So today was a productive day. I had a 5:00 am wake up (maybe one beer too many beers last night). By 6:00 am I had cooked breakfast and was ready to get to work. First, a few things to prep before I load up and get in the field. The day’s task: deploy sondes, collect gas samples, and bait some bacteria!!!! I was in the van and driving by 7:30.
First Site: Canyon
I’d say that Canyon is my favorite lake here. It is just so interesting and challenging – my trip to the lake is proof of that. As I try to turn onto the road my map says leads to the lake, I find this:
So being the fearless, determined scientist I am, I grabbed my gear (>50 lbs) and walked the 2 miles to the trail head. Nothing is going to stop me.
The trail is about another mile and includes some boardwalk through the swamp, some rocky flat terrain, a small mountain, a bit of mixed forest and finally some more swamp with a rotten boardwalk. That about covers the major biomes of the area and I love it. Once you make it to the boat dock you find an old aluminum boat (not one of the fancy Club boats) and a dock blocked up with logs. With some careful maneuvering you can get the logs out of the way and get the boat in the water. As you start to row out you can see how amazing the lake is
Well time for science, but nothing very interesting yet. I was just deploying a sonde so I can hopefully measure lake metabolism. Fun stuff.
The walk back is much more enjoyable – about 25 lbs lighter too! Time for a few pictures:
The view from the mountain
(Oh you can see the sonde, well the blue float)
Some pitcher plants growing on floating logs:
Oh yeah, this is what the trail looks like:
Can you find it?
So as you can imagine, it is past noon when I leave. Time for lunch, and lots of water.
Second Site: Ann
The after lunch sampling trip is a hike to Ann Lake. So there is a faster way to get to Ann – row across Mountain Lake – but I really wanted to do this hike. The trail goes from the boat house on Mountain Lake and into the woods. After a while you end up on the beach for a nice stroll along the water.
Ok, back into the woods, but not for long. Quickly the terrain turns rocky and the trail is going straight up that mountain, which is apparently called the Fortress. The walk is a bit steep when you have a ton of gear, but at the top you forget that you are out of breath and sweating bullets.
Ok, well time to keep going. Time to go up the side of Mt Huron.
Almost there! Just a short hike down the mountain and threw some more swamp. At least there is a sturdy boardwalk over this stream of duckweed.
Almost there! Just a little further through the woods and the trail brings you to the boat house
Now these are the nice boats – hand-made, solid wood. You don’t want to know how much these go for. Well they are sure amazing to boat around in. So more science. Blah blah blah.
Ok, well it is time to head back. The hike back to the van is over an hour and the drive back home takes 20 – 30 minutes. It’s already 5:30 so I better get going. What a productive day.
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