Thursday April 7 - 10, 2022

Low temps: 30°, 28°, and 20°

Hiawatha National Forest

Thursday

Some guy tried to drive down the logging road to my campsite… what an idiot. He was lucky to not get stuck. You can see the snow was soft and deep.

I’m sure he used 4-wheel drive to back out. It took about a half-hour. I won’t do that again!

On my drive north, it rained most of the way, but it stopped just as I got to my parking spot. The temperature was fine for the 1.3 mile trek down the logging road. Two weeks earlier, I saw a guy had driven down to the site with his truck. The snow was harder then.

Friday

Last night’s temperature only got down to 30 degrees, so it was a very comfortable night for sleeping. My Mountain Hardwear Lamina Blaze synthetic sleeping bag, rated at -15° worked well. I especially liked the fleece pillow case over my Nemo Fillo inflatable pillow. I have a Roll-a-cot and an Exped downmat. All combined, it is a very comfortable sleep system. My sleeping hat covered my eyes and I didn’t wake up until 8:30am!

I really like cooking a breakfast on the stove top using my cast iron pan and enamel coffee pot. Such classic camp cookware!

Here is the finished result. I had the same breakfast all three days.

I like using my old classic utensils when winter camping. The big kitchen knife has been on 30+ canoe trips!

Friday was an all-day snowstorm. It was windy as well but only had a couple inches accumulate. I went out fishing is search of bluegills… no luck. This makes three trips to the same lake with the same result. I meet the definition of insane. I met another fisherman who came in on a four-wheeler. He was having poor luck as well, but was still out enjoying the quiet of the National Forest.

Saturday

Same breakfast, next day.

Saturday, I took a hike to a nearby lake to look at the hiker shelter.

Here is a nice set up for someone to winter camp. You could hang a tarp across the front and with a stove this would be super-comfy.

I did some wood carving while tending to my stove. Not sure what the little paddle will be. But I’ve always used a board in front of the stove for utensils. This is cherry that I had sawn for projects. The cherry logs came from the Tomorrow River Bike Trail in Central Wisconsin. My next little carving idea is to make an ice fishing rod handle for next year. I need to glue the knob on the cutting board as there is a split there. And sharpen that whittling knife. I think carving projects might be a better activity for camp-time. I’ve usually played solitaire.

Sunday

Last September, I made a stash of firewood next to my campsite. The weather in Sept and Oct was especially nice and campers used up over half of my stash. I typically haul in my own wood anyway, so there was still plenty for the little that I used. Note to self: Make firewood stash later in the year.

My trout fishing lake shows in the background. The short log in front of the pile has been used several times to counter=weight the end of my canoe in the summer and fall

View of my tent from the wood pile. I burned a variety of woods on this outing, not by plan but it just happened. My wife wants a smaller wood pile in the garage. I sure like the garage wood as it is dry and burns well. I burned Cedar, Oak, Cherry, Pine, Birch, and Maple.

Well, it was a great site as usual. At least I did get out winter camping once this year.