Fall Off Marquette Pick Up Munising

I’d thought I’d love Marquette but found the people around me cold and disinterested compared to Big Bay. While there, loneliness set in and I drank too much.

On the way to Munising, I continued turning angry as I kayaked. The shores were lined with all the accoutrements of upper middle class #cabin_life. I could see “Live Laugh Love” through every picture window. So, I ignored shore and kept paddling arrow-straight lines from point to point, no matter how deep into the lake or how threatening the weather.

Nature kept doing its best to coax me away from my foils.

I tried drying out in Munising. Instead of nights drinking in my tent, I had mornings swimming in the warm bay. Instead of working 12-hour days, I closed the laptop and brought my boat back out to practice strokes and rolls.

I regained a sense of calm and accomplishment I hadn’t felt since Duluth. After this last stretch around Grand Island and along Pictured Rocks, I’d only have two more weeks of work in Grand Marais before I’d finally be by myself to just paddle.

The short trek across Furnace Bay to Grand Island was much later than planned because of a heavy workday, so I couldn’t be bothered with my usual routine. After crossing, I just brought a few fig bars to the tent for dinner. The weather was so warm I didn’t put up the rain tarp. I didn’t even bother with a change of clothes for the night, just hanging what I had in the trees to dry. As the sun set warmly through the tall pines, my attention drifted as I scrolled the news in my tent, naked.

At some point I became vaguely aware of sawing. I first thought it was a ranger clearing trails. But it was late evening. And the sound was also much too close. Looking up from my phone I saw a strange hump just outside. I was looking directly into the maw of a black bear sniffing around my tent. I shouted like a banshee Viking before stumbling into every curse word I could think of. The bear jumped back. Unzipping the tent, I meant to get as tall as I could before he figured out what I was. He scampered down the trail, confused and terrified. I chased. Every time he looked over his shoulder, I yelled louder and ran harder.

It wasn’t until well after he turned off the trail and disappeared into the woods that I stopped bellowing and screeching. I strutted back to the tent, laughing. Maybe the indecent exposure was really what scared him off.

If you’ve been to Grand Island or Pictured Rocks, they defy words. Great sheets of Earth’s history compacted over eons are revealed again by the relentless force of a great glacial lake cleaving chunks away from shore while the remnants remain standing proudly against the onslaught. Trees and bushes cling to the ledges far above, leaning into a precarious life and certain death on the rocks below as an exchange for the brilliant sunshine sparkling like emeralds off the waves. 

July 10-27, 2023

Route Map - Big Bay to Marquette to Munising