Manistee River Memorial Day Trip

Over memorial day weekend my wife, Water Weasel, her fiance' and I did our traditional trip down the Manistee River.  This was the 5th year in a row for us on this trip.  We paddled from 131 Bridge to Harvey Bridge.  We have had lots of rain this spring and we were worried that the river would be high.  It didn't appear to be flooded or anything, but the flow was a little faster than normal.   We got to our campsites much faster than in previous years and we were all less sore after a day of paddling than in the past. 

Saturday was our first day on the river. It was a little chilly and we dodged a few raindrops.  We didn't see many others on the river or lots of people camped on the banks.  We made a nice camp about an hour past Baxter Bridge Campground.  The site was nice but were the mosquitoes bad!!  They were the worst I have seen in 5 years of doing this trip!  I have paddled in the U.P. of Michigan where you can hear the mosquitoes buzzing.  This was not that bad thank goodness!  We enjoyed each other's company around the fire and listened to some great music.  We talked long into the night and finally went to bed when the fire died down.



Sunday was a nice partly sunny day.  We awoke to sun and pleasant temperatures.  The bugs were still bad though.  For breakfast we made some gourmet eats.  The night before our trip I made a yeast dough to make into cinnamon rolls.  So, Sunday morning I baked fresh cinnamon rolls.  I used a recipe from my NOLS course and the same brand of pan I used on my course.  It is called a Banks Fry Bake and it is one awesome piece of cookware.  Click for more info.    The dough is rolled to about a 1/2 inch thickness.  I used a wine bottle as a rolling pin.  The filling is made from real butter, cinnamon and brown sugar.  I spread this on the dough like peanut butter then rolled it.  I tried cutting the dough with dental floss like the recipe suggested.  This didn't work well so out came my razor sharp Mora knife.  After we had the dough cut, I placed them in the pan, covered with the lid, and put the pan on the Whisperlite.  On top of the pan I built a small twiggy fire and baked for about 20 minutes.  You can see the results in the pic and they tasted SOOOOOO good.  I made the dough with 1/3 whole wheat and 2/3 white flour with 2 tablespoons of wheat germ.  The finished rolls were very dense and filling!

We saw more people on the river and more campers along the banks.  I guess with the warmer temps. and nicer weather more people came out.  We came across a flotilla of canoes rafted together and the occupants were thoroughly enjoying themselves.  This was a fine example of "Cabrewing".  A short distance down river we came across 2 kayakers who were part of the "Cabrewers".  One of the kayakers had a nasty ankle injury from jumping off a bluff.  He misjudged the distance.  I got to use some of my Wilderness First Responder skills and did a quick and dirty assessment of his injury.  It was severely swollen.  My guess was that he broke it.  Water Weasel gave him some ibuprophen, I instructed him to keep the angle in the river to ice it, and I suggested he hurry to his take out point and get to a hospital ASAP.  I saw him an hour after we set up camp and his ankle looked worse.  I hope everything turned out OK for him.  In the late afternoon we got a nice camping spot on a high bluff.  This was a higher bluff than we normally like to camp on, but the site had a nice breeze and plenty of firewood near by.

I had some time to give my Bidor Parang a good test at this campsite.  There was an abundance of large logs and I got a chance to chop and split a few.  I also practiced digging for worms with it which it excelled at.  No worms were found so I didn't fish.  This parang was well worth the RM28 I paid for it.  That is a little over 7 bucks US.

I decided to get the evening fire going using my firesteel instead of a lighter.  I was determined to use natural tinder so I collected some dead grass and dead fern.  I tried and tried and tried to get a spark to catch but my tinder was obviously a little too damp from the rains the day before.  I finally resorted to some magnesium shavings to get a flame.  Once I got a flame the grass and ferns caught quickly.  After some birch bark and a little pine pitch my small fire was going nicely.  This fire was then built up larger and made smokier to help chase the mosquitoes away.  After dinner we all played a Wild West themed card came called BANG.  This game is from Italy and is very fun to play.  Google it.  We noticed the sky getting a little dark and WaterWeasel busted out her phone.  We were able to get 3G internet way out in the boonies.  She pulled up radar and a storm was on its way.  We prepared the campsite and banked the fire with more wood to prepare for the coming storm.  This video says more than I can type. 





 The storm didn't last long and we had a quiet night for the most part.  Off in the distance we could hear a pretty rowdy party.  We could hear the lyrics of the music and other "crowd" noise.  Sound really carries at night in the woods.  We all went to bed a little earlier than the night before and the party was still going strong.  I awoke around 3 am to a strange sound outside our tent.  I peeked out with my headlamp to investigate and found a raccoon munching on some food at the base of a tree just outside Water Weasel's tent.  I watched the raccoon for 5 minutes or so to figure out what it was eating.  I was maybe 20 feet from it and he did not care I was shining my light on him.  Then I watched him climb the tree and chew on a bag that was hung from a broken branch.  The bag was too close to the trunk and apparently there was some food in the bag.  I got my Teva's on and chased the raccoon away.  I found a small hole chewed in the back and potato chips on the ground.  I moved the bag and hug it from the ridgeline of our tarp.  The rest of the camp seemed secure with no way for marauding raccoons to get at any more food.  I also picked up a half dozen small round rocks for my sling shot and 2 golf ball sized ones in case the critter came back.  At 3am I could still hear the party in the distance going strong!  I briefly woke up again at 5am and could still hear the party!  WOW!!!  I remember those days when  I could party like that.
 

Monday turned out to be an amazing day!  The weather was hot and sunny.  I took a quick dip in the river which was ice cold.  We had a short paddle of 2 hours and then we picked up the cars and headed home.  This was an epic trip and everyone had a good time.  This was the first official canoe trip for Baby Denn and my wife and I think our baby will be a good companion on future trips.  The baby is due in September.  This trip is just what we all needed before a long and busy summer and before Baby Denn arrives!