My First Packrafting Adventure: Manistee River, MI - Sept. 28-29, 2013

Manistee River Trail near Baldwin,MI + Packrafting

Overview: Day 1 - Arrive and Hike the 11 miles of the MRT, Day 2 - Packraft the Manistee River back to the car.

We drove up early in the morning in order to make complete the full Manistee River Trail on Saturday. We planned to camp on the location we had 1 year ago when we did the MRT + North Country Trail Loop.

This was also the first camping/backpacking trip with my new car AND my new packraft. The goal of the trip was to get out camping one more time before the colder fall weather came, but also to try out my new packraft. With a smaller pack already, it was tough to fit in the gear and the packraft, but somehow I managed. Personally, I was really worried about my gear leaking and things getting wet. The shortness of the 1 night trip was all the we could fit in. In general, this was my first chance to also figure out how well all my water/rafting is going to work out. Chances are, I would identify that something should change in order to improve things for the next trip.

The trail views of the Manistee River were just a great as I remembered.

View from one of the mid-campsites along the MRT.

We scoped out of the river for debris. We'd be rafting back through here the next day.

We ran into this little guy on the trail.

In addition to the new packraft, this trip was also a chance to try out the MLD Trailstar.

The campsite and campfire before the packrafting trip.

The Trailstar before the rest of the gear is underneath. We had plenty of space here, and even got to test it out against the rain. Except for a ripping bivy sack (mine..booo....), it worked out really well. We still have to work on learning to pitch it lower, but it still protected from the rain very well.

A pic from inside my packraft. I don't have many since I wanted to keep my phone secure.

Mike on his packraft.

In summary, the weather for the packrafting could not have been more perfect. I was just under 70F and the water, was cool, but not freezing. I did have some trouble with my spray skirt leaking into my boat and getting my pants and sleeping pad all wet. Going forward, I'll have to figure out whether I can fix this or will have to move my sleep pad so that it protected from the leaks will seem inevitable.

Stay tuned for future trips in 2014!