Apostle Islands

long weekend
Written By Sydney Musselman

Apostle Islands Mainland Sea Caves

STATS

  • Milage/hours from Chicagoland: ballpark 460 miles / 7-7.5 hours

  • Trip days: 4

  • Passengers: 2 adults, 1 child

  • Accommodations: rented cabin via AirBnB, www.airbnb.com/rooms/32193483

I will put the disclaimer that this was not an inexpensive long weekend. Bayfield is small but also a hub of tourist activity in that area so lodging was pricier that we initially thought it would be and since the entire trip centered around water, we needed to go on guided tours and hire chartered boats.

Note: Peak season for The Apostle Islands is July and August (though apparently there is a second peak season in the dead of winter when the water around the sea caves is frozen). I booked the accommodations in March and the tours in early May.

Apostle Islands Mainland Sea Caves

Day 1: Drive Day + Apostle Islands Mainland Sea Caves

About 5 miles of kayaking, moderate

Luke (8.5) and I had zero kayaking experience going into this tour, Mike had kayaked once, but he’d never done sea kayaking before. It’s going to be tough for me to speak to what kayaking on Lake Superior is actually like because it was uncharacteristically calm when we went out. The good news is that this tour company will cancel and refund your tour if the waves are too dangerous (that was a huge relief to me - I felt much safer trying kayaking on Lake Superior knowing that I wouldn’t be allowed to venture out if it wasn’t actually safe to do so).

You only need to bring a water bottle with you (a snack is optional - we opted not to), everything else you should leave in the car. The tour company has a box for car keys because, as the guide said, “we give back, Lake Superior doesn’t”. They’ll also loan you a dry bag if you want to pack extra layers. It being mid-August, we didn’t need an extra layer - but we had them just in case, and if it were a few degrees cooler, I’d definitely have used my extra layer. I brought my cell phone and took photos through a waterproof, able to float, wear it around a lanyard case (remember, Lake Superior doesn’t give back).

We wore swimsuits (I also wore a pair of quick dry hiking pants) and water shoes. They’ll outfit you with a life vest and a splash skirt.

The tour company will drive you from their building about 5 miles down to Meyers Beach (parking at the beach is hard to come by). We had two guides and there were 5 kayaks in our group. Some kayaks were for 2 people, but Mike, Luke, and I had a 3 person kayak - which was perfect. Mike sat in the back because the sea kayaks have steering pedals, Luke sat in the middle, and I had the front. A big key learning for us was that Mike couldn’t see the front of the kayak from where he was sitting (they’re VERY long), so I needed to verbally tell him when to turn and how much of a turn was required.

The guides were great, the tour was beautiful, the water was shockingly calm, and we were continually amazed at the caves and crevices that our guides encouraged us to kayak through (in the beginning we legitimately thought the guide was joking about us fitting through a notch in the rock…he wasn’t, and if we ducked down and pulled our paddles in, we fit!)

I will say that Mike paddled the entire time while Luke and I switched off on paddling, mainly because he wasn’t in sync with me so we kept knocking paddles…despite the fact that he could see my paddle in front of him. By the time we were headed back to the beach Luke had mostly stopped paddling, and I was definitely feeling it in my muscles.

Day 2: Devils Island Boat Tour

Kayaking milage unknown, easy

This boat tour was a mixed bag of adventures that offered a little something for everyone. History on Raspberry Island for me, adventure kayaking through the Devils Island sea caves for Mike, and beach combing on Otter Island for Luke. It was a small tour, there were 6 of us total (two families of three) plus a captain/guide.

Note: it is a small boat that definitely feels the bumps/waves - not one of the massive touring boats that also operate around the islands.

The first stop was the Raspberry Island Lighthouse - which for $10 a family (sometimes the NPS ranger on duty will count the whole boat as a family) you can take a guided tour of. Bring cash for that. Mike and I found the tour quite interesting - we happen to be into learning about historic buildings - Luke was unenthused - he has taken many tours through buildings of a similar time period so this was old news for him.

Next we pulled up to Devils Island, which happens to be the Northern most point in Wisconsin. The sea caves here differ from the ones that bordered the mainland that we toured the previous evening. There were less tight spaces to get through, more caves to weave in and out of. After our captain showed us where she’d be dropping us off and where she’d be picking us up, she set to work inflating the kayaks (yes, inflating). Thankfully, Lake Superior was again uncommonly calm, so it made for a very chill experience kayaking around. The captain stayed with the boat and floated along within eyesight of us careful to not make any waves. This kayaking experience was much more choose your own adventure. Mike and Luke were in one kayak, the other family’s father and daughter were in a second, and myself and the other mom were in a third kayak.

I’d definitely suggest clothes that are either quick dry or bathing suits. But do keep in mind, Lake Superior is a cold lake - so I had no qualms about the quick dry hiking clothing that I was wearing. Also, water shoes were handy here too. You can leave anything you want on the boat. So we also brought snacks, towels, and left our backpacks and sneakers on the boat.

After we reached our kayaking destination, about 45 minutes later, we hopped back onto the boat and headed for some beach combing on Otter Island. There is a decent amount of sea glass to find and collect here (it’s considered picking up trash and isn’t a violation of leave no trace).

Day 3: Stockton Island

Hike, easy/moderate

Trails we did:

  • Tombolo Trail - 2.8 miles

  • Anderson Point Trail - 1.4 miles

The perk to having a company like Adventure Vacations take us to Stockton Island is that we were able to spend the entire day there. When we docked, a ferry docked as well, but those visitors only had until noon to look around before the ferry came to retrieve them. By going through the campsites and starting with the Tombolo trail, we avoided all of the ferry crowds who wouldn’t have the time to hike Tombolo. By the time we got to Julian Bay Beach - we had it and the walk back via the Anderson Point Trail almost completely to ourselves.

Eatable blueberries

BLUE berries NOT blueberries - do not eat these!

Tombolo Trail

2.8 miles, easy

The highlight of the Tombolo Trail for us was the fresh blueberries lining the trail. They. Were. Delicious. The ranger on duty gave us the green light for foraging for blueberries as we hiked, but cautioned us against eating the also blue berries that aren’t blueberries. I included pictures of both above, as you can see - aside from being blue, they look nothing alike.

After hiking through a pine forest with lots of ferns (and blueberries), you’ll come to a marsh. Here we actually saw some cranes, which was a neat animal sighting. After crossing the boardwalk, we were in the woods again for a short time before coming to another boardwalk that led us to a rock beach. Once you make it to the pink sandy beach, you’ll know that you’ve made it to Julian Bay Beach - home of the allegedly Singing Sand (try as we might, and we spent a lot of time trying, we couldn’t get the sand to “sing” for us). But we did enjoy a windy picnic and the boys played in the water and sand while I sat and sketched.

Anderson Point Trail

1.4 miles, easy/moderate

At the end of Julian Bay Beach, you’ll see the trail pick up going into the woods, from here there are two ways to hike the Anderson Point Trail (don’t worry, you don’t have to pick exclusively one) - you can rock hop along the water, or you can walk a trail just behind the tree line through the woods. The winds really picked up on that side of the island, so we did a combination of both trails, rock hoping when it looked safe enough to, and tucking back into the woods when the water was getting too high (and truth be told, it doesn’t look like you can rock hop the entire trail, just the first half of it). Sadly, there were no blueberries along this otherwise nice trail. The rock hopping is fun - especially for a kid like Luke, however, please make sure you’re wearing the correct footwear and exercising caution as the rocks can become slippery when wet - we had Mike go out ahead of Luke, so Luke could see where to hop to.

We’re pretty fast hikers, so we finished both hikes (including plenty of beach time) with an hour to spare before our boat came to scoop us up. Luke occupied himself playing with rocks while Mike and I were offered fried fish by some friendly Minnesotans who had just caught 4 fish in the nearby waters and were wrapping up their fish fry with plenty of leftovers that they happily shared with us. Not that I’m advocating taking food from strangers - but if some friendly fishermen are willing to share their catch with you and you feel safe doing so, eat the fish - you cannot get any fresher than that! There were both women and men at the table, and we’d seen them offering fish to other hikers as well.

Day 4: Headed home

With a 7.5 hour drive ahead of us, we packed up the truck, drove to the next town over, grabbed breakfast pastries from xyz and hit the road back home to Chicagoland.

Good eats!

This trip had some fantastic food (so. much. fresh. fish) - here is where we ate:

  • The Deck - The Bayfield Inn - We grabbed lunch here upon arriving in Bayfield on Thursday - it’s a rooftop deck overlooking Lake Superior.

  • mortyspub.com - This pub was a lifesaver after our Thursday evening kayak tour - it was one of the only places still open - the fish tacos were some of the best bar food I’ve ever eaten.

  • Bayfield Cafe – Wonderstate Coffee - We got breakfast here both on Friday and Saturday before catching our boat. The food is very good - two things to be aware of: 1) we arrived around 8am each day, the cafe opens at 7am, and both days they were sold out of the blueberry smoothies, and 2) while it wasn’t crowded, and service was speedy on Friday - the opposite was true on Saturday. We waited 45 minutes for our food (bagel and lox, plain bagel, and a breakfast sandwich) and had to scarf it down quickly to make it to the dock by 9am (thankfully, the dock is only a couple of blocks away - downtown Bayfield is very small).

  • Hotel, Bar, Restaurant | Pier Plaza | Bayfield, WI (bayfieldpierplaza.com) - We ate dinner here on Friday, great apps, sizable portions (Mike and I could have split the entree after eating the apps - but you can’t split the unlimited fish fry, so we got two entrees), and tasty desserts. This place is rated one of the best Friday Fish Fries in Wisconsin - and we must admit, the fish fry did not disappoint.

  • Manypenny Bistro | Facebook - This place came recommended to us by numerous people, so we ate here Saturday night. We ordered the pizza with the homemade crust and homemade sauce, and it did not disappoint.

  • Home | Sweet! (sweetandsaltybayfield.com) - We grabbed ice cream cones here after dinner on Saturday, we each got a flavor that we couldn’t get at home and were all very pleased with our selections. Mike got something with coffee in it and Java in the name, Luke got Mackinaw Island Fudge Mint Chip and I got Mackinaw Island Fudge Swirled.

Support local bookstores:

Bayfield has two great local bookstores which are very unique from one another. We loved perusing and shopping at both of them:

Sydney Musselman
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