Onward Glide to Devil's Lake!

Living in Madison, Devil's Lake is an easy one hour drive away, making it the perfect place to escape from the craziness of the week.  This past weekend, Doug organized a large group from St. Paul's to go camping at Devil's Lake.  Knowing that the drive would be too easy, he decided to up the stakes and have a group bike there instead.  Of course, I think biking is silly, so I decided I would rollerblade the 40 miles (and a ferry) instead.  Here's the before picture, when we are all still so happy, not realizing what is ahead of us.

Not everyone was biking (or rollerblading), so we had lots of nice people like Josh, Marco, and Allison who were willing to drive all of our stuff up to the campsites.

We left a little after 9am.  The three cyclists were nice enough to stay with me until we snaked our way through Madison and Middleton.  After that it was just me, my camelbak, and my cell phone.  I managed to not get lost, and made it all the way to the Merrimac Ferry at mile 29 in 3 hours.  I was grateful for the half mile to rest and stretch, but I received quite a few weird looks.  I mean, who wouldn't want to rollerblade on a ferry?

The last 10 miles were interesting.  A mile after the ferry, I ran out of water.  I called Doug a few miles later to see if he could wait for me with his waterbottle.  He doubled back and met me at the South entrance of the park.  The last 3 or 4 miles were the worst.  There was a mile long hill that took me about 20 minutes and several breaks to climb.  We ended up going the wrong way around the lake to get to the North campsites.  I had already made it all the way to Devil's Lake, and had started to go around the lake so I decided I was done.  Doug called Josh, who came to our rescue!  When we got to the campsites, I chugged my entire Nalgene, and a Gatorade.  

WE HAD MADE IT!

To celebrate we swam in the freezing cold lake, while the rest of the group hung out on the beach.

It wouldn't be a trip to Devil's Lake without at least one hike up the bluffs.  We found quite a few places to boulder.

And Luke found lots of opportunities to conquer nature . . .

It was fun to hang out with friends, even if half of them didn't camp overnight.  We cooked supper over the campfire, sang songs, made s'mores, and played charades.  

The next morning we had fun watching Doug make pancakes without a spatula.  Don't worry, we also made sure that he got to eat as well.

   

Afterwards, we packed up and posed for our "We Survived!" picture.  

I wasn't crazy enough to try and rollerblade back as well.  The cyclists had an interesting time on the way back due to a strong headwind.  Everyone did get back safely, some were just a little more soaked by the rain than others.  

Another awesome weekend adventure for the books!