Backpacking Grand Island National Recreation Area:

Day Four: Trout Bay to Williams Landing

On day four we found ourselves ahead of schedule. We had planned to spend 2 nights in the North Point area so that we could have a day of relaxation and enjoy the beach. However, since the campsites weren't overlooking the water, we had decided to move on. Now that we had a perfect beach campsite, we needed to decide whether to stay on Trout Bay another night or to finish up on the fourth day. Williams Landing and the ferry dock were only around 5 miles away, and we didn't really see the point in packing up and staying at another campsite along that route for our final night since the Little Dune sites were so good. I voted to stay put and spend the day reading on the beach with periodic breaks to go swimming or nap in the tent. Craig is more stir crazy and wasn't sure if he could relax all day without getting bored. In the end, we compromised and planned to spend an unhurried morning eating breakfast, drinking coffee, relaxing, and eventually leave for Williams Landing around noon.

Just as we started to break camp, I spotted a couple of backpackers making their way down the boardwalk with the look of hoping against hope that our site was available. We occupied the last one, and we knew everything else was full. Upon spotting me, the woman's shoulders sagged and she turned to her male companion who pulled out a map and looked depressed. Remembering how Craig and I felt the day before, after trudging all the way to this very place, I ran over to let them know that we were clearing out and the site was theirs. They nearly cried and immediately dropped their packs and set off for the shore. A half-hour later we waved goodbye to the couple on the beach and began the last leg of our trip.

Unfortunately, we had to walk back down that stretch of road which was unprotected from the sun, now high in the sky and beating on our heads. While making our way down the road with our heads down, a shadow suddenly floated across the trail in front of us. We both looked up in time to see a magnificent bald eagle soar directly over us just above the tree line. I missed this perfect photographic opportunity because for once I did not have my camera in hand. The eagle was a beautiful sight, gliding silently against the clear blue sky, and it's presence brightened the slightly boring stretch of trail.
The trail curves sharply south and runs past Duck Lake - a small inland lake with a viewing platform – before reaching Murray Bay Beach which features picnic areas for day use and campsites for overnight stays. Various historic sites grabbed our attention along the shore of Murray Bay. The Stone Quarry Cabin, built in 1845, is one of the oldest standing structures on Lake Superior and was home to various workers such as stone cutters in Michigan's early history.

It is near this spot that we encountered the largest pile of bear scat we have ever seen. The size of a small mountain, it held evidence of a diet of berries and seemed fresh. Would we be lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the undoubtedly huge fellow who released this impressive bomb? Did we really want to? Was he, right at that moment, hiding behind a tree and watching the ridiculous humans gawk at his excrement, wondering how we made it to the top of the food chain? We looked around nervously but saw no sign of a large omnivore lingering to receive praise for his accomplishment.

Further south we passed the decrepit remains of tennis courts which used to be part of a resort operated by an iron mining company in the early 1900s. The main hotel is gone, but some of the cottages still remain and are privately owned.

Once back at Williams Landing, we again encountered the forest service volunteers from the day before and chatted about our trip while waiting for the ferry that would return us to Munising. When the boat reached the dock, it unloaded a new group of visitors including a couple of backpackers with their dog who was suited up with her own pack.

We nearly broke down on the water when a huge tree branch that had been floating in the bay lodged itself in the pontoon boat's motor causing us to stall halfway to shore. Thinking fondly of showers and whitefish sandwiches, we returned to town and spent a few days relaxing before beginning the long drive home.

Food

Eating while camping is a much more profound experience than a meal at the kitchen table. The desire to travel light and eat only survivalist essentials – granola, coffee – conflicts with a more powerful urge to indulge in anything that can be cooked over a fire as long as it is reasonably easy to bring along.

When my like-minded sister accompanies me on camping trips, we are known to plan everything we do around the kind of food we want to eat and the best time to eat it. On a recent trip to Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, the first morning began with a serious brainstorming session revolving around the rations we brought with us, the meals we intended to make, and how we could schedule any activity away from camp in such a way that no opportunity to eat would go unexploited. Would the day hikes we wanted to experience cut into our food schedule? Would there be time to come back for lunch between activities, or would we have to settle for only breakfast and dinner? We wanted to explore the area, but fresh air tends to make a person peckish and we had a lot of cuisine to enjoy.

For Day 1 it was decided that we would make cheese and salsa quesadillas for breakfast and pack extras to take with us for lunch (along with a few token power bars). This would enable us to take a long hike along the North Country Trail near Grand Portal Point and spend as much time as we wanted obsessing over the sandstone cliffs and clear blue-green water. We should be able to return before dark and start a fire to make brats and corn on the cob just as the sun sets over Lake Superior and the temperature instantly becomes chilly. Day 2 called for rain so we figured that would be a more appropriate time to laze around the campsite and enjoy as many meals as we felt like while reading and watching the lake from under our propped-up rain tarp. Day 3 was a wild card that might involve a visit to a local town to gorge ourselves on pasties and local pub fare, so we made an allowance in the schedule for a conservative bit of culinary spontaneity.

In actuality, we returned on Day 1 just before sunset from what ended up being a 13-mile day hike and were so tired that we immediately collapsed inside the tent and fell asleep (gasp) sans dinner. This would mean a long, carefully planned day of nourishment ahead of us starting the following morning if we were to make up for the lack of brats the night before.

It was hard work but we managed to eat our way to success starting with oatmeal and summer sausage. Oatmeal for breakfast is perfect because it is just so outdoorsy. Throw in a few Michigan-grown berries and I can practically feel John Denver smiling down at me in macrobiotic approval.

Summer sausage, on the other hand, is not something any health-conscious person should ever eat under any circumstance. It is also one of the most erotic, groan-inducing foods one can eat around a campfire. The grease drips sizzling onto the coals as the outside is cooked to a crispy, even-better-when-burned shell of mouth-watering salty perfection. I am lucky enough to have relatives in my native Wisconsin who smuggle forbidden meats like summer sausage and brats from their neighborhood butcher to us, their deprived family members across the vast reaches of Lake Michigan. There are certain things you just can’t buy from a grocery store once you’ve had the real thing.

For lunch we ate a huge pile of redskin potatoes with rosemary and a couple of smores for good measure. A park ranger stopped by to conduct an interpretive lesson about the area but we were too full to participate. It never actually rained more than a brief drizzle but the persistently overcast sky and gloom over unpredictable Lake Superior provided sufficient excuse and the perfect setting for a full day of napping and eating.

I had a strange food awakening many years ago after an unsuccessful foray into vegetarianism. In an attempt to be healthy and assuage guilt over animal cruelty (something I still struggle with and try to make up for by doing things like adopting neurotic dogs and experiencing periodic and pathetically brief stints of swearing off certain foods when I have a crisis of conscience), I spontaneously stopped eating meat and went five years without so much as a bay scallop. Then I was plagued by an unforseen bout of insomnia that slowly gnawed its way through my brain. During those sleepless nights I would lie awake and inexplicably fantasize about chicken. I have no idea why but chicken suddenly became an irresistible temptation that haunted my sleep-deprived senses. I was no match for it. Eventually my resolve crumbled and a secret, hastily executed rendezvous with a chicken sandwich opened the door to a previously unappreciated world of meats and it was suddenly inconceivable how I’d managed without them.

My appreciation for the brat is a result of this awakening. Although I am from Wisconsin (the land of beer, meat, and appropriately corresponding obesity), the brat never appealed to me when I was younger. I think the clammy-looking gray skin turned me off so I traditionally rejected them in favor of their skinny, more attractive and swarthy cousin the hot dog. For some mystifying reason, when I emerged (ashamed yet eager) from my failed attempt at healthy guilt-free living, I needed a brat. I couldn't recall ever having tasted one but I knew that we were meant for each other.

Once it was time for dinner the fire refused to cooperate and there was difficulty in getting the brats positioned over the best spot. It is bad form to cause their casings to rupture and juice to escape so it shouldn’t be too hot. The fact that I forgot to pack tongs also didn't help matters. It took so long to resolve these issues that darkness had fallen by the time we hunkered down to eat and we were dangerously hungry. Any animals that might have been tempted to investigate our food were undoubtedly scared away by the inhuman sounds of our ravenous grunting and snarling as we tore into our brats and corn on the cob with unseemly enthusiasm.