Activities Articles

Discover the Park through activities such as hiking, boating, camping and kayaking.

Ageless in the Apostles: Are you ever too old for an island adventure?

Ageless in the Apostles: Are you ever too old for an island adventure?

At what age should one stop kayak camping in the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore? Sixty? Seventy? Even eighty years old?  For more than 30 years a group of us has been spending a long weekend over the 4th of July holiday kayaking and camping in the Apostle Islands. We are all aging (the median age of the group was 70 this year), but we are still strong paddlers and competent campers. Perhaps it was only the oldest one of us who had been giving the “at what age …” question serious consideration. Come along with us on this year’s holiday trip. Perhaps you can help answer the question. Maybe...

Holiday Weekend Delivers Typically Atypical Island Adventures

Holiday Weekend Delivers Typically Atypical Island Adventures

We have all heard the term “multi use park’’ but only the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore could deliver the wide range of experiences park visitors experienced over the long holiday weekend. We may try to plan our visits across the water but in the Apostle Islands, it’s the wind and waves that determine time and destiny. Some call it “wayfaring.” If you were a sailor, Friday’s 25-30 knot winds out of the southwest tested skill levels and rewarded those who chose the lee side of an island to change sails. Likewise, a quiet bay was a welcome anchorage.Sailor Erica Peterson works the...

Attention Paddlers and Boaters: The Buoys are Back!

Attention Paddlers and Boaters: The Buoys are Back!

“The lake is the boss” and “know before you go” are literally words to live by when kayaking in the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore. Before your next paddling or boating adventure, it pays to learn as much as you can about the weather forecast and wave conditions. Lake Superior can be glass-calm in one instant and a short time later you might face three-foot waves from a fast-moving storm. The islands themselves influence wind and wave patterns every day and the cold water presents and ever-present risk of hypothermia. That’s why proper gear, training and forecast knowledge are so...

A Few Quiet Words on Silence

A Few Quiet Words on Silence

Shhh. Just listen a moment. It is early, before the sun has even broken the horizon this soft summer morning. The lake is still, rising and falling as softly as the breath of someone sleeping. The sound of dripping water inside a shoreline cave along the north side of Oak Island, like the gentle pluck of harp strings.  This is morning in the Apostle Islands. This is natural silence.Morning in the Apostle Islands – Jeff Rennicke photoWhen we speak of the value of nature, it is often natural resources we speak of – timber, oil and gas, fisheries, stone from quarries. Even in discussions of...

Recreation.gov app can be used to pay fees in Apostle Islands National Lakeshore this summer

Recreation.gov app can be used to pay fees in Apostle Islands National Lakeshore this summer

There’s no need to carry cash, checks or credit cards to pay for parking at Meyers Beach or to pay docking fees at one of the islands, if you have the recreation.gov mobile app on your phone. This free app, offered in partnership by the National Park Service and other federal agencies, includes a feature called “Scan and Pay.” You simply download the app to your phone and set up your account. Best advice: do this before you arrive, as cell service may not be available everywhere in the park. When you need to pay a fee in the park, scan the appropriate onsite QR Code located at the payment...

Cross Country Skiing to Oak Island

Cross Country Skiing to Oak Island

Thick ice and deep snow made for perfect conditions to explore a bit of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore. Three local cross country skiers with significant island experience skied from Frog Bay Tribal National Park to nearby Oak Island early this month.National Park Service MapThere, they found several sets of wolf tracks, confirmed by a wildlife biologist who said wolves have been sighted offshore of Red Cliff and the Apostle Islands this winter. Under clear blue skies, they also found some nice ice formations along the shoreline.Like the snow and ice beneath their feet, the wintery...

Volunteers prep Gaylord Nelson Memorial Garden for a long winter’s nap and vibrant spring

Volunteers prep Gaylord Nelson Memorial Garden for a long winter’s nap and vibrant spring

Bayfield-area volunteers and native garden advocates met at Apostle Islands National Lakeshore Headquarters in Bayfield for their annual fall cleanup in the Gaylord Nelson Memorial Garden. “It’s really a chance to get the garden ready for next Spring,” says Erica Peterson, one of the organizers. The group deadheaded spent flower heads but left the ones with seeds for dispersal. Flower stalks up to 14” were also left for native pollinators who make homes in the hollow stems. The group is always pleased to see the before and after. Together they put in a combined 20 hours of work, and it...

Senator Tammy Baldwin tours Apostle Islands National Lakeshore

Senator Tammy Baldwin tours Apostle Islands National Lakeshore

Big things happening on Sand Island. Friends of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore toured several projects on the island with Wisconsin Senator Tammy Baldwin on Thursday, September 2nd. The tour, led by Park Superintendent Lynne Dominy, including seeing dock work at East Bay, the accessible boardwalk project and more. The 2-mile-long boardwalk will connect the dock and accessible campsites, picnic areas, water sources and privies at East Bay with the Sand Island Light. The project is about halfway completed. It will be a major step forward in making the islands accessible to all. Friends...

Watch Now: ‘Sailing the Apostles,’ from our Sense of Adventure series

Watch Now: ‘Sailing the Apostles,’ from our Sense of Adventure series

There’s nothing like feeling refreshing Lake Superior spray in your face and the power of the wind in your sails. We want to thank everyone who joined us for “Sailing the Apostles,” our second Sense of Adventure online event on Tuesday, July 27th. Watch the program replay below.Friends Excecutive Director Jeff Rennicke takes us on location to talk with sailors about various aspects of the sport. Whether you’ve always dreamed of chartering a sailboat in the Apostle Islands, getting your kids involved, or racing in Bayfield Race Week, we’ve got you covered with information you can use to make...

Explorer’s guide to the Apostle Islands just released – buy a book to support the park

Explorer’s guide to the Apostle Islands just released – buy a book to support the park

Bayfield, WI – "My first visit to the Apostles was over two decades ago. Every wave over to Basswood Island made me wonder if we were going to die," says longtime explorer, paddler and author John Frank. "That feeling has since been replaced with a sense of awe and respect." Frank has just released the second edition of Apostle Islands Water Trips, an Explorer's Guide. And thanks to his generosity, we at Friends of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore are pleased to be able to sell a thousand copies of the book, with proceeds benefiting the park that we - and John Frank - love. Apostle...