Day 3 17 Aug 2008 Spruce Lake

I woke up first to a beautiful morning. I really wish I had a fishing pole right at that moment as the lake was like glass and I knew it was full of hungry trout. We petty much had the same routine that we did the previous day, only I felt even better than the day before. We headed out to Spruce Lake along the NPT.

The weather was nice and the trail, though muddy at first dried out and we had an easy walk into Spruce Lake. The woods were as interesting and full of variety as the last two days and I really enjoyed the walk into the lake. Just before we reach the Spruce #3 lean-to we found a couple of boats chained to trees. We wondered how the hell some determined person got these in. We stopped and had lunch at Spruce #3, which was gorgous and would have made for a nice place to camp, but Guide and Trail Blazer wanted to go to Spruce # 1 at the S end of the lake, so we headed S. we made a quick visit to Spruce #2 to check it out and moved on to Spruce #1.

We were very disappointed when we reached Spruce #1 as the Lean-to was set far away from the lake and was built in an area that water would drain if it rained. You could tell by the way the ground looked. We had to make a decision here as we did not like the site but it was 9.5 mi from the trailhead, while not only would we have to back track ¾ mi, but we would have a 10.3 mi walk out and for my footsore companions there were not happy about either choice, but they thought it was best to go back to Spruce #2, which was a nice site, but the lean-to needed work as some of the floorboards have no support underneath. The decision proved to be the most correct one and is a reason why it is good to hike with experienced people.

We didn’t get much sleep that night as, just after dinner and right when we were settling down to a comfortable night in camp, we heard thunder and saw flashes of lightening. The first storm was the most violent and only lasted for 20 minutes, but we had straight-line winds, a lightening strike 150 feet away from the lean-to, ½ hail and torrential rain. We were dry and comfortable in our lean-to. We had a brief respite and we watched trout jumping just off shore. Oh I wish I had a damn pole. About 45 minutes later another round hit, but it was not as intense, but it rained for another 10 hours. We didn’t sleep much, but we were snug as a bug in a rug in our shelter.