It has been a very dry summer this year here in Bemidji. We find ourselves primarily staffing for fire, which requires us to be to work by nine in the morning. So, six AM came a lot earlier than I wanted it to today, as we are going to be spiking at Big Bog Recreation Area to do some trail work instead. This isn’t new territory for us since we have already spent eleven days working at Red Lake during fishing opener in May helping to ease congestion among boaters. In addition, we added a few more miles to the North Country Trail in the Paul Bunyan State Forest last June.
Since we got all of our tools and camping gear loaded up the Thursday before, all we had to do that morning was pick up some groceries for the week of camping. We’ve been on spike a good deal of the year, so the grocery shopping goes pretty easily. Turkey burgers, brats, and Hamburger Helper made with spicy Italian sausage are the usual meals. After we stacked our groceries and personal gear on top of everything else we were ready to drive the hour and a half up to Red Lake to begin our week of work.
We checked in with our project host who let us know where are campsite was so we could get our camp set up. We unloaded our stuff only to find that the other Bemidji crew had pilfered through our stuff and ransacked us! We were down a Pulaski, three tents, and who knows what else. Luckily John, our field specialist was able to come to the rescue and resupply us with some tents.
After we got our one remaining tent up we threw our groceries inside, and got to work on our trail. The trail building went really well and was a lot of fun. We chain sawed and brush sawed a path through the forest and pulled out some roots. The area is beautiful. Be sure to take a look at the Big Bog boardwalk if you get a chance, and while you’re up here be sure to check out the new trail that we put in around the bog.
