Crackling campfires, Technicolor leaves, colossal orange moons, and the heady essence of pine give Labor Day in the north woods its dramatic sensory appeal. On the practical side, crowds are long gone, lakes are the warmest they’ve been all year, and cooler breezes have sent the mosquitoes to that great picnic in the sky. But the best reason for stealing away to a northern retreat in the waning days of summer is the satisfaction of milking this region’s tragically short season for everything it’s worth.

GET IT WHILE YOU CAN: the season’s final flare at Ely, Minnesota’s Burntside Lodge

DEERWOOD LODGE, the Midwest’s newest rustic-chic retreat, is an ideal place to escape into autumn. The six-suite deluxe log cabin, which opened in July 2003, on northern Lake Michigan’s Beaver Island, is 32 miles west of Charlevoix and is accessible only by boat or plane. Expect hand-stitched bed linens, in-room hot tubs with lake views, and fresh whitefish grilled to perfection by a Culinary Institute of America–trained chef. Beyond the lodge, the 13-by-eight-mile island is thick with white cedar forests where wild turkeys roam and bald eagles roost. It’s also pleasantly lacking in paved roads and anybody else.

“Our version of road rage is when someone doesn’t wave back when they drive by,” says Ken Bruland, a.k.a. Kayak Ken, the island’s sea-kayaking guide, who can take you paddling around one of seven islands or snorkeling through shipwrecks off Garden Island, a few miles to the northwest. Drier island pursuits include horseback-riding or mountain-biking a 20-mile trail system, hiking on the lodge’s abandoned four-mile rail trail, or playing Scrabble in front of the massive stone fireplace.

If the fly- or ferry-in logistics of Beaver Island sound daunting, BURNTSIDE LODGE, in Ely, Minnesota, offers the classic Boundary Waters experience for fishermen and paddlers. But instead of taking in the shimmering northern lights from a Therm-a-Rest–enhanced rock, they can watch the show from the veranda of one of 20 impeccably restored 1914-era cottages. There’s also a cedar sauna, cappuccino bar, and dining room with an award-winning wine list.

In the self-proclaimed “Musky Capital of the World,” Hayward, Wisconsin, three hours northeast of Minneapolis, you’ll find SPIDER LAKE LODGE BED & BREAKFAST INN, an 81-year-old resort outfitted with seven guest rooms. A close second to fishing is mountain biking along the nearby wooded Birkebeiner Trail, which hosts the Chequamegon Fat Tire mountain-bike festival the third weekend in September, as well as the famous Birkebeiner cross-country ski race in February.

CANOE BAY is the only development on private, 50-acre Lake Wahdoon near Chetek, Wisconsin, two hours east of Minneapolis. The posh, secluded resort accommodates 19 couples—in four lodge rooms, two inn rooms, and 13 cottages. Take one of the resort’s rowboats, kayaks, or canoes out to catch and release largemouth bass and perch, or hike the 280-acre grounds or the nearby 20-mile Chippewa Moraine Ice Age Trail. Back at the resort, there’s a fitness facility, in-room massages, and a restaurant with a chef’s tasting menu that changes nightly.

The post Summer’s Last Stand appeared first on ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø Online.

YOU DON’T float the Desolation and Gray Canyons of the Green River for the rapids. You go for a blissfully mellow trip through remote wilderness. During a trip down the Green one recent fall, an old friend and I didn’t wear life jackets or get our feet wet for eight days. The life-jacket part I don’t recommend, but the rest I do: We floated 84 miles through the Uintah and Ouray Reservation from Sand Wash to the takeout near Green River, Utah, eating lunch on the raft and passing the yellowing cottonwood leaves and the sweet-smelling tamarisk in various shades of yellow, brown, orange, and salmon.

When Edward Abbey floated the Green in November 1980, he wrote that this was “one of the sweetest, brightest, grandest, loneliest of primitive regions still remaining.” Late fall is still the best time to go, in my opinion: The nights are frosty and there may be patches of snow in the shade, but the days are warm and (most of the time) you can get by wearing just a T-shirt and long pants. You can eat well; on an oar-rigged raft trip you don’t need to skimp on gear or rations. You can also camp on ample silt banks and and hike up side canyons to look for tracks of bear and mountain lion, or scout for 1,000-year-old petroglyphs left by the Fremont Indians.
After Three Fords rapid, at mile 59, you pass out of Desolation Canyon and into shallower Gray Canyon. Look upriver here and you’ll see a great contrast between the red-stained Wasatch formations you’re leaving behind and the low, rounded, gray-green hills of the Mesa Verde Group ahead. The mild rapids turn to riffles and become fewer and fewer from here to the takeout.

Rapids: More than 60 rated Class I, II, or III.


Runnable Water Levels: 1,000 to 20,000 cubic feet per second.


Permits: $18 per person, required year-round. Apply to the Bureau of Land Management Desolation Canyon River Unit, 435-636-3460. Another permit is required to camp or hike on the river’s left bank from mile 7.5 to 70, which has restricted access controlled by the Uintah and Ouray Reservation. Apply to the Tribal Office, 435-722-5511.


Logistics: Drive your gear to Sand Wash, the put-in beach, via the 50-mile-long Forest Road 5550 (a left off U.S. 40/191 one mile south of Myton, Utah). Unload here, and then drive to the takeout at the town of Green River, Utah. Leave the car and hop an air shuttle ($100 per person with Arrow West Aviation, 435-259-7421) back upstream.
Getting Outfitted: Western River Expeditions in Moab rents rafts equipped with oars for $95 per day (435-259-7019). Adrift ºÚÁϳԹÏÍøs (800-874-4483; www.adrift.net) and Sheri Griffith Expeditions (800-332-2439; www.griffithexp.com), also based in Moab, will outfit five-day trips in November for $690–$725.


Don’t Go Without: The waterproof Desolation River Guide.


Best Campsite: Jack’s Canyon, at mile 24 on river right (facing downstream), is a wide, sandy beach under a grove of cottonwoods with massive, gnarly trunks. Sleeping quarters are beds of dry alder leaves—no tent. Heavenly.


Best Side Hike: Rock Creek Canyon, at mile 41 on river right. Look for the former homestead built of hand-carved sandstone. Hike up the spring-fed creek, where brook trout thrive. Fremont petroglyphs are on the right a short hike into the canyon.

The post Backcoutry Pass: Rafting Utah’s Desolation Canyon appeared first on ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø Online.