Our final zigzag across the island included some of the most gorgeous scenery, and still plenty of wildlife!

From McCargoe Cove, we headed south back to the Greenstone Trail and some moderate climbing back up onto the ridge.

The trails were more heavily trafficked as we intersected some crossroads, but “heavy traffic” on Isle Royale meant that we saw SIX other hikers that day, so… subjective, haha. By then we’d gotten spoiled by the remoteness as we got to explore the island in near-total isolation. What an incredible luxury.

“Pristine” really was the word.

We overnighted at Daisy Farm in an awesome shelter with an incredible view of the east end of Moskey Basin, and started to hear the distant buzz of the occasional seaplane coming in or out of Rock Harbor.

On Day 10, we had just 8 miles to go, and slowed down to try to absorb every last bit of that magical place. The trails took us along the southern coastline, “and around every corner was another spectacular view. Little islands completely captivated the landscape of the bay (inlet). Boats zoomed in and about enjoying the perfectly calm waters. The weather was perfect as the sun would peek in and out behind fluffy dense clouds. By far the best views of the entire trip—magical” (from CK’s journal).

From our last night’s shelter at Rock Harbor, there was just one more day trip to make before we flew out the next day: the 3-mile loop out to Scoville Point and the very eastern-most tip of the island.

From CK’s journal on our last night on the island:

“I had brought a bottle of Roaring Dan’s rum with me and it was nearing the end, so I made my last few cocktails and enjoyed the afternoon sun. We could hear all the air traffic from the seaplanes and thought about how close we were to returning to civilization.

“The forecast for tomorrow is cold and rainy and if there’s too much fog we may be stranded for another day. Not the worst thing in the world but we’re both ready for a hot shower, a hot meal, and a soft bed.

“In lieu of that, I took a walk down to the docks. The old Rock Harbor Resort is there (shut down this year due to the pandemic) and it was surreal walking around the buildings. It was like walking through a ghost town.

“As night fell, we started talking about and dreaming about what our next adventure might be…”

After an exhilarating seaplane landing in Houghton, we collected our car from the parking lot at Isle Royale Seaplanes and drove across the bridge to our luxurious last night of vacation at The Vault Hotel. It was slightly awkward standing in their immaculate art deco lobby, covered in dried mud and not having showered for 11 days (we took plenty of freezing Lake Superior skinny dips, but we were good about Leave No Trace practices and didn’t bring soap, so… still fairly stinky), but the staff was very sweet! It’s a really outdoorsy college town in the northwoods, so probably they’re used to backpackers?

We strolled around the cute downtown and picked up a lavish dinner from The Den, big salads and steak and duck fat fries, ate it WHILE SITTING IN CHAIRS in our hotel room, and then watched a Will Smith movie marathon in bed. After spending about an hour and a half-liter of soap in the shower (still not clean but better).

This was our first long backpacking trip together, and we couldn’t have been luckier to be able to experience it. Isle Royale is a rich, vibrant wilderness of dense mists, rugged rocks, and busy wildlife, with all the moods of icy, powerful, crystal clear Lake Superior. Go immerse yourself if you get the chance.

*Isle Royale, native name Minong, is the stolen land of indigenous people from many different groups “from a widespread area that encompassed the entire Lake Superior basin. Included are the Straits of Mackinac sequence from the Juntunen site, the Lakes phase and its cognates from northern Wisconsin, Blackduck culture, Selkirk composite, and Wanikan culture from the rice district of northern Minnesota and adjacent areas of Ontario and Manitoba, and the Huron-Petun from northern Lake Huron” (from Michigan Tech’s Isle Royale National Park Cultural Resource Interactive Mapping Project) who relied on it for hunting, fishing, copper mining, maple syrup harvesting, and other resources. *