Wisconsin NCT: Day Five

 Wednesday, September 10, 2025

Beaver Lake Campground to Porcupine Lake Area, 20.4ish miles predicted

We were all up before the sun on Wednesday morning.  If you look closely, you can see all three of our tents glowing!

It had rained most of the night, which meant we'd be packing up wet gear.  Packing up wet gear meant our packs would be even heavier than the day before.  Hopefully things would clear throughout the day, and we'd dry out a bit!

This campground was complete with pit toilets and a water pump.  We all filled our bottles, since a lot of the water sources we had come across were not really water sources we wanted to use if we didn't have to!

While Matt and Tanya finished packing up, I decided to venture down to the lake with my coffee.  It was so quiet here, and I enjoyed the peaceful moment.

Just after hitting the trail, the rain began again.  Where was this coming from?  Our last radar check had shown no rain after Tuesday morning's storm!  This was uncalled for!

The weather did make things mysterious and beautiful, though, and I was comfortably warm, even with my jacket.

We decided that every four miles or so we'd take a pack break.  We discovered that if we stopped, even for just five minutes, we felt re-energized enough to make it the next four miles.  It was an added bonus if there was cell service, as we were in a pretty remote area.

The forest continued to be dark with the overcast skies and rain.  Every time there was an overlook, I just had to take the short trails to see them.  Sometimes I was disappointed, sometimes it was great!  Marengo Valley Overlook didn't have much to offer.

No worries, I had another Rice Krispie Treat to brighten my mood!

FarOut had really hyped up the Swedish Settlement area, and we were looking forward to seeing it.  Upon arrival, though, the entire settlement was completely overgrown.  If there hadn't been a map indicating where the various structures had been, we never would've known!

We continued along, and came through another tall, tall tree area-my favorite!  

Another logbook appeared and Matt signed it.  There was also another overlook: Juniper Rock.  Tanya decided not to come along on this side venture, so it was just Matt and me.  The trail was rocky and a little technical, but it was so worth it. It felt like another world up there!

By lunchtime, the skies began to clear a bit and there were even peeks of sunshine! I think the sunshine got under my skin because I turned a little crazy!

In the afternoon, we entered the Porcupine Lake Wilderness.  Wilderness is an appropriate word for this section as it was quite rural and overgrown.  There were no ticks, but lots of little sticky pickers!

We took one more late-afternoon break beside a lake, and it was sooooo nice.  It was quite an amazing spot and I didn't want to get up and go again!

We didn't know where exactly where we were going to camp for the night, but we were on the lookout.  The forest was very thick here and not very flat anywhere!  We still had a bit of time, though, so we pressed onward.

And then we kept hiking.  And hiking.  And hiking.  Every time we thought a good spot would be just up ahead, it wasn't good.  We needed a spot that had room for three tents, preferably mostly flat.  So, we kept hiking.  And then we started to get a little desperate.  We were tired.  Like, tired tired.  We took a side trail in hopes of finding anywhere at all to set up camp.  Finally, we came to the end of the trail and met a road.  Just across the road there was a makeshift parking spot that we quickly transformed into our campsite.  Our tents were still soaked from the night before, so we set them up to air out a little and set about making dinner.  

As soon as my tent was dry enough to get inside it, I did so.  All I could think about was lying flat and not moving for a really long time. Tomorrow would be the last day of our adventure, but we had miles to go before the finish.