I got up early the next morning, hoping for some sunrise
views on my way to the Scoville Point.
The trail is a little different.
Kind of shaped like a U with the two ends starting and ending at
different places in the Rock Harbor improved area. From the bottom of the U, at the closest point
to Scoville Point, the trail is a single track out to the point and back. Anyway, I took the leg of the U along Rock
Harbor out, and the Tobin Harbor trail part of the U back.
I was surprised that the Rock Harbor part of
the trail was actually pretty rough, and it still had blow-down! I had expected something manicured for the
lodge residents. The single track out to the point was
mostly on rock, and the trail actually disappeared. But there was only one direction to
head. A hundred yards or so from the
point, I was passed by a young female.
She got to the point and started doing push-ups on a flat area. I intruded a bit to explore the overlook at
the point, and found out she was a park employee. I left the point while she was still doing
calisthenics.
Back on the Tobin Harbor return trail, I stopped for a drink
of water. She caught up with me again,
and stopped 10 feet or so past me. She
pointed out some small orchids on the side of the trail. I stayed behind to take some photos.
A while further down the Tobin Harbor trail,
I was passed by another single day hiker.
He looked like he was just doing the U, and was moving along fast! I did stop to look at some old mine
areas. Like those I had seen earlier,
the NPS had put wooden fences around the pits.
I saw those on the trail near Daisy Farm too. There the NPS has put up signs warning that
you needed to use extreme caution. Not
sure why when they put fences around each pit.
Also, the pits looked like nothing more than 15 foot wide depressions
that had filled up some with rain water.
When I got back to Rock Harbor, I finished packing up for my
trip back, but left the pack in the shelter.
Then I went down to the pier and waited around to try and get a shot of
the Queen arriving. I read for a while,
bought a soda, and waited some more. The
Queen arrived about 1145, and I got the best shots I could considering the
rangers made us leave the pier long before the boat arrived. I was a bit surprised that many of the
passengers were out on the bow waving to us as the boat came in; maybe they
were crew? I then went back to
the shelter to get my pack and make the shelter available for any new arrivals.
When I got back to the pier, the Queen was heading out
towards Mott Island. I had assumed the
Queen normally stayed moored at Rock Harbor from its 1130 arrival till its 1445
departure for the trip back to Copper Harbor.
A crew member later told me they always stay at the dock, but this time
they took the Rolph Peterson team (they've studied the wolves on Isle Royale for years) out to Mott and had only dropped off a few
regular passengers.
There were an awful
lot of people waiting for the Queen that day (Memorial Day). I was surprised since I had seen so few
people (except for the full shelters at McCargoe and Rock Harbor). The waiting folks included a large group of
high-schoolers with identical green packs.
One of them later told me they had arrived Friday. Maybe that’s what most of them had done; paid
the $120 ferry fee for just two nights on the island over the Memorial Day
weekend. So I had another soda and ate
some snacks, and observed the people till we boarded.
The crowd made the 3 ½ hour trip back to Copper Harbor a bit
miserable—mostly from lack of leg room.
Almost every bench/seat on the boat was filled. The ride was a bit rougher on the way back,
but still pretty smooth. Felt more like
an amusement park ride.
Back at Copper Harbor, my pack was one of the last off the
boat. But I still think I was about the
first person out of the parking lot.
Maybe the others were driving home directly; while I was only going a
couple of blocks to the Mariner North for the night.
I must admit, the shower at the Mariner, the whitefish
sandwich dinner, the beer, and the nice bed were fantastic! I got up early the next morning and drove for
about 14 hours to Lexington to pick up my wife.
The next day we went on to Texarkana, and made it back home the day
after.
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