I've been chomping at the bit to get the hiking season started in northern Minnesota. My last days off Sierra and I went for a hike (more like a slog through standing water and snow) on the trails at Franz Jevne State Park along the Rainy River. With the warm temperatures of the past week I figured trails should be even more snow free, and so I made the drive through Buyck to the Echo Trail and the Astrid Lake Trail.
The trail begins at the beautiful Lake Jeanette campground on its namesake lake.
While ice-out hasn't happened on any of the lakes in northern Minnesota quite yet (things look pretty close on at least a few lakes), this campground appears to be a wonderful place to spend an evening or two and bring the canoe along. From the trailhead I made my way past 2 walk-in campsites and passed an amusing sign along the side of the trail.
As I expected given the late winter, the trail was very wet in places.
However, given the vegetation growing alongside this section of trail, I wouldn't doubt that parts of the trail are wet year-round. I took some time to observe the pitcher plants growing alongside the trail
and even saw a spider inside one of the pitchers being slowly broken down by acids and enzymes in the water.
Soon enough the trail made its way to Nigh Lake.
The ice on the lake is very dark and I would venture to guess that it will go out on Nigh Lake within the next few days. In one bay of the lake, the ice was melted out and a pair of mergansers swam around. There was also a massive beaver lodge on this section of the lake.
After a few minutes of admiring the view at Night Lake, it was time to move on. I started to see what appeared to be moose tracks in the snow and mud.
When I found the first of many piles of moose scat, my hunch of moose was confirmed.
There was also lots of wolf scat along the trail here and there.
Most of it was probably frozen and buried under the snow all winter.
I trudged through some pretty deep snow in shady, sheltered areas
and made my way up to a level rock ledge. At one point I heard movement in the woods off to my left. I paused and looked around and then saw what had made the sound: it was a wolf! It was brownish in color and about 50 yards off in the distance. I took my camera, zoomed in on the wolf and moved to get as good a shot as I could. Unfortunately, the wolf took off before I was able to get a photo of it. Still, it was an exciting moment. I've seen wolves in the wild before, but all my other sightings had previously been from a car, or from a building (one wolf crossing the ice on Black Bay was visible from inside the Rainy Lake Visitor Center, another we saw crossing the ice on Rainy Lake from our living room when we lived in the lake house). After the wolf sighting I reluctantly moved on. There was a small waterfall on the stream that flows out of Pauline Lake and into Nigh Lake.
I arrived at Pauline Lake via a portage between it and Nigh.
I spent a few minutes there
and then moved on, passing through an area littered with large glacial erratic boulders.
There were also a few really large trees, mostly white pines in this area.
Soon enough I found myself at the beautiful campsite on Astrid Lake.
This site would make a wonderful place to paddle into and spend the night. I rested at the picnic table and tried to dry my socks a bit. After about 15 minutes it was time to move on.
I passed through woods carpeted with bearberry.
The green leaves and red berries provided some of the only color in the mostly-dormant forest.
Soon I noticed a body of water off to the side of the trail that was not marked on my map. It turned out to be a fairly large beaver pond.
There was a large beaver lodge on the pond and one of the highest double-tiered beaver dams I've ever seen.
These two dams must have raised the water level in the basin by at least 5 feet! I retraced my steps back to the campground and the car. On the way back along Echo Trail I stopped at the point where Echo Trail crosses over the Hunting Shack River on a bridge.
There is a 4 mile canoe route back to Astrid Lake that starts here. It's an adventure that I really want to try this coming summer.
Update: May 12, 2018
After my hike at Big Moose Trail earlier in the day I headed over to the trailhead/portage trail on the other side of Astrid Lake
to hike the parts I had missed. What a difference 2 weeks makes! The ice and snow are gone and the forest has started to awaken. I parked alongside the forest road and made my way down the wide, smooth path. As would be evidenced later in my hike, the wide trail here is utilized by ATVs to portage canoes and even small motor boats into Astrid Lake.
Astrid Lake itself looked beautiful with a blue sky reflecting on her liquid waters.
The trail continued past the put-in spot and got decidedly more rugged. Eventually it crossed a small wetland
on a pair of bridges and then headed over to some campsites. There was a short side trail that led down to a sandy spot that could be used as a swimming beach. I noticed some folks paddling canoes on the water.
Soon after continuing on the trail I reached the junction where I had started the return trip back to the trailhead 2 weeks ago. On the way back to my car on this hike I noticed some large, and very square woodpecker holes chiseled into a tree.
Before I knew it I was back to my car for the drive home. Seeing Astrid Lake on this beautiful day really convinced me that Noelle, Sierra and I need to get our canoe out here to paddle the Hunting Shack Canoe Route!
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