Five non-woody vintage hikers and one puppy met up at Nichols Lake North TH. As you can see, the day was bright, but it was barely above freezing when we started. By the time we finished I was in shirtsleeves!
Four of us made it as far as Tank Creek, 3.7 miles south on the trail. There is a very new bridge there, nicely built, with rip-rap protection for the stream around the footers.
No matter how many times you hike some section there are still things you may not notice. The bridge may be new, but the Carsonite post with the name is definitely vintage. Can you believe there is a sticker on the back side of it that indicates the date that post was installed? It's been there since June of 1992. I mean, at this point that's almost museum quality. I don't think I've ever noticed an installation date sticker on a Carsonite post before!
Speaking of museum quality, this piece of trail was actually built in or shortly after 1971. After the feasibility study for the NCT was done, a club called the Michigan Trail Finders agreed to build it through the Manistee National Forest. They made it from Croton Dam to McCarthy Lake. The trail is still mostly on their original route. I didn't find one today, but there there are still a couple of the old Manistee Trail markers out there in the woods. You can read more about them at exploreNCT. I got this information from David Snoek.
The weather and sky were perfectly gorgeous, and our choice of route took us past Nichols Lake. This view has been pictured so many thousands of times, it must surely be vintage by now. This lake is 160 acres and spring-fed, as are many of the lakes in this area, with no inlets or outlets.
And just north of Nichols is the tiny Atodd Lake, which seldom gets enough sun to look blue, but from one angle, it did today.
This is the first time I've hiked this section since I started my big hike in Dec 2021. This is in the Western Michigan Chapter territory, but it's only about an hour away, no farther from me than the northern stretch of our own chapter.
I didn't get a lot else done. We hiked 7.4 miles, and 7.2 of them will count for Hike 100.
Total miles hiked in 2024: 142.6 of which 45.4 is North Country Trail.
North Country Trail, Newaygo County, MI, Nichols Lake North to Tank Creek and back, 7.4 miles
 | See Momentous but Familiar |
2 comments:
Looks like nice trails. Glad you had good weather. That sticker held up well.
Lulu: "If that baby Ent is looking to participate in the siege of Isengard, I think he's a little late ..."
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