Day 58: Just Past Presque Isle River – Saxon Harbor, 28mi

Woke up this morning a little before sunrise, and found Superior just as calm and already as hot as it had been yesterday evening, so after a quick morning dip I loaded up Roark and started the day’s paddle. The shore spanning past The Presque Isle river is really quite beautiful, but with the end literally in sight (I could just make out the Silhouette of the Apostle Islands on the hazy horizon) I was in a pretty pensive mood, with my mind wandering all sorts of places, making it hard to focus and appreciate the shore in front of me. Took a couple of swimming breaks on my way up to Little Girls Point to cool down and escape the heat (somewhere in the 90s today according to my radio), but other then that had a pretty steady day of paddling up to Saxon Harbor and the end of the Michigan shoreline. Near the harbor I paddled a little ways up the Montreal River after having heard the sound of crashing water as I paddled past, and found a pretty sweet waterfall not too far back roaring into a root beer colored pool. After that minor detour I paddled a little ways past Saxon Harbor (and into Wisconsin!) along the steep sand and clay slopes that line the shore (that were also packed with people out enjoying the cool water of the lake on this hot day) until deciding to pull ashore at one of the beaches at the base of a particularly steep clay slope a little ways down from the crowd of people to call it an early day and take shelter from the heat. Spent the afternoon swimming, reading, and smoking my pipe while watching the many boaters (there is a marina and boat ramp in Saxon Harbor) zip around across the calm water, before making dinner and then pitching my tent (right near the water and without the rainfly again after last nights sweet experience) sometime near sunset. The fact that Bayfield is now only a days paddle away is really, really…. Weird.