Madeline Island 2008

We're back from our week- long camping adventure on Madeline Island, the largest of Lake Superior's 22 islands. We had a fantastic campsite at Big Bay state Park and enjoyed the hiking and beautiful beach there, as well as treks into the town of La Pointe for various diversions.

We tried a new little hobby this year, too. I have been trying to get my act together the past couple of summers to do some letterboxing or geocaching with the boys. Time has run out on me every year to do it, but this year Steve came to my rescue and did some work to get us set up for geocaching.


We also got to do some letterboxing thanks to some friends of ours. We know a family of homeschoolers who had camped the island the week before we did and hid a special box for Will, Ben and Charlie to find. They had emailed us written clues the day after they came home...which was the day before we left. Kind of like passing a baton. After dinner our first night we decided to head out and find the treasure...

At the trail head

The great thing about Letterboxing (as opposed to geocaching) is that you have written clues to give you direction rather than a GPS. We had fun paying close attention to visual markers in the forest to help us on our way. One of our clues was to "follow the trail to the 4th uprooted tree on our right with roots perpendicular to the ground". There are a lot of fallen/uprooted trees on Madeline island due to a storm in 2003 or so. The boys had to be mindful of which trees were totally uprooted.

Here's the roots of 4th tree...massive!

We continued to follow clues out onto a rocky point, to a set of tall oaks and a fifth uprooted tree. And then, beneath the brush where four rocks meet....

Found it!!

Inside were pop rocks , drawings and messages for the boys. I think our friends rock, don't you? Thanks for the treasure hunt Kian and Liam!

We had great weather for our trip (aside from some rain in the wee hours ) and so we spent a big chunk of time at the beach. The beach at Big Bay park is incredible! Lake Superior is shallow in the bay so you can go far, far out, and it is crystal clear to it's sandy bottom. Yes, a little cold, but not so cold to prevent swimming and splashing. And when we have been there, it is never crowded. You always get a nice huge chunk of sand realty to yourself. We love, love love it! Everyone (even Steve who is a non-beach type ordinarily) voted the beach as a highlight of the trip.

Ben got so excited about the beach that at one point he literally lost his head! What a mess that was! Here he is pulling his head out of the sand.

Naturally there was plenty of sand play as well. Here's Ben's sand monastery. (Notice the cross to the left of the structure)

An invigorating swim!

Water Frisbee

One of the most beautiful hikes we took was on Burroughs trail on the north shore of the island. We might not have otherwise come to this far-and-away trail had it not been for a geocache search we were on.



We did find the cache, but it was quite a way off of the beaten path, down into a a crazy steep valley.

Found in the gully!

A side-trip while I give my opinion on geocaching

The "Buried in the Burroughs" geocache was one of three we searched for on Madeline Island. We love the idea of geocaching. I mean, who doesn't love searching for a hidden surprise...a buried treasure? The kids thought it was great fun and getting to see and trade the trinkets inside the box was just plain cool. But. The jury is still out with our family as to whether we will continue to do this. As I mentioned, this geocache was waaay off the beaten path. Literally off the end of the trail. A trail through gorgeous woods with a forest floor of delicate ferns and mosses. Off the trail. To go off the trail in the woods is couter-intuitive for us. Not so much because it's against the "written rules", but more so because one or two steps off the trail eclipses the respect required to maintain the integrity of natural resources. Ferns are crushed, rotted log habitats are smashed, animals are disturbed. Did anyone read the sign at the trail head? Geez, I don't mean to sound like naturalist of the year because I'm not by any stretch, but I know our family is a lot more careful about nature than many others. The damage done by people who don't give a flip can be devastating. I've seen it so I believe it. When you find a geocache, you leave a few words and the date of your visit in a notebook. Glancing through these notebooks, you find these sites are being visited several times a week. Lots of feet. Lots of damage. Not sure I want to contribute. Disclaimer: we have only visited 3 geocache sites, so maybe rules of placement are generally better followed than our small representative group. I would hope. One of the other sites on the island was easy to access from the trail. No complaints there. The other was just outside an Indian cemetery in the woods. Don't get me started on that. So, there is my 2 cents worth on geocaching. Now please help me off my soap box before I fall.

Back to our regularly scheduled vacation

Other than swimming and hiking the beautiful trails, we carved out some quiet relaxing time at our campsite.

This is the woods behind our campsite. No other campers behind us or to our right. The boys went off exploring here often and ran into deer. The funny thing about this photo is the figure there off to the left. I didn't notice it while I was taking the shot, but did see some movement out of the corner of my eye. I just thought it was another deer. Do you suppose it could be...Sasquatch????

There are so many more pictures and activites from our week on the island that I just don't even know where to begin with them. If I continue, I'll never get to Mount Washmore! I'm going to leave this post as it is now, just a taste of what we did. You'll just have to imagine the mini-golf, ferry rides, ice cream and taffy feasts, more hiking, more beaches, more geocaching,campfires and marshmallow roast-offs. We had a fabulous time and are tired, tired, tired. A great end to our summer!