Superior Hiking Trail
Map 1 - Section 10
Skyline Parkway to Haines Road
Date Hiked: May 3rd, 2025
Other Sections Hiked That Day: Map 1 - Section 8, Map 1 - Section 9, Map 1 - Section 11
This was one of those hikes where I wished I'd chosen to stop one section before I did, and the empty clanging of my water bottle only further emphasized that lack of better judgment.
With this early May jaunt providing tremendous views of Canal Park and the big ol' eponymous gnarly bitch of a lake, it was also accompanied with a surprising level of heat to which I had not yet adjusted. After all, mere weeks earlier I was pushing myself through temperatures with a minus in front of them and questioning my life choices for pressing on through thigh deep snow in a town where they'd have to figure out where it was before even attempting to find my Shining-esque, hilariously frozen hiker face amongst the rest of the Nothing.
Reflecting on these hikes now, given how long it's been since my entire summer of displacement, disappointment, heartbreak, and dearth of terrible decisions, it's hard to remember when completing this trail was the foremost goal in my mind. As of this writing, recent attempts to pick up where I left off in section 3 have led me to pick the wrong place for an entrance, be warded off by the dangerous levels of smoke being about, and also opting for paved, photogenic lakeside paths when I've been up in the arrowhead. Perhaps I'll continue finding sections to highlight on my massive poster when spring comes back around, but it feels like a different lifetime when I was pursuing this milestone, so the distinction between sections is a bit harder to recall than it was months ago when I was penning these entries as they were fresh in my mind. Life comes at you fast, and if you don't flip Ferris Bueller the bird and empathize with poor Jennifer Gray's character, you could miss it.
The Brewer Park loop section is among the more difficult in Section 1, including for making Enger Tower appear much closer than it actually is, at least by hiking standards. It reminds me a lot of the bluff trails in the Hiking Club reviews, with the trails along the edges of massive hills and rocks. They make one grateful for the scenery and relative lack of leaves that haven't obstructed the views quite yet, but also for trekking poles, as one slip on the steep elevation gains and declines could make for a less than pleasant afternoon from headbanging with a rock the size of a bulldozer.
While the views of the urban landscape, particularly of the gorgeous architecture that is Duluth, the scenes in distant, diorama spectacle aren't quite equal to crossing roads and dodging drivers uploading their panoramic shots with thumbs visible in the corner while driving up the hills. It may be part of the territory for section 1 before it becomes dystopian levels of rural, but it's still not what I prefer in the general context of hiking. Though by the time the trail reached lakeside, it was paltry by comparison.
No comments:
Post a Comment