A spin around the Little Manistee River in Northern Michigan
I headed out for a loop on the backroads and single track surrounding our place Up North. This is one of two stands of poplar trees, similar to Aspen, along the twists of Campbell Road. These individual trees are actually part of a larger interconnected organism.
The sandy Forest Service roads benefitted from the recent rains, which lowered the extreme level of wild fire danger. Koenig Road cuts across the forest to our south, dead ending then and starting again as many FS roads in the area do.
Couldn’t resist this shot near Schoenberg Road. It was actually on private property but we’ve met the owners and they probably wouldn’t mind. They’ve also set up a small chapel nearby. There must be a story.
There are plenty of houses and cabins but it doesn’t take long to feel a sense of remoteness. Somewhere near here, our horses cut thru the forest when they broke loose from our round pen earlier in the spring. We tracked them about four miles away by their tracks in the sandy roads.
County Line Road, the border of Manistee and Mason counties, is our quickest route to Lake Michigan and is usually washboarded enough to rattle your brain on a mountain bike. Not sure who would stop at that stop sign since Schoenberg Road leads off into the nowhere of the deep forest.
The Huron Manistee National Forest Service is quite active in the area and recently clear cut a few hundred acres near the Little Manistee Weir for wildlife habitat rehabilitation. The weir facility, by the way, is the source of most of the steelhead planted in Lake Erie and caught in northern Ohio’s Steelhead Alley.
Six Mile Bridge on the Little Manistee. Karen and I have paddled this stretch dozens of times and we’ve become quite familiar with its “stained” clear water, tight twists and turns, log piles and holes. And every once in awhile I catch a fish there.
It’s taken a long time to learn all the Forest Service roads on the north side of the infamous Nine Mile Bridge section of the Little Manistee, with its Blue Ribbon trout and steelhead fishing and Class II paddling. There are still a couple of two tracks I’ve yet to explore. It’s a stretch of river that is personal to many people, and it’s unbelievable that some douchebag with a gun had to use this sign as target practice.
The constantly changing light of the route.
Old Pops didn’t have the same problems these gravel bikers had on the way into Big M. One of the many virtues of the Spectral is its ability to glide over deep sand.
The “shoulders” of Big M remind me of my own shoulders: one slightly higher than the other. Big M has been described as a “pile of glacial poo” and provides quite a bit of elevation gain in its 30+ miles of singletrack.
The Bitchin Berms/Catamount/Bullwhacker area of Big M is among the finest singletrack in all of Michigan, but I had to duck out early because time was running short again. Preparations were being made at the main trailhead for the Lumberjack 100, an event I’d like my friends to attend next year.
Then it was back to the two-track near Pomeroy Springs alongside the section of the Little Manistee upstream from Nine Mile Bridge. I had hoped to do the loop out to Lake Timmerman, a beautiful place Karen and I have spent many hours kayaking. I had also hoped to find a new route to Lake of the Woods. Instead, I took the connector to the North Country Trail, which would lead back to our place. Plenty of private property along this stretch of the river. Just upstream are some of the old fishing lodges that rival those along the Pere Marquette. Thomas McGuane “immortalized” one of these lodges in his novel The Sporting Club. Read at your own risk.
Dead Horse Marsh. Next year, I’ll volunteer with the Spirit of the Woods, a chapter of the NCT.
Luckily, mountain bikes are allowed on this enchanting segment of the NCT, which had quickly recovered from some Forest Service controlled burns.
We call this place Night Hawk Hill. Usually four or five of them buzzing and whirring at sunset. It’s on the NCT, near a recently logged area a half mile from our trailer. Hermit Thrushes have nested in the area as well. Their haunting, re-echoing, flute-like songs are one of my favorite things about the time we get to spend Up North.
Our private path to the NCT. We only own two acres, but the NCT and surrounding National Forest provide us with nearly endless possibilities for exploration.
Our fledgling bluebirds woke me up one morning with their tapping at the window.
Speaking of a landscape that has grown into someone’s soul, David Roberts reveals not just the history of one of the most controversial places in the US, but he also gradually reveals some of his cherished secrets of southeast Utah. One of the best books I’ve read in awhile, and an area I hope to explore next month.
Travels with Pops 