4 city people enter the woods, try not to laugh at what happens next

What could go wrong when 4 city dwellers head into the Northwoods at night?

Mistake #1-Packing wayyy too much for a "Backpacking Site"

I'll admit, I was one of the four.... Before you go thinking that I am just some city boy who decided to get in over my head out in the Minnesota Northwoods, I am a semi outdoorsy person and I live in the cities because of convenience, not preference.
That didn't stop this from being a hilarious story of things going terribly wrong, but it needed to be said so you don't judge me too harshly....
Let's move on. My wife, her aunt and uncle and I went on a camping trip to the remote areas of Split Rock Lighthouse State Park, near Two Harbors, MN. This is an absolutely beautiful gem of a place, right off Lake Superior. You would not be disappointed visiting here and many of the other parks along Route 61 that runs next to the massive Lake Superior.
A backpacking site is remote site, away from the main part of the park. Hence the name Backpack. You pack it in, you pack it all out, got it? Good. Because we learned that this is a LITERAL meaning the hard way.......

I do have experience in camping, and not just the K.O.A. down the road where your tent is right on top of the family with the huge RV, who runs the loud air conditioner and generator 24/7.

My family would take trips occasionally to camp at National and State parks, including making 3 trips out to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW).

The BWCAW is one of the most pristine wildernesses in the US, and one most remote too. It is located on the border of Minnesota and Canada. So I had experience with "real camping".  But that was when I was a teen, and now as a grown up, I wasn't used to being the most experienced outdoorsmen in the group. 

So, not paying attention to how remote we would be in our campsite, me and my wife's uncle were tasked with getting food supplies for the trip. I did try to explain that it would be smart to pack light and not make our food menu for this weekend trip be too extravagant. 

But he was not having it. He had just gotten a brand new portable charcoal grill, and he was bound and determined to grill up some delicacies that weekend!

And I caved, because he's a good cook.

So we ended up loaded down with food, our sleeping bags, air mattresses, pillows, clothes, camping gear, and on and on.... I had an uneasy feeling about this.... But hey, the medium rare steak is going to taste BOMB next to the campfire that night. Let's Go!

Mistake #2-Beginning to head to the campsite at night...not very smart

Because of taking too long and packing too much, we didn't leave and get to the park until dusk. That was not the original plan.... The ladies were both working that day, and so the plan was that they were going to carpool and meet us at the already set up and prepared camp that us men would have already taken care of......

There was a few things that made this plan DOOMED from the start. Because we didn't pay attention to how remote this site would be, we over-packed and then took too long prepping at the store as well.

So we ended up getting to the park when we did. By the time we got there, the ladies were not far behind and so we decided to wait for them so we could walk together to our campsite. We ended up waiting another hour or so, so it ended up being around 10pm when we finally got all our gear together and started our hike into the unknown...... 

When our wives arrived, it was pitch black outside. 

All the smart campers who were staying nearby the park had already eaten dinner, and we could see the flickering fires raging, while they sat around them, enjoying a perfect night.

We were now loaded down with all of our stuff. I had a packed Mountaineering Backpack, with both me and my wife's sleeping bags attached to the back pack weighing me down. I also was carrying another bag and also our pillows. 

Oh, and I had our young golden retriever attached to me too. Everyone was similarly loaded down, with coolers and a cart also filled to the brim. 

If you're rolling your eyes at us right now, I understand. I am not proud of this, being that I am a huge camping and outdoor enthusiast. But I need to get this admission off my chest! 

So we were finally off on our fated journey to the backpacking site. Will we ever reach our destination? As I am writing this, I'm not even sure. Better hang on and find out! 

Mistake #3-Hiking and setting up camp at night not recommended

So at this point, I was kicking myself in my head for packing so much, but I was still excited to get out to the camp.

As we walked the typical graveled trail headed towards all the campsites, we passed the bathrooms and information and map board. Stopping to take a look, there was a few things that immediately stood out to me:

1. On the map, there was the typical campsites that were all near the parking lot, bathrooms and showers. Then there was the "cart-in" sites. These were sites that were farther from the the parking, making it inconvenient to lug all your luxury camping gear to. Hence why they provide the carts. Then off on this long jagged trail was the backpacking sites.....2.2 miles away.... We all groaned at this, "Oh no, I ain't walking 2 miles!" "what were we thinking!?" "How are we supposed to get there with all this stuff!?" Unfortunately, we were hundreds of miles from home, and we already spent money on this, so we weren't turning back.....
2. As the group turned to continue down the trail to our site, I noticed a posted notification:

WARNING: MOTHER BEAR AND CUBS SITED IN AREA, DO NOT LEAVE OPEN FOOD IN CAMPSITES  

GREAT! As if trying to carry basically my whole apartment on my back in the dead of night in the woods wasn't enough, now I had to keep an eye out for bears.... 

I was going to let the group know about this, but I checked myself. I figured if I told them, they would probably just freak out and want to head home immediately. I decided that I would just make sure to make a lot of noise as we went, so that we didn't startle any angry mother bears and get mauled.

As we continued on, we passed all the typical campsites following the signs that led us towards our destination. Then, we passed the cart-ins. So far so good. The cart that we had with us was holding up good too.

Now we started to realize why "BACKPACK" was the operative word here...

We kept walking along the trail, it seemed to take forever, but at least was an easy trail. Maybe it won't be so bad we thought, if the trail was like this the whole way...And then we came to another sign to our right, showing the way to the back-packing sites. 

It pointed off into the dark woods.....With a narrow rocky, un-paved trail that made it impossible to continue with the cart.....

So now we started to realize why "BACKPACK" was the operative word here. 

We were forced to leave almost half of our things right there at the trail-head, meaning we were going to have to make another trip back at some point that night...

What followed was a long night walk through very rocky terrain, stumbling under the weight of our packs and trying trying to look out for signs with our flashlights dashing this way and that into the darkness.

I made it a point to keep talking to the group very loudly, to serve as a warning if mother bear was anywhere near. Nobody seemed to notice at first, and in hindsight that is because it was no different than usual..... Hey, I am a talkative guy ok? 

But as this trip went on, everyone became more anxious, tripping over rocks, missing turn offs and generally getting upset at our bad planning. 

Mother bear and cubs were probably watching us from the trees and laughing at how ridiculous we looked out there.

At one point, we came to a clearing in the woods, leading to a long stairwell down into what seemed like nothingness. We could feel the breeze on our faces and realized we must have been right near the Lake Superior shoreline. I'm sure that this was a breathtakingly beautiful sight, but at that point all we saw was a huge obstacle in our way with the stairs.....And on we went......

Mistake #4 - Not knowing what lives in these woods

There's bear, coyotes, bobcats and possibly wolves here my friend...

We had been trudging along for more than 2 1/2 hours. Everyone was upset, frustrated and generally in a foul mood by that time.

We had come to a bike pathway that actually is next to the Interstate Highway, but still not where we were supposed to be. 

By this time the group had noticed my constant loud talk and had become fed up. "Dude why are you talking so much!" "You have been talking non-stop this whole time!" 

My answer: "Well I was trying not to scare anyone, but there was a notice back at the park entrance saying there's mother bear and cub around campsites, so I was trying to keep us all safe." This answer was met with disbelief. 

"There ain't no bears out here! Whatever, you're just being annoying" I looked at whoever said that with a face that said, REALLY?? No Bears? There's Bears, Coyotes, Bobcats and possibly Wolves out here my friend, and these sheltered city people didn't believe me that there was bears. 

Side Note: Just last week there multiple bear sightings in the city of Saint Paul, a major metropolitan area, so black bears can show up just about anywhere. Luckily they are rarely aggressive to humans......

Once it was accepted that there truly could be a bear out where we were, there was even more tension from some in our group. It was a great night so far.....That was obvious sarcasm.

To move this along, we stumbled around for close to another hour, and by about 1:30 am we finally arrived to our campsite.....

We remembered we had to leave essential supplies behind at the trail-head

Upon reaching our campsite, we put up camp begrudgingly. It was not the vacation we were so excited about before.

And the trip got even more epic when we remembered we had to leave essential supplies behind at the trail head including the other couple's air mattress and other things. And so began the fun trek back through the rugged and winding trails that we spent hours getting lost in.....

The early morning hours were spent with me and my wife's uncle hiking back in silence, because we were both in pretty foul moods at that point. I guess I subconsciously was still trying to walk loudly and keep an eye out for the bear family, but no longer was I talking either.

The ladies finished making camp, and hung out in our tent.

We trudged along, and made much better time back to the trail-head. It was still a long journey there and back but much easier now that we sort of knew where we were going. 

We ended up back at camp close to 3am, and finally got to bed shortly after...That was rough, but man was it nice to finally get to sleep!....

Now the rest of the trip was not nearly the ordeal of that first night. And the thing about camping I realize is that there's going to be struggles and inconveniences, that's kind of the point..... But afterwards, you look back at it as an adventure and just a part of the experience. You end up wanting to go back, because you get to see scenes like this.....

(view of Split Rock Lighthouse, credit J.Richards exploreminnesota.com)

"Ok I googled What it means when coyotes are howling"...

Although not as exciting, the rest of trip had it's hilarious points. On the second night of the trip we were rudely awakened by howling and yipping off in the woods. Now I admit, when you first wake up to a howling sound, it's pretty unnerving and makes you wonder what is out there near your camp... But the telltale yipping and barking made me figure out quick that there was a couple coyotes out hunting. 

Nothing to really worry about. just keep your dogs close! But the best part about this, is my wife's aunt was quite freaked out by the sounds and yelled over to us in our tent wondering what was going on out there. 

Then a couple seconds later she yells, "Ok I googled what it means when coyotes are howling to each other!" She found out what was pretty obvious already. they were most likely hunting, but we were in no danger. I am sure at this point you're not surprised by our groups need to google this, judging by how we handled everything else so far.....

The Park Ranger must have been rolling on the floor laughing inside her head...

By far the funniest part of this story though is what happened the morning after our ordeal to find the campsite.

We still had some supplies left at our vehicle. I know, that seems pretty ridiculous after my description of what we were weighed down with the night before.... But the ladies ended up hiking back during the day to get the rest of our things. They came back talking about how beautiful the views were along the trail we stumbled through the night before, but also they had a HUGE REVELATION for us.

When they got to the vehicle, they met a Park Ranger making their rounds through the park. They got to talking to her, and ended up letting her know that we were staying in the remote backpacking site, and told her our story......

The ranger casually mentioned to them that there is a drop off about a half mile away from our camp site right off the highway. She said it like it was no big deal, just like 

"oh hey, you could've just dropped off your big load that you just toiled over for hours last night right next to your site, no biggie." 

The Park Ranger must have been rolling on the floor laughing inside her head, but she didn't show it, she's a professional and probably deals with people like us all the time.

So it turns out we could've dropped all our junk off right to our site, set up camp, and had a nice tent to rest in after our much more enjoyable night hike. Instead, we have a story to tell!

To conclude, I love remote camping and would do this again in a heartbeat. I think our whole group would.

And that is the beauty of getting outdoors and away from the comforts that we get so used to in our modern lives. Even when you have a trying situation like we did, and which many people do when they get away from their warm and comfy beds, you come out of it ready to do it again. I have no idea why scientifically we enjoy these inconveniences, I can only say that I get tired of the security sometimes, and the concrete walls we build for ourselves. 

As scary as the unknown is out in the woods, it sparks imagination, awe and a sense of adventure in all of us. Get out there and enjoy it!