Tuscarora Lodge & Canoe Outfitters

With a plethora of hiking trails in Tuscarora Lodge and Canoe Outfitters’ Gunflint Trail backyard, it’s no surprise that we’re frequently asked for hiking recommendations. More often than not, hikers want to know which trail we prefer: Centennial or Magnetic Rock?

On paper, the two hikes appear pretty similar: Magnetic Rock is a 3 mile round trip easy hike, versus Centennial’s 3.3 mile moderate loop and their parking lots are kitty-corner from each other on the Gunflint Trail. I’ve made my preference for Centennial well known. While there’s nothing wrong with Magnetic Rock Trail (and the concept of a three-story tall rock that you can stick magnets to and that can spin around your compass is pretty impressive), I’ve just always found the Centennial Trail a more interesting and invigorating hike.

But sometimes, all you need to get re-excited about a destination is to completely flip around how you go about getting to that destination.

When my family was up earlier this month, we decided to get to Magnetic Rock . . . backwards. We left one vehicle at the Magnetic Rock parking lot and then all six of us piled into the truck to park at the Superior National Forest’s Border Route Trail pull-off on Warren’s Road (Gunflint Narrows Road, USFS 1347). To find the pull-off, drive down Warren’s Road about one mile, right past/through the gravel pit and then down the narrow, one-lane road a little ways. You should spy the Border Route sign just north of the small parking area which has room for two compact cars or one large pick-up truck.
The first mile of the hike cuts across a rock outcropping which offers beautiful panaramic views of Gunflint Lake to the southeast. You can spy the cliffs on Arrow and Rose Lakes at some spots on the trail in this section. Just beyond the trail on the north side lies a deep valley.

Of course, you can only walk on the rim of a valley for so long; eventually you’re going to have to go through it. We did the hike on the first sunny day after a week of drizzle and although there was only one significant wet section of about 30 feet, it was very mucky. If you do this hike in the spring or late fall, definitely wear waterproof footwear. You also might like to have a hiking stick for additional stability in this section.

Once you cross through the little slough, you’ll hike about another half mile, mostly through lower ground and then, if you’re looking carefully, you’ll be able to spy the tippy top of Magnetic Rock to the northwest.

It’s a 1.8 mile hike from the parking area on Warren’s Rock to Magnetic Rock. From Magnetic Rock, it’s another 1.5 mile hike out to Magnetic Rock parking lot on the Gunflint Trail for a 3.3 mile hike total. Past Magnetic Rock, there are several more stunning overlooks to the north, as well as many groves of healthy jack pine saplings.
This is a great hike for a big groups because you really need two cars to pull off the hike (unless you just want to get to Magnetic Rock and turn around) and because the hike never crosses into the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness so you don’t need to limit your group size to nine people to comply with U.S Forest Service regulations. When you reach the Magnetic Rock parking lot, you’ll have to send two people to fetch the vehicle on Warren’s Road, but the rest of the group can continue hiking towards Tuscarora by heading down the Gunflint Trail and then cutting down the snowmobile trail that connects the Gunflint Trail and the Round Lake Road.  If you hike all the way back to Tuscarora, it’s a perfect 5 mile hike.

It’s Halloween and as seems apt, this morning dawns dark and misty, with a mild threat of snow.

It doesn’t always snow up here on Halloween, but it’s a frequent enough occurrence that when we woke up to a good inch of wet snow on Thursday morning, I hummed “It’s beginning to look a lot like . . . Halloween” to myself and got on with my day.

It’s little wonder that I associate Halloween with snow. When I was six years old, the Halloween blizzard of ’91 dumped two + feet of snow over Minnesota and completely shut down my trick-or-treating plans. Although the Halloween blizzard was definitely an anomaly, with an average temperature of 39 degrees in Grand Marais and along the Gunflint Trail on October 31st, there’s an omnipresent threat of “inclement weather” each Halloween in the Northwoods.

Much to my parents’ amusement (bemusement?), I spent much of my trick-or-treating years steadfastly refusing to believe that the weather would be cold for Halloween. Yet each year, it was down to the low 30s, if not upper 20s, by the time we were out masquerading for candy on the dark streets of west Grand Marais. This was a problem, since I insisted on such practical Northwoods costumes as . . . hulu dancer or . . . ballerina. In turn, my parents insisted we bundle up for trick-or-treating. (I guess they figured if they were going to end up with tired, cranky, sugar-high children by the end of trick-or-treating, they could at least avoid cold, frostbitten children.)

When you’re dressed as a ballerina, you can’t really pull your tights over your snow pants. A bulky jacket covers up all of your leotard and is long enough that it pretty well disguises the frilly tutu you’ve managed to squeeze up and over your snow pants. By the time I was dressed for trick-or-treating, my tutu just barely visible, I looked like the kid who couldn’t bother to get a costume together and is just looking for free candy. I met with many a raised eyebrow when I knocked on homeowners’ doors – a candy bag in one hand, an orange cardboard UNICEF box in the other – snowflakes settling softly on the top of my stocking cap. “So . . .,” they said. “What are you dressed up as?”

By age 10, I’d given up. My Pierrot costume pictured above could easily accommodate a full snowsuit underneath. Unfortunately, in 1995, when you told your friends that you were going as Pierrot for Halloween, they expected me to arrive for trick-or-treating dressed as Ross Perot. So much for doing away with costume confusion!

But from those chilly, snowy Halloweens, come some of my warmest childhood memories. Even as I carved our pumpkin this Halloween, I can still feel the weight of my UNICEF box growing heavier as we collected spare change along with treats. I can feel the cold nip of the breeze against our cheeks as we trooped up and down the streets and cut across frosty lawns. I can definitely remember the excitement of dumping out our bags of fun-sized candy on the living room floor when we got home. And every once in a while, I still find my mind wandering to the topic of snowsuit appropriate costumes.

I doubt we’ll have any trick-or-treaters tonight, but if we do, there’re some full-sized Snickers and Milky Ways in the pantry, left over from this past summer’s outfitting food.

Happy Halloween!

Robert Frost famously penned a poem proclaiming good fences to be good neighbors. But we don’t really “do” fences around these parts and the fences that we do have are usually attempts to keep rabbits and deer out of our veggie gardens.

We kind of think that Robert misspoke when he wrote that poem. Did he mean benches? We’re pretty sure that’s it. Benches. He meant benches all along!

Case in point – just a couple weeks back, we got a really good bench from a really good neighbor.

We’d noticed that bench on the office front porch had done its job well, but was ready for a replacement. Andy mentioned that maybe Bob Sr. over on Gunflint Lake could make a couple new benches for Tuscarora. Ada and Bob know each other pretty well from their time working for the Gunflint Trail Historical Society and Chik-Wauk Museum. (You might also have bumped into Bob if you’ve ever been down to Gunflint Pines.) In fact, you’ve probably seen some of Bob’s benches if you’ve ever stopped in at Chik-Wauk. But we weren’t really sure if Bob was still in the bench making business, so to speak, but figured, hey, it never hurts to ask.

When we floated the bench building project past Bob, he said, “Sure!” and called it a “win-win.” He got to use up some materials that had been clogging up the back of his workshop and we got a brand new bench.

We weren’t sure of Bob’s timeline with the bench project, but we figured he’d give us a call in the next few months when it was finished and we’d trundle down to Gunflint Lake to pick it up. But just 10 days or so after we’d initially asked, Bob and grandson came rolling up with a new bench in the back of the truck. Such service!

After spending a little time in the Tuscarora workshop getting varnished, the new bench is now ready to be enjoyed by you as you wait for the rest of your group to finish up in the office. It would also be a good place to have an ice cream or cold pop (or beer) at the end of your trip.

Thank you Bob for the beautiful bench and thank you for being such a good neighbor.