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We will be at Shelter 1 on Friday, Shelter 2 on Saturday, and catching our ride at Shelter 3 on Saturday. This group is also based out of Meetup.com. It looks like there will only be 2-3 of us hiking and 2 car camping. If anyone is passing through and sees us, feel free to come on over and hang out for a bit.
Below is some basic info I got from the Ranger Station. I'm not sure if it's useful to anyone here.
Here is the latest and greatest from the ranger station:
1. Where to buy wood? --Piggy Wiggly in Kewaskum at Highway 45 & 28
2. Snow cover. Snowshoes required? --Good base layer still be high temps and rain over the next 2 days could change that. Call back on Friday. Snowshoes would be useful if conditions do not change.
3. Where do we check in? -- -no check in and & no check out. Just have a copy of your reservations with you in case a ranger comes by.
4. Are there any manned Ranger Stations in the Northern Unit on the weekend? --No station. Visitor center staffed on weekend. 930-5pm on Saturday and 3 hour on Sunday. The visitor's center is on Highway 67.
5. Emergencies- 911 everywhere in the park. Ranger reported good cell coverage.
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OK.....just so you are prepared. I go through there a lot and even though I haven't been there so far this winter, I've done many Dec. to April trips in there. Our March trips have been on snowpack from snowshoes. A lot of people dayhike in showshoes on the trail between shelters. especially up by Parnell Tower. It can get extremely icy due to the hard packed surface that is like solid ice. I've never seen it this early where it isn't like this. If you have YakTrax, kahtoolas or cleats of any kind, bring them. Trekking poles help tremendously also. One year it was so bad, we used the horse trails to move around because it wasn't packed ice on them. The IAT was like a luge run and we could hardly make the shelter. That's how slow we had to go.
If I go, it will be Greenbush to Shelter 5 and back for a quick overnighter.
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It's shaping up to be an interesting Sunday: possible 4-8 inches of wet heavy snow that will probably change to ice later. Bring snow showshoes or yaktracks if you got em.
http://www.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/116508653.html