The Monks Trail on a Particular Day in December with David

A red and gold Greek Orthodox Cross fashioned as the trailhead sign points the way to a lightly worn woodland path leading into the the depths of sky-reaching pines and along side a pristine pond encircled with raised wooden walkways and a Hobbit-like bridge. Once there you find yourself in sparking silence. The pond, replete with 12"-14" trout is remarkably tannin-free and crystal-clear, allowing one to see as deeply into it as the depths will allow before the covering darkness presents itself. 

From the pond, rough hewn signage directs the visitor to the precarious Jacob's Creek Gorge, a mining-era cemetery and the Arnold Mine Ruins. Along the way unique benches, all hand-fashioned and not two alike confirm the presence of the trail. 

Thoreau-like "campsites" built in rustic fashion and, on a winter's day, piled high with mounds of fresh tuffs of white snow pop out of the woods.                                      

The invitation to sit with a cup of hot tea is tempting. The hike into and along the Gorge is one to take with respectful caution as the trail is steep in places, runs precariously close to the Gorge edge and, in the winter, can be icy. Varieties of animal tracks and scents (if of the canine variety) are everywhere throughout the forest and down into the Gorge, assuring that one is never alone in these beautiful woods, silent as they are, save for the Creek. Jacob's Creek tumbles through the Gorge over and under rounded bobbles of ice and ice-caked rocks and branches reaching down into the cold, thick water as it makes its way to the step-plunge falls it is so well known for.

.                              At its exit point from the Gorge a neighborhood space, as it were, on M-26, is shared with the Monks Bakery and Jampot - a well known purveyor of jams, jellies and all sorts and kinds of baked goods in the Keweenaw.

 

The Arnold Mine Ruins stand where a once short-lived and relatively unproductive mine venture once stood. Its presence now represented only by a pile of poor rock. The hike to the sight is exhilarating in the winter and adventurous all year round.

 The solitary cemetery was a visit David and I, on this particular day in December, had to promise to return to as the light left us and evening fell.