Island Fairy Godmothers

Ranger Karena: you floated my boat twice over. I might not have done an early evening rounding of Blake Point without your encouragement. It was the best paddle of the 21 days.

Captain Mike of the Voyager II: thank you for delivering my precious packages and for sharing weather reports and weather concerns. Good luck with October!

Don Watson, professional trip guide, thank you for gently-given advice. I took your admonition to protect my rudder to heart and lifted it at the barest suggestion of shallow rock. You’d be proud of me.

Norm, Mark, and son, thanks for conversation, for a shared sunset from Carribou Island dock and Greenland paddle inspiration.

John, I loved our quiet evening conversation on the rocks above Chippewa Harbor and particularly your understanding and sharing of the solo traveler’s desire for silence.

Ginny Danfelt of Hovland, MN, thanks for posting my letters, even providing the stamps, and for the phone call with news of my trip to Lisa.

Malone Bay Ranger Clif, thanks for an early morning weather report and solicitous care squarely in the tradition of retired Michigan State Troopers.

Joseph, I am grateful to have seen how far a man can go, starting from the Ysleta barrio. Thank you for Spanish, for honesty. The bell rings only when things get interesting.

Larry and Dick: for one of the most interesting conversations regarding racism on the island. I’ve no doubt that you meet interesting people wherever you go!

Tracy and Derik: blessings for your good hearts and your strong legs. Thanks for conversation and wild apples.

Nile and Patti, for your love of each other and for our shared love of the island.

Jonathon and Bart, you were gentlemen and never once mentioned paddling around a point and out of the fog to find me wearing only my shirt and spray skirt.

Jim, thanks for perfect silence at the Duncan Narrows, for the freshest fish fillet I’ve ever eaten, for taking an end of my boat on the Duncan Bay Portage, and especially for your love, your care, and the rollicking conversation as we trudged back and forth with boats and gear. Thanks, also, for having more stuff than me!

Island Return

14 September 2007

Dear Friends and Allies:

I have completed both the paddling, and the more dangerous 1,700 drive home to Austin, Texas and am safe at home. Unpacking and the transition are my challenges now.

My big lessons from 21 days with the wild are to go slow, pay attention, and wait for the moment. Lessons learned through the practice of a hundred rituals of gathering water, lighting fire, making food, creating shelter, and then breaking it all down again and stowing it in the boat. Where a single forgetful or inattentive moment easily results in the loss of a vital supply or piece of equipment without backup.

I practiced these lessons in a thousand footfalls on rocky trails and wet, slick rocks getting into and out of my boat. One twist of an ankle would leave me in pain and far from help.

But most particularly I paddled the lessons in thousands of strokes. Pull too hard and I've a shoulder injury. A misjudgment of wind and wave conditions at a point, fail to notice that particularly big waves curl over a hidden rock and I find myself in paddling conditions to challenge my skills. Even in a calm sea, an overeager or misguided pull on the blades could tip me into the icy water with a risk of hypothermia and death.

The possibility of capsize without recovery was my constant companion. Carlos Casteneda referred to keeping Death on your left shoulder. I embarked on the journey neither wanting nor expecting to die. But I was willing to risk it and when I anti that poker chip into the game, it is a good one regardless of the outcome.

I offer thanks from the very depths of my heart and a deep bow to all of you who kept me in your thoughts and prayers, to those of you who sent letters, Mary Oliver poetry, cookies, dried beef jerky, noodle dinners, instant mashed potatoes, a bees wax candle, snack bars, a bag of cookie crumbs (Isle Royale tradition - we eat them with a spoon!). And 3 cotton swabs, which gave me both a laugh and provoked much thought. For what purpose and why 3?

I also offer humble gratitude to all of you who answered phones, wrote e-mail, planted gardens, sat on cushions, and generally kept this precious world going as best we can.

With much love,
Juniper Lauren

P.S. I won't send any more e-mails about the trip. You are kind to read this much. I will be posting excerpts from my diary on this blog: IsleRoyaleJourney.blogspot.com. Any of you with additional capacity for nerdy trip details, nature narrative, or philosophical ramblings please check it out. I'll get some photos up.

I hope that fellow journeyers might add their contributions to the blog. Journeyers is a broad term and an island is a state of mind. JL

The Journey Begins

13 August 2007

Dear Family, Friends, Compadres and Allies:

These are the final few days before I leave Austin for a 21-day solo paddle around part of Isle Royale in Lake Superior. I’ve been hoping to do this trip for more than a year and have spent the last months re-reading my books on kayak touring, sorting through my kit, and getting onto any easily accessible piece of water to get muscles and ligaments into some kind of shape.

I am grateful to Ron who has unfailingly shown up at a moment’s notice to add my boat to the top of his van and drive us to varied launch points. He is good on his end of a boat, has persuaded me of the indulgence of iced water, and doesn’t talk when I want to just paddle. If you know Ron, you might find that surprising.

I’ve one remaining challenge in addition to all of the small things like cancelling the newspaper and stocking up on vacation fish tablets, attending the last meetings, and finishing one more report. My food is shopped and sorted through, repackaged and divided into a box for the first 2 weeks and a separate box that I will mail to myself for the last week. Gear has been added to the “take” box, removed, and then added back again. Spare batteries have been purchased and travel times checked on MapQuest. But I don’t know whether everything fits in the boat.

Tomorrow night is the test pack. Everything will be bagged to be waterproof and a string tied to some of the bags. We will carefully load 50 pounds of kit and food into each tiny nook of the sleek and fast Looksha IV: the forward and rear hatches, in front of my feet, behind my seat, the pockets of my spray skirt. If everything fits, I get to paddle this boat, rather than the Chinook, a slow, high-volume boat purchased years ago to hold a mother’s cargo.

I hope it all fits: the olive oil and two pounds of summer sausage, 3 pounds of cheese, mixes for biscuits and cookies, dried refried beans and lots of masa for tortillas. Also the paddling jacket with the strangling neoprene collar designed to keep water out and me alive if I spill into Superior’s cold water, extra-thick neoprene pants, fleece, fuel, stove, tent, a book for writing, a waterproof and floating (isn’t that a great idea!) marine radio.

The marine radio will be my only contact with anyone farther than shouting distance. No cell phone service, no internet connection, not even a pay phone on the island. So I shall be incommunicado for the 21 days, except with boats within range of my radio. Since I have no way to recharge the radio, though, I will save it for some situation that I hope not to encounter.

A VERY urgent message could be sent to me through the park rangers by calling the park service in Houghton, Michigan: 906 482 0984 during business hours and 906 483 3169 or 906 337 4994 or 906 482 2121 after business hours. Cookies or mail could be sent to arrive on precisely one date when I shall be certain to be at Windigo. Mail them in advance to:

Lauren Ross

c/o The Voyager

Grand Portage, Minnesota 55605

The lower left corner of the package must say: Pickup @ Windigo on September 3, 2007

Thanks to all of you who will mind the babies and feed the cats while I am gone. Be well.

With much love,

Juniper Lauren