Professional Help for Our Trails
/By Ned Hancock
A crown jewel of the Wilderness Preserve is its 8.1-mile system of hiking and skiing trails at the Island’s north end.
The trails can be accessed at three well-marked trail heads (see the accompanying map). And once on those trails, you won’t get lost: there are prominent red dots painted on trees for miles and miles. But despite the hard work of MIWP board members and many volunteers, nature frequently takes its toll; too often the trails are wet and not so easy to walk on, if not impassable. The MIWP is therefore excited to announce that professional help has arrived!
With a generous bequest from the estate of Mark Allsup combined with dollars from our annual fund-raising efforts, we have hired professional trail builder and designer Will Krift of Trails Anonymous, LLC. Will has earned a well-deserved reputation building and refurbishing trails around Duluth and Minnesota’s North Shore including parts of the Superior Hiking Trail, as well as the “Big Ravine” park in Bayfield, and others.
For starters, the Board asked Will for a proposal to enhance the 2-mile section we call the “Upper East Loop” (see map), accessible from the Sowl Trailhead, 3547 North Shore Road. The work will include the addition of duck boards, elevated boardwalks, the rerouting of sections to avoid standing water, improvement of drainage, etc. Our goal is to create a more walkable trail system, while still allowing for skiing and snow shoeing, with minimal environmental impact.
The work will begin late this summer when the trails are dry and should be done by November 1 — perhaps in time for a final hike through the fall foliage and before the first snow.
