I was
heading south east on highway 41. I wasn’t too far from L’Anse Bay which is
located at the bottom of Keweenaw Bay, Michigan. There was also an Indian reservation
just to the left. I had discovered my Michigan Atlas/Gazetteer which shows the
entire state in detail, like Google maps, in a compartment behind the back
seats in my truck and decided to utilize it for the rest of my trek. The atlas
showed about four waterfalls all nearby so I decided to check them out
providing there weren’t a lot of tourists. None of them had anyone around as
the falls weren’t that big of a deal anyway. At the fourth falls there was a
small ranger station with no one around. There was also a trail leading into
the woods with a sign, “hiking trail length 1.5 mi” and a map of the trail. It
looked like the path went next to a river so I jumped at the chance of being
able to take some pics.
Before
hitting the trail, I changed as I’ve done in the past just to be on the safe
side, and checked to see if my phone had a signal. It did. Okay I’m cool and
ready to hit the trail. The trail meandered through the deep dark woods. There
was little light coming through the forest canopy so it seemed much later in
the day than it was and it seemed like it was twilight. I have to say that it
felt a bit eerie walking by myself through the thick of the forest. I knew that
it was bear and wolf country and was a bit apprehensive. I also knew that there
was a good chance of me spotting a moose so fear aside, on wards.
To my
amazement during this whole trip thus far, I’ve not encountered any biting
flies nor mosquitoes even deep in the forest. They don’t come out until July
and this is still June. I came at the right time. About .75 mi into my hike, I
came to the river. It was actually a creek but at that point it had widened
quite a bit making it look like a river. I took a few pics as I saw some ideas
for a painting and then continued ahead. Not far ahead, I could see an area
where two creeks come together making a wider area from that point down. Just
before the merging of the creeks and across, I see an old shack. It had no
electric or telephone wiring going to
it. It was pretty run down with an old worn out stair step with a broken down
railing leading towards the front door. There was also an old dock at the
bottom of the stairs which looked very unsafe. I thought that it would make a
cool painting so I snapped a few pics. A light had turned on in the back and
then another towards the front. Perhaps someone might have woke up and turned
the light on in the bedroom, walked to the kitchen and turned that light on.
 |
| painting of a cabin in the woods |
Since there
wasn’t any electricity running to the house, maybe the guy used a lantern.
Perhaps it was an old hunting/fishing cabin. I don’t know, I didn’t really
think that much about it. Just then the lights went off in both rooms and I
expected for someone to come out the front door. I waited with curiosity but no
one came out. Well maybe there was a back door and he went out that way, I
thought to myself and moved on taking a few more pics. A little over a mile,
and around the bend, I see the ranger walking towards me. He stopped and we
chatted for a few minutes. I asked him “so who’s living in that old shack
across the creek?” He answered “what are you talking about, what shack?” “The
brown broken down shack across the creek with white trim, just down the trail
about a few hundred yards or so. There’s some broken old steps and a fallen down
railing. It also has a dock. I saw some lights turn on in the back and then
towards the front,” I explained. He answered; “There’s no way anyone could be
living there, that shack burned down over a decade ago and the owner lost his
life in the fire.” “no way” I said, “I just saw the shack not five minutes ago.”
The ranger goes, “yup that’s the house all right but how could you describe it
so well, have you been here before?” I said “no”. We walked together to the
area where I saw the shack. All I could see was some of the charred remains of
it. Nature took over the rest. I thought that I would show the pics I took to
the ranger but they weren’t at all what
I thought that I had taken pics of. They were just pics of trees across the
creek.
He invited
me over to his office by the entrance and said “I want to show you something.”
What I saw was unbelievable. He had some photos of the shack hanging in the
back room prior to the fire, as I described it to him.
