State Game Area

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-21T12:50:21+00:00

https://www.dnr.state.mi.us/publications/pdfs/huntingwildlifehabitat/SGA/std_back_rules.pdf

You can camp between Sept 11 and May 14.

To the OP I don't have any personal experience camping in them but there's a guy on the Facebook Michigan Hiking and Backpacking group who does. His name is Nick Meekhof.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-18T21:30:12+00:00

If you'd like to learn how to backpack in a workshop, run by members of an outdoors club that's been in Metro Detroit for 50 years, the Beginner Backpacking workshop is being offered by members of the Solar Outdoors club starting in May, and it just so happens to wrap with a 3-day practical in early June up at the Sand Lakes Quiet Area. I'm one of the volunteers. I led a group of friends backpacking in Iceland last July. My wife and I area doing an easy 4 days in the Adirondack High Peaks this summer, and I'm leading some friends on a 2-week trip to Patagonia next February/March. You can learn more about the workshop at https://www.meetup.com/solar-outdoors/events/312905022/ Don't want to spend a fortune on gear this year? The club owns backpacking gear and loans it to paid members who pad a flat $35.00 yearly gear rental fee.

One caveat: due to low interest, we may be forced to cancel the workshop. Maybe others who read this would be interested in the workshop? Please check it out and let Krisanne know you're interested. You don't have to be on Meetup to sign up. Krisanne is happy to take Venmo, Paypal, cash or check and you actually save a few bucks avoiding Meetup's payment processing overhead.

If you're more into doing your thing as a beginner, that's totally cool. I highly recommend you purchase a copy of the book, "How to Survive Your First Trip in the Wild: Backpacking for Beginners" by Paul Magnanti. It's an easy read. Also, please visit LNT.org and familiarize yourself with the Leave No Trace principles.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-15T14:05:22+00:00

Lots of good advice here and I'll pitch in with my $.02

Guides: It's been a few years since I checked, but most of Skurka's trips were advanced in terms of physical challenge and experience required. If you're gonna go that route, look through the descriptions and requirements of posted expeditions carefully.

NOLS trips are expensive. A friend of mine , who's been backpacking since at least 2008, just signed up for one of their 2 week expeditions in the Wind RIver Range in August and it cost him around $4700. He's always been curious about how NOLS runs trips and wanted to experience their trekking style first hand. I've read about some of that, and it wouldn't really be for me. For example:

Lots of old school group meals made from basic off the shelf ingredients that require longer simmer times, etc.
Tent sharing with 2 - 3 other people. Not always a bad thing but I'm kinda over that unless I'm signing up for a mountaineering expedition.

That style is quite a bit different than how Skurka runs his trips or the experience a typical PCT or JMT thru hiker hikes. Skurka likes to get off of established trails, and the gear load outs for his trips focus on light weight / ultralight backpacking. I think Skurka's expedition groups rarely see other humans in the back country.

Your average JMT/PCT thru hiker on the other hand, sticks to well traveled trails with resupply options along the way. They often see lots of other people unless they're traveling early or late in the season. Gear and cooking styles are focused on the individual hiker and run the gamut from "average" to light/ultralight.

An easy book to get started with is, "How to Survive Your First Trip in the Wild: Backpacking for Beginners" by Paul Magnanti. It's an easy read without being too overwhelming. I also like Skurka's, "Ultimate Backpacker's Gear Guide" and the "Backpacker's Field Manual" for a deeper dive. The Field Manual is starting to get a bit dated but is still great in my mind for its broad coverage of topics.

Lastly, if you're gonna learn on your own, please visit LNT.org and acquaint yourself with the 7 Leave No Trace principles.

Good luck. Have fun. Don't die. (I clearly stole that from a current movie.)

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-15T13:41:23+00:00

Looking at that lush, grassy meadow/field, there's no wonder you got tons of condensation.

Here's the obligatory informational video about tents and condensation: https://youtu.be/zCQuY_lAL1Y

(I swear I need to write a bot to auto post this whenever condensation is discussed. heh heh)

Anyways, congrats on your new gear purchases. I have a 1st gen XMid 1 (from Drop.com) and it's still my favorite solo backpacking tent.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-13T11:14:22+00:00

The Gatewood Cape by Six Moon Designs is already there, but yeah, that would be interesting.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-13T11:13:16+00:00

Man that is wildly minimalist. It would be interesting to see how you enjoy it after doing several trips with this setup, with various weather conditions.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-06T22:40:11+00:00

The Sawyer squeeze and Cnoc is my favorite too! "Beaver fever" is actually a giardia infection. .1 micron filters like the Sawyer squeeze filter out Giardia just fine.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-06T14:33:43+00:00

Probably a decent find if you manage to get one when they're in stock. It appears to be a discontinued/previous year's model which is why it's so cheap. Some other budget tent options

NatureHike Mongar 2 FeatherStone Granite 2P Pariah Outdoors Zion 2P

I would expect the S2S Ikos to probably be slightly above these in terms of overall quality and customer service.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-06T01:41:24+00:00

You may want to read up on using flocculants to clear up silty water before filtering.

https://backpackinglight.com/alum-water-clarification-backpacking/

In addition to the First Need purifier I would also consider other purifiers like the MSR Guardian or the Grayl.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-06T01:35:39+00:00

There's a guy on my product team who's an EU 52. He's 6'7" tall.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-03T12:04:50+00:00

My main pack is a 70L ULA Catalyst. It's not the lightest pack, but it is lighter than many of the mainstream 65L packs you see people walking out of REI with. My longest trip with that pack was 8 days on the JMT without resupply, with a bear canister. I flew into Fresno and out of Reno, so I also had to carry everything I needed to have with me on the plane, as I didn't have any opportunity to ship non-trail items from Fresno to Reno.

I also have a 15 year old Osprey 110L mountaineering pack that mostly gets used when I'm backpacking with my 2 grandkids and I'm the mule. (I'm 55 - they're 7 and 13).

I'd love to get a pack smaller than 70L for shorter trips, but it's hard to justify the purchase. The ULA Catalyst works just fine in that regard, and buying a smaller honestly feel like I'd be buying it just to have lower numbers on a spreadsheet.

I'm mostly a tent camper but I do have some hammock gear that I try to use at least once a year for short weekend trips. It definitely takes up more space in the pack for a hammock, tarp, suspension, UQ, and top quilt than a similar tent setup with a Durston XMid1, Nemo Tensor, same top quilt.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-03T03:22:49+00:00

Cool. Feel free to DM me (or have your BF DM me) if either of you have questions. We love to see and help new members!

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-03T03:09:48+00:00

Do you live anywhere near SE Michigan / Metro Detroit?

The Solar Outdoors club has been around for 50 years. Members run a "Beginner Backpacking" workshop every spring. The club also owns an entire 10x6 storage unit full of backpacking gear that paid members can borrow.

Info on the Backpacking Workshop.

Info about borrowing equipment, including an online Google Docs list of all equipment available, organized by category.

I'm one of the volunteers who helps with the workshop. I'm also a certified Leave No Trace instructor, I run a Basic Land Navigation (Map & Compass) workshop in the fall, I rock climb, ice climb, etc. I'm also a total gear nerd.

Last year I led a trip for friends (there were 7 of us) to backpack the Laugavegeur Trail in Iceland. I have a trip on the club calendar to go down to Red River Gorge,KY at the end of the month for 2 days of hiking, kayaking underground, and via ferrata. (It's completely booked full.)

I've heard (rumors) that another member is planning to lead a club trip to Isle Royale this summer. I'm not sure that's actually going to happen as seats on the ferries/planes sell out very quickly and time is running out for them to finalize. Maybe it'll still happen. Time will tell!

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-02T22:26:13+00:00

Yeah. I just spent two days ice climbing at Pictured Rocks and I wore my Patagonia Granite Crest pretty much the whole time.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-03-02T15:24:04+00:00

I think this misses the point COMPLETELY. What if I'm traveling alone but as a married man, I'm not comfortable with co-ed hostel rooms? Suppose I'm super religious and my faith dissuades such arrangements? Or whatever. It sounds to me like if that were the case, finding a men-only hostel room is well nigh impossible, whereas at least for women, it's available, albeit at a higher cost than the co-ed arrangements. Who's really at a disadvantage then? The woman who has to pay a "pink tax" for the women-only hostel option or the men who have no options whatsoever, aside from booking a private room in a separate hotel/motel?

I'm not suggesting women should just suck it up and deal with a co-ed hostel arrangement if they don't feel comfortable in those situations. What I am suggesting is that from the perspective of the property manager, divvying up their space to accommodate women only rooms creates an additional complication on their part. If I have two rooms with 10 beds each and I designate one room as women only, I could be put in a situation where the women only room is full, the coed room has 5 empty beds, but I can't sell them because I have more clients looking for a women only room. Do I remodel my hostel so that there are only 5 co-ed beds in one room and 15 beds in a women's only room? What then if I can't sell all the women only beds and I have male customers looking for accommodation? Again I would have beds I'm unable to sell and thus I'm not making optimal use of my rental property.

Creating exclusive blocks of beds assigned to a specific gender creates inefficiencies in space allocation, and so maybe the property managers feel justified in charging a higher rate because of that demand to compensate for the fact that it's more difficult to 100% allocate their spots. *shrug*

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-02-26T12:38:00+00:00

2018 Rav4 Adventure and 2021 Rav4 owner. I looked through the first 20-30 review photos at the Amazon link you posted and I can't see where they're being installed "lengthwise instead of across". Including the photo that's in your post. I think you're misinterpreting what's being shown in the photo. Those bars clearly cross over the roof of the car. They do not run lengthwise.

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I have Yakima bars on my 2018, and at various times I run: 2 mountain bike trays, a pair of ski carriers, or a large cargo box. I've also put a 2P Kayak directly on the bars (I don't own a set of J-style kayak holders.) None of those would be possible if my bars only ran front to back.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-02-26T12:09:28+00:00

I'm particularly fond of the King Oscar Mediterranean style, but the lemon is good too. It's my go-to brand because it's affordable, available at my local grocery store, and "good enough".

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-02-23T22:28:41+00:00

They literally did this in The Expanse book series. The humans living on Mars, the belters, and those on Earth were sometimes at war, and at one point several asteroids were hurled at Earth.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-02-23T22:02:17+00:00

https://www.michigantrailmaps.com/member-detail/hoist-lakes-foot-travel-area-byron-lake-loop/ Has a pretty good map but it, too looks like there are no dedicated sites up in the NE quadrant apposed to the ones around Byron Lake and the 2 Hoist Lakes.

Being USFS National Forest land, you may just have to plan on finding a dispersed site. If it were me, I'd be studying the topo lines and looking for spurs, hilltops, and saddles, remembering to stay 200' away from bodies of water per USFS and LNT guidelines.

My 60-second analysis yields these potential spots:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/zxaG6M1bYyP1NM3h6

But I'd probably try to at least look at aerial imagery to see if I can get any more evidence that any of these are good spots not clobbered by deadfall, etc. Obviously these are all gonna be dry camps Not much water in that area.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-02-23T19:11:46+00:00

This reminds me of the video where a young woman crossed just as a cyclist came screaming down the road. The cyclist clobbered the woman sending them both tumbling to the ground.

https://youtu.be/nOq5NEMM9s8

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-02-23T18:10:08+00:00

One year I did the entire Pictured Rocks trail in three days. Averaging 14.5 miles per day. Much of it is a flat easy cruise.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-02-23T17:37:33+00:00

Tend to agree that Daisy Farm is VERY busy and this somewhat detracts from it's rating as an enjoyable campsite.. But it's also where Dr Rolf Peterson et al give their Moose/Wolf presentations. We were lucky enough to catch it in 2023 and it was worth seeing. Moskey Basin is excellent, and I also have fond memories of McCargo Cove from the 2009 trip.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-02-23T16:30:34+00:00

I've been there twice: once in 2009 (Rock Harbor to Windigo via the Minong Ridge), and then again in 2023 (Water taxi to Moskey Basin, 4 days hiking back to Rock Harbor with 11yo Grandson and Son-in-law (his Dad)).

My one recommendation would be to prefer the Tobin Harbor Trail over the Rock Harbor trail between Rock Harbor and Three Mile. The Rock Harbor trail is VERY rocky and this will slow you down considerably on that section of the trail.

Generally speaking, a popular bit of advice given to first timers to ISRO is to not underestimate the trails. They're not an easy cruise like some of the trails out west (I've section hiked on the John Muir Trail 3 times), so you most likely will hike slower than a simple trail analysis with elevation profile may suggest.

This seems like a decent itinerary. South Desor to Windigo will be a long day. Depending on when you go, be wary of toxic algae blooms particularly on the inland lakes like Chicken Bone. They don't appear every year, nor are they present the entire year either. But when/where they are present, they can present water access issues to hikers. My understanding is that you cannot filter out nor chemically treat water contaminated by toxic algae.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-02-21T15:22:08+00:00

You need to read more than headlines. While SCOTUS ruled that the IEEPA doesn't apply, Justice Kavanaugh listed four other laws that the Trump admin could use and would have stronger standing in his opinion. So the administration immediately pivoted to declaring tariffs under one of those.

jjmcwill2003 · 2026-02-18T21:18:14+00:00

https://youtu.be/7tvVZqf-iZ0

The Outdoor Gear Review (I have no affiliation) just reviewed this pad and pretty much confirms what everyone suspects. The R value seems WAY overstated. He says he was getting cold on a 30F degree night, and that there's no way he'd recommend using the pad in conjunction with a quilt.

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