Beginning a week along the Superior Hiking Trail

Instead of continuing our journey from Riverdale, ND, we ventured east to Minnesota to hike along the Superior Hiking Trail (SHT) during a long-overdue vacation.  Fortunately for us, the North Country Trail follows the SHT along it’s approximately 300 mile distance.  We intend to hike different sections of the trail throughout the week.

Today we began our hiking at Gooseberry State Park; familiar environs for us (we visited the park last year) and convenient, too (less than two miles from our cabin).  Our daughter, Sarah, joined us for the hike along the 2.1 mile section north of the falls.

(Heading out mid-morning before the temperatures rise)

(Gooseberry River, middle falls section)

(Fifth falls bridge, and location of today’s recorded soil)

(Soil map units seem to make sense...  Alfisol in a forest, Fluvent near a waterway)

It didn’t take long for us to reach the bridge, so we continued south along the trail for another half mile.  The extra hiking yielded a couple unexpected finds.  One was a huge ant hill (three feet tall…  …estimated from a safe distance) and a large forest exclosure.

(Now that is some serious bioperturbation!)

(Vegetation and litter fall were denser in the exclosure than adjacent forest)

Wild raspberries were abundant along the trail.  I took full advantage of the opportunity to try a ripe berry.  Tart, but good.

(Plenty left for the bears)

Later in the day we traveled south to Castle Danger, MN to climb up to Wolf Rock from Lake County Road 106.  Though short, this was a significant hike compared to our morning venture, but the view was worth it.

(A great view with a nice breeze to help cool off from the climb)

We continued from Wolf Rock for about another mile to the first primitive campsite.  Trail conditions were wet, so we decided to stop and return to the parking area.

(Our turnaround point for the afternoon)

(Lots of saturated soil and makeshift bridges)

As for the soil along this section, it was similar to we located this morning.  Both were along wooded areas of the trail, so the outcome wasn’t surprising.

(Who is Miskoaki?)