Chrissy made granola bars based on a recipe she found at the Trail Cooking website. We had the granola bars and coffee for breakfast. Chrissy also surprised me with a grapefruit. I'm convinced there's nothing better than a grapefruit on the trail... except a Snickers Almond maybe.
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| NCT Blue Blaze |
We hiked past a campsite on a point on the east side of the trail that we wanted to come back to on another trip.
Before our trip I had read that bears had been seen in the area. I kept my eyes open in the hopes of seeing a bear, or at the very least some sign of bears in the area. We didn't see any bears but we did see some scratches on a log that crossed a valley near the trail. Aside from the scratches we didn't really see too much wildlife. Squirrels, birds, lots of frogs, but nothing bigger.
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| Bear Scratches on a Log |
There wasn't much traffic along the trail. We passed a couple guys who were hiking together a few times throughout the day, we met a couple out for a day hike, and the Boy Scout troop headed back to Red Bridge to meet the rest of their team passed us headed south. A few of them looked beat, but their leaders were friendly and gave a nice trail report to us.
We continued on our way until we got to forest road 8060. We stopped here for a lunch of tuna wraps and coffee. After a short break we hoisted our packs back up to our shoulders and continued north up the second longest hill on the loop.
The next several miles were mostly uneventful. Walk a while, stop and adjust some piece of gear, hydrate, continue north. Some maps indicate that there is a water source near Sheep Ranch Road, however trail reports reviewed prior to our expedition said that the first water source is Eddington Creek. As we crossed through the area where the first water source was supposed to be, there was no obvious source of water, so this confirmed the info we received. As you cross through this area it's a potentially easy place to lose the trail especially where the forest road crosses the trial, the trail follows the ridge line north-northeast. Just follow the blazes and you should be good to go.
We arrived at Eddington Creek with plenty of water in reserve. We filtered water and stopped for a short snack of jerky and chocolate. There was another couple stopped at the creek with similar plans as well as the guys we kept trading the lead with.
The trail north of Eddington Creek is a little different than the previous 7 miles. Everything south was well marked trails with minimal interaction with roads, north of Eddinton we begin to hike closer to roads, through day use areas, down a road and through a parking area. The trail changes a little bit too. As you cross over from the hardwood forests of the south into the coniferous woods north the trail isn't as well marked and you need to watch for signs identifying the trail.
I'm not sure if it was the monotony of the trail, or my adventurous personality, but we managed to lose the trail and end up on the shore of the Manistee River. Somewhere in one of the day use sites I proceeded to where I assumed the trail resumed but failed to not if there were blazes marking the way. The trail led us to the river. This was as good a place as any to take a break, so we took our shoes off and waded in the cold flowing water. It was so cold in fact that the crayfish on the bottom of the river wouldn't move as you walked by them, I had never seen this before. A few fishermen floated by on kayaks but it looked like they were having better luck emptying beer cans than catching fish.
Our trek resumed with some bushwhacking to try to find the trail again. I figured if we kept the river to our right and kept going north we would eventually find the trail again. About a half mile through the swamp we met up with the trail and resumed our trek.
You can see the Little Mac from the foot path about a mile from the bridge as well as the last 100 yards or so before the bridge. The bridge is more impressive in person than it is in pictures, although not by it's size but by it's beauty in the surroundings. We stopped to take a few pictures before crossing over and starting our southbound trek.
Our intent was to cross the bridge and make it to campsite 4 to make camp for the night. However, as we crossed the bridge Chrissy said that she was getting sore. She's not known for complaining so I knew this meant she was more uncomfortable than she let on. I began lookin for a place to make camp for the night. This proved harder than I anticipated. I always like to find a campsite that had a nice view, or is something more than a flat patch in the middle of the woods. This combined with restrictions on distances from trail or water limited our choices. We found a spot one hill climb shy of campsite 4, and as luck would have it there was already a family camped there, so our plans would have to be altered either way.
Our campsite was great, although I may have mis-measured the distance from the river by a foot or two. After camp was set up we filtered water and made dinner. I don't carry a watch on backpacking trips, so I'm not sure what time it was when we laid down in the tent to read, but the sun was still up and it made the tent nice and warm. We kept the rain fly off as we fell asleep reading. We woke up when the chill of night hit us, opened our sleeping bags, crawled in and got some sleep. A midnight jaunt from the tent to respond to the call of nature revealed a beautiful starry sky, a mist was floating up off the river, an owl was hooting somewhere in the distance, and coyotes could be heard playing across the river. This was as close to perfect as I could imagine. We crawled back into the tent and slept until sunrise. 