Last Friday Linda and I drove up to northern Minnesota for a weekend of cross-country skiing at Bearskin Lodge with fellow sea kayakers Jody Russell and Dave Schubert, and Jody's friend and former sister-in-law Claudia, who flew in from New York for the week. The temperature was consistently below zero in the morning, getting down to -21 degrees F. one day, but always rising above zero later in the day, sometimes even to ten degrees. We checked out the kayaking possibilities on East Bearskin Lake one night on our snowshoes, but found the water thoroughly frozen. Lake Superior, however, was open everywhere we looked except outside Duluth, where there were several miles of thin ice. From Two Harbors to Grand Marais, there was not even a short skirt of ice near shore, and I wondered if anyone had been out on the lake in their sea kayaks this winter. The weather was glorious. There must have been a high pressure center stalled overhead, because every day was sunny and nearly windless. Though the trails could have used some fresh snow, they were well tracked and in good condition. Every day was a green wax day, and we practically flew down the trails. The saddest part was seeing downed trees all around us; Bearskin caught only the fringe of the Fourth of July storm that knocked down a quarter of the Boundary Waters, but there are now vistas from hills that had formerly been crowned with trees, and scattered piles of brush and logs where some cleanup has been done. Most of the downed trees, however, remain where they fell, snapped off a few feet from the ground. There are many resorts along the Gunflint Trail, and the residents' greatest fear now is that the downed trees will fuel an uncontrollable firestorm sometime in the next few years. Camping reservations for the Boundary Waters are up already this year, and there is worry also that many canoeists will be caught in the fire when it comes. We skied in our kayaking gear -- well, some of it, anyway. Under wind pants and a thin wind shirt, I wore the same Patagonia expedition-weight Capilene tops and bottoms that I sometimes wear for insulation under my dry suit. That was all I needed, except for socks, ski boots, mittens, and a thin knit cap. I suppose I could have skied in my dry suit, but that would have been overdoing it. As it was, I was quite hot and damp by the end of each day, and the shower in our log cabin felt very good. Oh, we found a flattened squirrel on the road to the lodge, which led Linda to coin a new definition of "SUV" -- "squirrel under vehicle." Chuck Holst *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
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