Travel: A Superior walk

First day on the Superior Hiking Trail, I walked upstream alongside the Temperance River, which takes a precipitous course out of the Sawtooth Mountains.

It was late September, and the plant world was preparing for the cold months ahead. Green, in all its varied hues, was on the run. In its place, the flames of fall burned: Maples redder than a flamenco dancer's dress. Birch leaves shining brighter than a kid's crayon sun. Oranges so vivid they'd make a traffic cone blanch.

Even at autumn's low ebb, the Temperance River sang loudly as it followed gravity's imperative toward union with the big lake. A cool breeze shook leaves from the branches, making a dry clatter that could be heard over the river's song.

All in all, I was pretty happy. I had five days of walking this trail in front of me. The Superior is 244 miles of footpath, with wooden bridges over rushing rivers, log stairs up to towering outlooks and well-trod alleys through columns of cedar and white pine. Most of it built with volunteer labor.

You can do the trail the hard way, pitching a tent, filtering water and boiling up dehydrated meals. Or you can do it the easy way, lodge to lodge. At the end of each day's hike, I looked forward to a hot meal and a soft bed -- neither of which would have to be made by me.

The trip was arranged by Boundary Country Trekking. For a very reasonable rate (about $535 including single supplement) I had secured four nights' lodging, two meals a day (breakfast and a bag lunch) and a room, each one a dozen miles down the trail from the last. Because the Superior Hiking Trail is often a few miles from Hwy. 61 and the lakeshore (where the hotels are, generally), the price included a daily shuttle run. Each morning, someone from that night's hotel would follow me and my car to the end of that day's trail segment, pick me up and then backtrack to drop me off at the start. That way, at the end of the day on the trail, my car was waiting to be driven to the next hotel.

Loon and T-squared

In the low places on the trail, wooden boardwalks traverse seeps and sloughs, and it was at one of these crossings on my first day's walk that I met two Minnesota gentlemen of retirement age going by their trail names -- Loon (Mike Freed) and T-squared (Mike Shepard).

T-squared explained that his wife had given him the name "because I'm so slow. It stands for turtle times tortoise."But I'm slower than him," Loon said. "It's why we make good trail partners."

The friends had hiked the entire Appalachian Trail and parts of the Pacific Crest Trail together, and although they enjoyed their time on those more-famous routes, they said they were savoring the better-built, better-maintained Superior Hiking Trail.

"You're going to run into a lot of people out here," Loon said. "This is a famous place now; Backpacker magazine named it one of the top 5 trails in the country, and this is the best time to be here."

Loon was wrong about the number of people I'd see. During the next four days on the trail, I saw only about a dozen other hikers, and eight of them were in one youth group. At the moment I encountered them, near Indian Camp Creek in Cascade River State Park, their group leader was teaching them the fine art of pooping in the woods.

Restful retreats

Over the course of five days, I covered about 50 miles, in segments stretching from the Temperance to the Devil's Track River just outside of Grand Marais. Each night I moved on to the next hotel, carrying with me my luggage and the satisfying exhaustion that comes from a day of physical exertion.

Chateau LeVeaux at Tofte was a basic condo arrangement, with big windows facing Superior. I cooked my own dinner and afterward sat on the concrete pad outside the sliding glass doors of my suite, drinking tea and watching the lake. The slow pulsing of waves, visible in the movement of reflected moonlight scattering on the surface, seemed the very breath of the universe.

Caribou Highlands Lodge is basically a modern ski condo (it's on Ski Hill Road in the hills by Lutsen Resort), and my room there overlooked Moose Mountain and the falls of the Poplar River. In the middle of the room was an oversized whirlpool tub, where I soaked blissfully until bedtime.

The Cascade Lodge, with its lost-in-time North Woods decor and menagerie of stuffed animals, was the most memorable visually, from the elk looming over the stairway to the otter on the TV in the lounge. The cafe served up a mean plate of walleye.

The last place I stayed, the Pincushion B&B, has since been put up for sale, which is a shame. The previous owners ran a cozy inn perched on a ridge 900 feet over Grand Marais. Its rooms boasted one of the premier views of any lodging in the state.

One boot at a time

The 10 miles I covered each day were enough to be a labor, but not so much that I couldn't stop whenever I felt like it to daydream by a stream, photograph leaves or exchange views with a woodpecker (one sat just 6 feet from me chattering on a stump while I peeled and ate an orange).

There were times when the path ahead looked daunting -- particularly when I was standing on one ridge looking across the valley to the next peak. That might be 5 or 6 miles away, with a drop and rise of 800 feet to contend with in between. But, plodding along, not thinking too far ahead, I'd forget about that, and two or three hours later, I'd be wherever it was that I was going.

There is a primeval rhythm to a day on foot; to me it is a salve and a meditation. The travel writer Bruce Chatwin referred to this as "the sacramental aspect of walking." He believed that in our hearts, all human beings are transients, nomads, and that by moving through the world at the natural pace given to us two-legged creatures, we receive a measure of connection and redemption that can be transacted no other way.

Chatwin often floated away from reality on the energy of his own rapidly flowing thoughts, but I think he was on firm ground when he formed his theory about foot travel. Especially as applied during autumn on the North Shore.

In a moving car along Hwy. 61, speed compresses the fall leaves into a pleasant blur of color that passes too quickly to be truly perceived. But on the trail, the world unfolds at precisely the right pace: step by step, tree by tree, leaf by leaf.

Chris Welsch • 612-673-7113

Story and Photos By Chris Welsch • cwelsch@startribune.com