Tag: state park

Lots of icicles hanging from a cliff face with some scare green trees

A Trip to Ohio’s Hocking Hills State Park

January 22, 2016

One of my top books that I read last year was Grandma Gatewood’s Walk: The Inspiring Story of the Woman Who Saved the Appalachian Trail by Ben Montgomery, a biography of the first woman to thru-hike the Appalachian Trail (at age 67), as well as the first woman to do so multiple times and the first person to hike it three times.

She also hiked the Oregon Trail, from Missouri to Oregon. However, despite the thousands of miles she accumulated on her Keds, her favorite stretch of trail was in her Ohio backyard: a six-mile stretch from Old Man’s Cave to Ash Cave in the Hocking Hills State.

In 1965, an annual winter hike of this stretch of trail led by Grandma Gatewood, herself, began and this year was the 51st annual hike. After reading about this celebration of this woman, relatively close to where I’m currently living, I knew I had to go.

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A cloudy sunset over Lake Michigan

Making Snowshoes at Michigan’s Ludington State Park

December 18, 2015

Three years ago, before I left for Thailand, I spent quite a bit of time researching and contemplating buying snowshoes. And then I reminded myself that I was moving to a nearly tropical and certainly snow-less country for just over two years and that would be a ridiculous purchase to make and that I should just wait. Well, now that I’m back in Michigan, and winter is supposedly approaching (though this El Niño affected weather system has me fooled), I thought this is the time to get those snowshoes.

Then I learned that there is a snowshoe making class at Ludington State Park offered several times in the late fall and early winter, that provides all of the materials and an instructor to make your very own traditional snowshoes and I jumped on that opportunity and decided to make a bit of a trip out of it.

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A close up of the bark of a white pine tree with some lichen

Where to Find Old-Growth Trees in Michigan

December 4, 2015

“You’re in charge of the last of the Truffula Seeds.
And Truffula Trees are what everyone needs.
Plant a new Truffula. Treat it with care.
Give it clean water. And feed it fresh air.
Grow a forest. Protect it from axes that hack.
Then the Lorax
and all of his friends
may come back.”

— “The Lorax” by Dr. Seuss

Nearly all of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula was logged in the 1880s and 1890s. When the “Panic of 1893” pausing the clear cutting for a brief window, a stand of trees, now protected by the Hartwick Pines State Park, to escaped unscathed. Hartwick Pines is one of about a dozen remaining locations that the state recognizes as “Remnants of Michigan’s Early Forests.”

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Green aurora borealis under a starry sky with a tree silhouetted on the right

Watching the Northern Lights Flashing in Michigan

November 6, 2015

Went I went up to Isle Royale in September, I had dreams of seeing the aurora borealis lighting up the night sky. I had done my research and knew that they were most active around 10-11 p.m. and just before dawn in the morning. Around the equinoxes is also a time of high activity.

However, I failed to account for the fact that I would be hiking an average of 10 miles a day with a 30-pound pack and that with the lack of electric lights that I would be sound asleep by at those times. I think I may have seen them one early morning, having been woken up by bright flashes in the sky, but I’m not entirely sure.

I got a second chance earlier this week though, when some kind of solar storm kicked up the solar winds enough to knock the Northern Lights a bit further south than usual.

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