Not only was there a literal night and day difference on this experience of the SHT, but the soft dirt trail was frozen and sometimes covered in ice. I soaked in the sun and the stark brown leaf-off condition which opened views that were previously blanketed by darkness and obscured by the lush green vegetation. Traveling in the opposite direction brought a new perspective as well.
With limited road crossings, I had a 16 mile or 7 mile point-to-point option during the encore visit. I chose the longer option (an out-and-back wasn’t even an option since I had shuttle service)! I began at Gooseberry Falls State Park, the most visited state park in Minnesota, which only had a handful of cars in the gigantic lot. This was a stark contrast to our family’s visit in early June the prior year when a was aghast at the throngs of Disneyworld-like crowds passing us as I helped my daughter dump a pebble out of her shoe. As good as it was to see people recreating outdoors, by the time we got ½ mile down the trail, we only saw a handful of people on the remainder of our family hike. Today, I wondered when or if I’d see anyone else after leaving the vicinity of the parking lot on a Monday with a high temperature around the freezing mark.
I couldn’t believe I was on dirt before the first day of spring, when the prior year Old Man Winter wouldn’t leave. Last year, patches of snow were still hanging onto the trail in May in this area with impassable sections further north. Although there were few deadfalls on this section of the SHT (most of the deadfalls we the same ones I negotiated around at Nester Grade and Mike’s Rock during my FKT attempt), today ice was slowing me down, with a potentially nasty fall if I wasn’t cautious. Last year was a terrible year for deadfalls due to an early winter ice storm. I knew I’d be facing deadfalls and stopped counting after I reached 13 trees down in my first tenth of a mile scouting the SHT. I’m incredibly thankful to the generous volunteers that spent hundreds of hours clearing the trail, taking up to 5 hours to clear a single mile!
