Off Grid

And loved it...

My last post I said I would be off the grid for ten days*. That was way back on the 26th of July. So more like 15 days. It was glorious. (Substack is telling me this post is too long for email…)

I brought nephew to what is called The Rendezvous on Fall Lake outside of Ely Mn, just at the edge of the Federal Wilderness Area, land you can’t get to but by boat, for our first night in the Boundary Waters region. It was a small gathering of men affiliated with The Mankind Project. It rained lightly, periodically and often. We were there less than 24 hrs, but nephew, dog and I made a good impression.

It was good for nephew to spend a little time with older men who have lived good, solid lives and who have done good work. Nephew’s dad was a relatively solid stay at home dad until about two years ago, when he disappeared and became a homeless junkie alcoholic. Nephew and I talked a lot about that on this trip.

After the Rendezvous we drove from Ely to the Gunflint Trail and the Tuscarora Lodge where we spent a night in a bunkhouse. The next morning we were on the water on Gunflint Lake heading east. For a little bit, it looked like this,

but a lot of time like this,

becoming this, most of the time.

Nephew got to stand in Canada briefly, illegally, which he appreciated, having never been. We paddled nine miles to North Lake and set up camp. The mosquitos, horse flies and river flies were a nuisance to me, but the end of all things that are good to nephew. He was complaining so much, somehow I never took a picture of the camp or North lake.

We were planning to cross historic Height of Land portage, between North and South lakes. This is the point where the international border with Canada and continental Laurentian Divide cross, water flowing west to Lake Superior and the Atlantic, or to the Rainy River and the Arctic. Voyageurs would stop here and if they had a newbie with them, they would pour a dram on the earth, give him a shot and sing a song for him. The portage was a half mile across the bay, the portage is shorter than the distance of two city blocks the long way, we were only going to cross and set up base camp on the other side in South lake and hang out for a couple of days.

Nephew awoke the next morning and was not having it. Just about the first words out of his mouth were “rrrrrgh, these bugs,” as he flailed around drawing more bugs to him. There was not a cloud in the sky, there was a little fog lingering in the bays, there was no wind. It was an absolutely perfect summer Boundary Waters morning. Within an hour he was crying, after telling me he woke up at 4am and cried.

We packed up camp. When we were ready to leave the site I asked him to sit with me and talk.

He said “I don’t feel well. My stomach hurts.”

“Why do you think it hurts?”

“It was probably breakfast.” He was crying softly. I had bacon, hashbrowns and hot cocoa waiting for him when he crawled out of his tent (I sang outside his tent to get him to get up, when he didn’t I let dog in.)

“Do you think your stomach hurts because of anxiety, about not wanting to cross the portage?”

“Yeah, we talked about not going. I think that’s part of it.” His stomach seemed to not hurt as much.

“Maybe you feel a little like you are letting me down, like I am disappointed in you?”

“Yeah, I suppose I do. I know how much you want to stay. But I think I need to go.”

I told him “First of all, it’s ok if you don’t want to cross the portage. Second, I’m proud of you, that you came this far, that you made such a good impression at the rendezvous. This was my plan for this trip, not yours. I cannot be mad because you do not want to follow my plan. If you aren’t ready, that is ok. We can come back some day in the future. But remember, if you want to return, it has to be your choice, you have to prove to me you want it, we aren’t going to do this again, paddle in for one night and turn around because you are uncomfortable. If we are going to do this again we are going to finish what we started.” I told him I loved him, he said he loved me and we hugged.

Not long after he said “thank you, for that talk we had. I really appreciate it. It made me feel a lot better. And I’m not going to lie, bacon, hasbrowns and hot cocoa waiting for me when I got up, that was special. Nobody has ever done that for me before.”

Paddling back he was in somewhat better spirits. We were still seven miles out, but as soon as he realized he had a two-bar signal, he was staring silently at Tik-Tok. I asked him what he was up to, and when he told me I said, “now I know you are addicted.” To his credit he put it away for an hour at least.

By the time we were on Gunflint Lake again, the wind was howling straight down the lake from the West, two foot rollers were crashing into the East shore, it was so windy we had trouble turning the canoe into it. The wind was only 10-15mph, but it had six miles to move unimpeded down that lake. The waves can get much bigger. Nephew had talked about being seasick when we were on flat water in a channel. Riding the waves was the first time he seemed like he was having fun paddling.

That said, I did 99% of the paddling, there and back paddling all 600 lbs of canoe, gear, food, myself, nephew and dog. Because of the wind it took me 30% more time to paddle back. Nephew kept asking how far the landing was, I kept saying fifty million miles, until I finally said, you do not get to complain how long we are on the water if you aren’t willing to paddle to help us get there faster. He paddled for about five minutes after that.

We made it back to civilization without capsizing. We stayed the night in the same bunkhouse, and then took our time driving back to the city. He enjoyed skipping rocks on Lake Superior, his first time seeing it.

When we got home I asked him, what was the most fun thing he did? He said, the Rendezvous, swimming (we played a lot of catch with a water football) and climbing rocks.

He volunteered that he Hated canoeing and hiking. I told him several times on the trip, that’s a strong word and you use it a lot. On the way back down the Gunflint Trail we went on a one mile hike looking for blueberries. We found mostly serviceberries, which were plentiful. He only ate one serviceberry and one blueberry I picked and gave him. I think he ate them. He enjoyed feeding a few he picked to dog. I took my time eating as much as I wanted. Pure energy, I told the kid. He did not care.

He’s still just a kid. He measures everything on a scale of silly, ridiculous and fun. He has kid muscles and a kid brain, and I was expecting too much for his first time in the Boundary Waters. That was an expensive lesson for me.

But it was a great trip for him regardless, there will be a lot of good memories. On our return he was clearly feelling proud of himself. He said, “you can see my muscles for miles,” as he flexed his biceps. “Gains, I got lots of gainszzz.” He went on to say that he eats raw fish every meal, catches them and eats them right out of the water (we did not catch one.) I said you better not be eating fish out of these city lakes or you might grow another arm, and he looked at me like I was crazy, flexed and said, “more gainszzzz, I don’t know what you are talking about, three arms, geezzz, more gainszzzz. One more fist to punch with.” He talked about all the girls calling him, that he was telling to “hold up.” Silly, ridiculous, fun and almost but not quite a teenager.

Nephew was happy to be home. I was not happy to be back in the city. All I wanted to be doing was camping, fishing, hunting for mushrooms and berries and paddling a canoe. I strapped my newly purchased semi derelict but seaworthy cedar strip canoe on top of the van and headed north again for the first of seven nights in St Croix State Park.

I set up a writing table (all that is missing is the coffee or whiskey),

I fished, I paddled four days in the St Croix river and the Kettle river, and I ate smallmouth bass from both. (Vervain at the confluence of the St Croix and Kettle rivers. This plant often picks the most attractive real estate.)

The St Croix has a sandy bottom. Expand the pic and you can see the Kettle river bottom is glaciated bedrock.

Dog and I hiked every day. The St Croix and Kettle to this point are draining mostly woodlands, the St Croix starting in northern Wisconsin. South of here you see a lot more corn and soybeans, the St Croix is dammed at Taylor’s Falls and at St Croix and loses it’s clarity and wild quality.

I stayed seven very fine nights at St Croix State Park. I even, finally, found a patch of blueberries, and dog and I hiked the mile to it four times. It turns out dog is fond of blueberries too, and eats them like a bear does, with not quite the same singular intent and vigorous focus.

I have been reading Annie Dillard’s The Writing Life. In it she has a short chapter about a volcano erupting out of her typewriter. At the end she says “at least now I know it can happen.” I was deep in the edit of a chapter at my writing table when I climbed out from under the tarp and watched this for an hour, parked in the east. It made every fireworks show I ever saw combined, look like weak sauce. My phone camera only caught the full detail of about half of the lightening bolts, hundreds visible every minute - for an hour. It looked like the outside of a giant cloud kettle containing a tornado, but in the video you don’t hear wind but crickets. It felt like once in a lifetime.

From there I traveled south, to the south end of Chengwatana State Forest (St Croix State Park is on the north end), and stayed two nights close to the bank of the Snake river in the Snake River State Forest Campground. The Snake river is beautiful like the Kettle and upper St Croix, though it passes through highly developed Cross lake in Pine City, and there is a lot of corn and soybeans from there to here, so the water quality is degraded and the fishing not as good. I couldn’t see these rapids from my campsite but I could hear them. That made for nice sleeping. Too many rapids and the water too low to paddle. (Vervain at Snake River rapids)

I would have continued camping for the rest of the summer, possibly, but for a job I committed to installing doors and trim in Minneapolis. It will be good to make some money rather than just spending it.

Camping solo, I wrote ten thousand words and the final chapters of the rough draft of my first novel, which was good. I set an intention and I followed through. There is a lot of work there yet but progress feels great and I am deeply grateful.

I also drove a lot, putting roughly 1000 miles on the van. That is a lot of carbon to expend, going camping. I recognize a certain folly in it. At the same time I found myself thinking, all I really want to do at the end of the oil age is live out of campsites, traveling to parks by personal vehicle, while I still can. One of the nice things about this bluff country of the rivers St Croix and the Mississippi along the border with Wisconsin, there is not a lot of standing water so not a lot of biting bugs. There is something very charming about hiking in the north woods in the summer and not being constantly assaulted by mosquitos, which constant assault is the case especially in wet seasons most of the spring and summer at the 80.

There is also something very charming I remember now, about the gravel roads of rural America. I spent a lot of time on gravel roads on this journey. There are roads along that river that are not in google maps, that dead end without saying they dead end, leading to unmarked landings on the river. There are places where there is very little money, and places you wouldn’t think, where there is a lot of money. By the time you are south of Taylors Falls there is godless amounts of money.

What I did not see much of though anywhere on this route, were gardens. And fewer roadside stands selling vegetables or anything else. I would have liked to stop and buy some fresh vegetables without having to enter a grocery. That is strange to me, and a little unsettling.

But all in all, a great journey. Thanks for reading.

* I promised Monica at The Mariachi Years I would document this trip. Thanks for the suggestion.