"Circle Tour"
February of '16 a good friend and I set out to do the "Circle Tour" Did plenty of homework, got Remote Boarder crossing passes, etc, Crossed into Canada at Gunflint Lake and oh my, what a different kind of adventure! One thing that was not made very clear to us was that the North/South trail from Gunflint Lake to the main East west Corridor trail had not been maintained for several years prior due to sparsely populated areas and lack of snowmobilers to maintain trails. Trails were not marked, there was no trailhead at the canadian side of Gunflint lake, we did make it to Northern Lights lake resort and Kevin saved our day... I think the only reason we were able to make it that far was because I had gps sled maps saved on my Navi unit and my pal had polaris app with all trails downloaded on the phone. We used a combination of the 2 to get as far as we did, the 2 maps kept confilicting, at times mine was right, at times his was right. Anyhow once we got to Northern lights resort we filled with gas and headed North. Kevin the resort owner seamed pretty concerned for us, as he was expecting us much earlier in the day. (I had called ahead to make sure we could get gas there) Up to that point, the trail had been basically a network of logging roads, so aside of not knowing if you were on the right one, it was very much passable. A few miles north of the resort, the trail basically turned back to a "normal snowmobile trail" that once was about 10 feet wide, now fully overgrown and entirely unpassable! We searched and searched for a way around there and went back to the resort as the sun was going down already, and convinced (and paid) Kevin to trailer us to our next leg of the trip, in Atikokan. From there we checked back into our hotel, and ate our emergency food, because it was like 10pm and there was no place in town to get food or beer at!! Next day went perfect, rode back to Our home base at Crane Lake where we started from. A couple of things I learned-
-be very careful who you do a trip like this with, I was lucky and we both kept completely calm, but there was plenty of opportunity for someone to loose their mind and become very difficult a time or 2 during our adventure.
-pack some serious emergency stuff, If we would've pulled back into the resort 3 minutes later, the only people there would've been gone. We caught the owners as they were shutting the gates to the entrance of their resort, headed back to home in Thunder Bay. (Again, the only reason they were there in the first place was because I called days in advance to make sure we could get fuel, so they spent the day doing maintenance and cutting wood waiting for our arrival!) We just about spent the night in the woods, realistically we would've probably gone back to gunflint lodge, but still.
-If you think you've ever been in a sparsely poplulated area in MN, just cross the boarder into canada and you'll find that it makes the Arrowhead seem well populated.
-That region of canada does not follow daylight savings time!
-Would I do it again? Heck Yes!, IF I could verify the condition of the trail from Gunflint Lake to the East/West Corridor in Canada. I do now know of a couple of contacts if I were to look into this again.
-Canadians in this region are much heartier then us, if they say a trail might need some brushing, it means bring chainsaws, ropes, etc!
-We did this all midweek, and had the trails all to ourselves! Rode from Crane to Grand Marais in a day, probably the number one best day of riding i've ever done in my life! Day 2 from Grand Marais to Gunflint lake was great as well, followed by some fill your shorts adventure for the rest of the day. Day 3 back to crane lake was great as well, Some freshly groomed trail, and some good ungroomed trail. i can tell you that I have not been so excited to see a welcome to Northern Mn trails sign before as well when we returned! All in all a great memory with a good friend!
