![](\"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/180x120.jpg\")
<\/a><\/div>\nAs I wrote about last time, this hike logistically is
\nproving to be more challenging than I expected.
\nThe biggest factor I need to deal with is the drought. Normally, finding water is not an issue on
\nthe Superior Hiking Trail. At most, you
\nare carrying two liters for ten miles.
\nAs the average rainfall for the area is six-to-eight inches less than
\nnormal for the year, the distances to sure water sources are farther. That means carrying more.<\/p>\n
On the Pacific Crest Trail there were areas where water was scarce. The desert of Southern California is obvious,
\nbut Northern California also has some long water carries. There were two helpful guides to deal with
\nthat. The Guthooks app was updated in
\nreal time and was the primary source I used.
\nThere is also a team that tracks reports and saves it on a spreadsheet
\ncalled the Pacific Crest Trail Water Report.
\nWith these two sources, I was pretty confident of the water
\nsituation. I also knew that I needed a
\nliter per five miles to start. At first,
\nI would carry a liter plus one per five miles.
\nAfter a while, I would chug a liter before I started hiking again and
\nthat would cover the first five miles.<\/p>\n
The Superior Hiking Trail doesn\u2019t have a real time app
\nsupporting it like Guthooks. There is no
\nteam tracking the water situation. All I
\nhave is a guidebook that says whether a source is normally reliable and some eyewitness
\nreports on the SHT Facebook page.<\/p>\n
I can deal with this.
\nI have a list of the sure water sources, so I will hike from sure water
\nsource to sure water source. That is
\nwhere I run into a problem with the very first section.<\/p>\n
I will start the hike first by taking a bus down to
\nDuluth. I will then need to arrange transportation
\nto the Martin Road Trailhead. I expect
\nto start hiking at roughly noon. I can
\nonly camp at designated campsites. The
\nfirst two sites with a sure water source are at 4.9 and 6.0 miles. The next campsite is at 11.6 miles; however,
\nit is dry. The next site with reliable
\nwater is 19.4 miles in. I\u2019m not going to
\nbe able to hike 19.4 miles on my first day when I start at noon. So, my first day is going to be six miles.<\/p>\n
Assuming I\u2019m hiking 15 miles a day, that gets me to my first
\nresupply point in Two Harbors on a Friday.
\nTwo Harbors is six miles from the trail.
\nHitchhiking is against the law in Minnesota. On top of that, everything is booked and has
\nbeen booked for some time. Ideally, I
\nwill hike in early, resupply, shower, do some laundry, and make any adjustments. That is not possible.<\/p>\n
If that wasn’t enough, there is a closure which is making this already unnecessarily complicated start even more complicated. Leaving Two Harbors is a five-mile road hike
\nand the next place to camp is roughly eight miles up trail. Doing that in a day is probably impossible when I have chores to do.<\/p>\n
Put simply, there are no good way to navigate this speed bump. So, I posted a question on the SHT Facebook
\npage and surprisingly received no good answer.<\/p>\n
As I always plan the crap out of every hike, I’ve been calculating distances in a spreadsheet. I’ve used Google Maps with the satellite mode on searching for water sources not in the guide book. No matter how I calculated it, the result was always shitty.<\/p>\n
Today, on a whim, I decided to call the Burlington Bay campground which
\nis located in Two Harbors. I studied
\ntheir webpage hoping to find something for backpackers to no avail. Many campsites near a major hiking trail have a dedicated walk in site for backpackers. Alas, this one does not — at least at first glance.<\/p>\n
They got back to me with an answer. They have one tiny campsite code named ‘Camp B’. It is in some trees near the office parking
\nlot. It is near the dump station, so it probably smells worse that I do when I get in. You cannot select it on the website, but it
\nis there. <\/p>\n
Honestly, it is perfect. This changes everything. The math works. I take a leisure stroll towards Two Harbors. I make camp at Camp B. I take a shower. I do my laundry. I resupply. I get a large pizza and I have an easy day. The next day, clean, recharged and ready to go, I hit the trail again. It is a much better plan. <\/p>\n
Fittingly, I\u2019m calling this — Plan B. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
(A crappy picture of a crappy camp site.) As I wrote about last time, this hike logistically is proving to be more challenging than I expected. The biggest factor I need to deal with is the drought. Normally, finding water is not an issue on the Superior Hiking Trail. At most, you are carrying … Continue reading T-Minus Six Days – Plan B<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3175,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sht2021"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3174"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3174\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3176,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3174\/revisions\/3176"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}