never known that I was at the place where I was supposed to camp for the
night. It was not really obvious, like
the DNR guy had told me. There was a
tiny tent sign indicating the campsite and that was it. What are the odds that just as I am passing
the area where I need to be, that 2 people just happen to walk out of the woods
on the trail? And this was the exact
same trail that the DNR guy told me that “no one” hikes because of how rough it
is.
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| The teeny sign that indicated where I was supposed to camp for the night. |
Anyway, I beached the kayak and started unloading my
stuff. I asked the couple how the trail
was. They said that I was way better off
having kayaked around then walking the trail.
They didn’t have any gear with them, but they said it was rough and the
mosquitos were merciless. They hung out
for a little bit on the water as I set-up camp.
After they rested, they took back off for Presque Isle Bay, where they
said they were staying for the night.
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| Campsite #2, North end of Stockton Island. |
I had kayaked for about 3hours and had made it to camp
around 3pm. It was early still, but once
I got camp set-up, I laid in my tent to read and rest for a bit. Around 5 or so, I got up, made dinner and
enjoyed the sunshine as best as I could while trying to keep the mosquitos from
eating me alive. I also had set-up my
portable solar cell to capture the sun.
It worked out great for keeping my phone charged the whole weekend! After dinner, I just laid in my tent, read a
little bit more and watched the rest of “American Sniper”.
The next day, I got up early again to pack things up and get
out on the water. At this point, my
itinerary said that I was supposed to go back to Presque Isle Bay to camp and
stay the night. Then on Sunday, I was
supposed to kayak from Presque Isle Bay back to Red Cliff to end my trip. I knew that there was no way I wanted to
kayak that far on Sunday and then drive 10 hours back home. After looking at the map, I decided to kayak
as close as I could to the mainland, so that on Sunday morning I wouldn’t have
to go far. I decided to head to Basswood
island and camp there for the evening.
That was the island directly across from Red Cliff and basically the
closest I could be to the mainland. I
just was worried that since it was the closest island, that all the camping
spots would be taken up. But, it
wouldn’t have mattered anyway because I had all my gear with me so I could have
camped anywhere on the island. Around
11am I had everything packed and had started my long day of paddling towards
Basswood island.
As I started paddling, I was thinking about the ‘American
Sniper’ movie that I had watched the previous two nights. It was a good movie, but incredibly sad and
upsetting. It might have been a
combination of the movie and the fact that I was physically exhausted by all
the hours of kayaking, but I started getting really upset thinking about that
movie. I felt like I was
hyperventilating and trying not to cry at the same time. As I’m blubbering down the coast of Stockton
Island, all of a sudden this butterfly flies around me and lands on my shoulder. It was really weird because I was out in the
lake, far enough from the coast that you wouldn’t think a butterfly would be
out there. I didn’t think much about it,
but this butterfly just sat on my shoulder and I swear it was staring at
me. I turned my head to look at him and
his eyes were looking right at me! I
expected him to take off because I was moving so much from paddling, plus water
was spraying up from the lake. But this
butterfly did not move at all. He just
sat there…on my shoulder…staring at me for at least 45 minutes. To make things weirder, he kept getting
closer and closer to my face. He got so
close to my face that I could feel his little wings brushing my cheek. I was getting butterfly kisses from an actual
butterfly. After a while, I finally
calmed down from thinking about that movie.
Once I had calmed down, the butterfly took off and flew back to the
mainland. I don’t believe in much, but I
swear that butterfly was not a normal butterfly. I honestly believe that someone, somewhere
was watching over me and helping me not be so upset through that butterfly.
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| Not the exact magical butterfly, but it looked like this kind in the picture. |
I had 2 areas of open water that I had to cross to get to
Basswood island. The first area was from
Stockton island to Hermit Island. That
particular day, the water was kind of rough and I really really really just
wanted to get across that open area as fast as possible. Luckily, the wind was at my back, so I had
some help moving forward through the water.
However, it was actually pretty choppy that day. I had bought a spray skirt for the kayak, but
it was so dang hot out I didn’t want to use it because it felt great getting
spritzed on with water. Once I reached
Hermit island, I hugged the coast for about 30 minutes before I had to break
away again and cross the open water between Hermit island and Basswood.
Just before I broke away, I saw a small group
of girls beach their kayaks to rest on Hermit island. They were in full on wet suits with spray
skirts and they looked super professional.
We waved at each other and I wondered if they looked at me and thought,
“what the heck is that girl doing with no spray skirt and wearing a t-shirt and
shorts!”
The last open water area between Hermit island and basswood
island was not too rough. It took me
about an hour to cross, then another 30 minutes or so to finally reach the boat
dock. After 5 hours of hard kayaking
that day, I finally reached the docks at Basswood island!! I was never so glad
to see a dock before in my life!
I beached the kayak and started unpacking. The water had been so rough that day, I had a
lot of water in the open hatch of my kayak. I
even had some water in the dry hatch as well.
Luckily, none of my stuff was wet or ruined. I scooped out as much water as I could,
grabbed my stuff and headed to find an open camping spot.
The camping area was higher up off the beach, so you had to
hike up this switchback path for a little bit before you got to them. Once I got to the top of the little bluff,
there was a group of campers there. They
had come over with all their stuff on a boat.
I asked them if any of the spots were open. They pointed to a couple of spots and said
that the people who were there had taken off in the morning. I was so relieved! I found a nice spot where I could see through
the trees to the water below. I set up
all my stuff, gathered some water to filter, sat at my picnic table, doused myself in gallons of deet and read my
book and relaxed.
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| Campsite #3 on Basswood island, |
My dad had texted me and asked if I had gotten “sea legs”
from kayaking all day. At first I didn’t
really know what he was talking about, but the longer I was on land the more I
realized what he meant. After being out
on the water for 5 hours in pretty wavy conditions, the sensation of rocking
side to side and being on water would not go away! I had to stop myself from tipping over a
couple of times. Even when I laid down
to nap, I still felt like I was rocking side to side. What a weird feeling! Luckily, I didn’t feel sick or dizzy from it
or anything, it was just a weird sensation.
After a bit, I made my little dinner and retreated to my
tent for the evening. Since it was July
4th, I could hear and see lots of fireworks being set off over the
water from the mainland. And since I was
directly across from the Red Cliff Indian Reservation, (where according to one
local, the Native Americans have a lot of their own fireworks) there was a lot
of explosions happening all throughout the night.
The next morning, I got up pretty early again to pack up my
stuff and head out for the day. I was
relieved that all I had to do was cross the open water between Basswood island
and the mainland to be done. I packed up
my things and pushed off for the mainland.
The water was fairly rough that day and the wind was directly in my
face, but I knew I only had to kayak for about an hour and I would be done. It might have been around noon when I finally
reached shore! When I landed, there were
a few boaters that asked me how I handled the rough water. I told them I was glad I only had to come
from Basswood island!
Even though it was a great adventure, I was so happy to be
done kayaking! I called my mom and she
was pretty happy to hear that I had made it back to the mainland alive as
well. I ran and got my jeep and started
taking apart the gear-stuffed kayak to pack everything back into my car. After I got everything organized, I drove
over to the casino and took a much needed shower in their camping shower
facilities. Best shower ever!
Afterwards, I started heading out for the long drive home.
Before I got onto the main road though, I saw
this small hand-written sign that mentioned homemade birch baskets. I figured I would check it out. I drove over to where the sign pointed me to
and there was this older man selling all sorts of stuff in his front yard. He had paintings, birch baskets and canoes of
all shapes and sizes. I asked him about
it and he said that he was Native American and created the baskets and canoes
according to traditional tribal methods.
I thought they were the coolest things I have ever seen. I told him I was super excited to buy a
couple of his pieces because that meant more to me than buying some piece of
crap from a store that was made in China.
So, I ended up buying 2 of his pieces.
I’m so glad I did!
The drive home was pretty uneventful, other than it was long
and I was tired. It was a great
experience and I got to see a lot of cool things. I’m glad I went, but I probably won’t be
kayaking again anytime soon
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| Map of my travels around the Apostle Islands |
