July 4, 2024

Campsite in Manitou State Park to Leskinen Creek Campsite

14.5 miles

On the AT in 2019 I noticed a pattern: almost always, a terrible day was followed by an amazing one. A hot day of steep climbing was followed by trail magic. Cold rain preceded dry warmth. Blueberries after a thunderstorm. There was always something around the corner that the trail offered as repayment for suffering.

This comes back to me today.

That is not to say that there isn’t suffering. The cloud of mosquitoes around my tent this morning is legendary. My stuff still smells like trash. My socks are still soaking wet and caked with mud. But as we get moving (slowly, of course), the trail reveals itself as beautiful and offers apologies in so many forms and makes us reconsider our desire to stop hiking.

First, there is a vault toilet one mile from camp. Hilariously, it has an air freshener, and happily, it has a trash can. Then there is a road walk in the sunlight. The bugs are few and we can take our head nets off and actually see the world! We re-enter the woods and there are roots and rocks, but the slop is minimal. We take a snack break at Aspen Knob Campsite and I have a cold brew coffee and a bar. The sun is out and it’s looking like it’s actually going to be a lovely day.

We continue hiking until we get to Sonju Lake Road. Ahead on the trail, there is a closure that takes us on this road to avoid a downed bridge over the East Branch Baptism River. But we decide to just take the road all the way, because ease, because no mud, because hike your own hike. It’s lovely. There’s a breeze, there’s sun, there are fewer bugs, and we absolutely churn out the miles. We reach the trail again after the closure.

“Break?” Machine asks.

“Yeah!” I plop my pack down and sit on my sit pad, back resting against my pack. Both of us fall asleep, wake up a few minutes later, and keep going.

There are pine needles all over the trail and the light is softly filtering through the forest. “I’m sorry,” the SHT seems to be saying. “Don’t quit. See what I can really be.” Soon we arrive at the first Sonju Lake campsite and stop for lunch. There’s a chair made of logs with a backrest, and as we sit there a squirrel comes poking around checking out what we have. Machine names him Nutty and we start doing a bit about how he has been sent by the squirrel colony to get food from the humans but failed so he has to try again.

After about an hour we continue up the trail. I’m settled in with my audiobook, but not long after the campsite I look to my right through a gap in the trees and see bog boards leading out to a little rocky island covered in pines and spruces. I look at Avenza but there are no details. Curious, as if I’ve come across a mysterious hidden side quest in a video game (I’m imagining Breath of the Wild), I walk towards it, over the bog boards and out into the lake.

There is a sign on a tree that indicates this place as Lilly’s Island. On top of the sign there are two carved figures: one appears to be a gnome of some sort with a fishing rod, and the other looks like a fox. A few feet further, there is yet another pristine SHTA logbooks in a blue box on a post. It feels like I’ve discovered something secret.

Machine comes to join me and we walk out towards the rocks jutting into Sonju Lake. I try to manifest some loons, but no luck. Even so, the wind rippling across the water and the view out towards the trees encircling the lake make me feel a kind of mysterious peace I cannot name. I write in the logbook while I sit on the rock.

I don’t want to leave, but alas, we must. I keep waiting for the trail to go to shit all afternoon but it just doesn’t. There are roots, and there is some mud, but it is contained. And in one mud pit even, I notice these little orange fungi sprouting up among the footsteps. Like magic. Even the mud is beautiful today.

We take another break at one of the Egge Lake campsites and I have another cold coffee while I watch the birds (swans?) out on the water. Another few chill miles to camp. The trail seems suddenly very well maintained, very recently maintained, so maintained that I have to check Avenza to make sure we’re actually on the SHT. We gather water (read: Machine gathers water) from a small trickle under a boardwalk, and we soon arrive to the turn-off for Leskinen Creek Campsite.

There are people there when we arrive. People! Other hikers! We say hello to them and then set up, then we go down to the fire ring to make dinner and chat. Our campmates are a mother and daughter from the Twin Cities. The mother, Lisa, is thru hiking northbound, and her daughter, Abby, is joining her for this section. Lisa’s husband is also coming out at one point to hike with her. We have a nice pleasant talk around the fire, which is cozy and keeps the bugs away.

Back at our tents after dinner, I say to Machine, “Yay, friendly!” referring to how it was worth it to be friendly with other hikers even when we were exhausted and wanted to crash.

“I was thinking the same thing,” he replies. “It’s like the trail heard all of our complaints yesterday and was like, okay, FINE, here is some easy trail, here are some cool spots, here are some other hikers to chat with, like you wanted. Please don’t quit!”

And suddenly, without really explicitly stating it, we’ve decided to continue hiking. We may see how we feel in Silver Bay still, but today alone has proven that the SHT is worth continuing.