By Leah Shoberg
The trip was interesting, and I believe that we all learned a lot from each other. Those of us who went on the trip were; Mike Bromme, Allen Jampsa, Tom Miller, Marti Norris, James O’Day, John Quaas, Leah Shoberg (that’s me), Carrie Tiggas, and our fearless leader, Doug Berg. The trip went well, and as I said, not only did we learn from each other, but I think we learned a lot about ourselves.
We all started bright and early February second, loading up the box on top of the van. We had skis and ski poles and ski boots. We had snowshoes and extra jackets, and extra boots, and mittens, and gloves, and hats, I mean, we had it all. But the most important things we had were the ‘boggen’ toboggan, and Green Thunder,(a sled) which belonged to Bromme.
We stopped in for breakfast at the Grant House in Rush City, and all laughed together about the possibilities of the rest of the trip. Leaving the Grant House, we headed for the cabin up in Grantsburg W.I. which was to be our “base camp.” We arrived, and cooperated quite well in getting the box unpacked, and getting all the equipment organized. We all took our time, chose our room, got comfortable, and talked about the plans for the trip. That’s when we ate lunch, and then had our first snowshoeing adventure.
Leaving the cabin, Doug took us all around the area in a big circle, pointing out things in the woods. Like tracks that animals left, the sound of the river, just things that most people don’t notice when they’re outside. The river…. The wind was fierce that day, and when we got out onto the river to head back to the cabin, we were almost blown over. I suppose because in the woods, the wind is more challenged by the trees, we didn’t realize that it would be so strong. We made it all right, but with a lot of tired and wind-burnt kids, Doug decided to have the rest of the night indoors.
We all sat together and ate dinner, as we did every night, and talked, and learned a lot. Doug reads us a book called Hatchet By Gary Pulson, as he did every night, after dinner, usually during “school” time. But every night ended with half the group playing a game of Star Wars Monopoly.
The second day was mostly Doug taking all of us for a short ski around the area, and showing us how to do it. He drove us to this trail next to the St. Croix river to practice.
It was a lot of fun, and Allen, and John picked it up right away. Marti had fun skiing in just her vest, and me in just my T-shirt. Bromme, (later adopting many nicknames) already knew what he was doing, so blew us all away, and Carrie, James, and Tom took their time.
Afterwards, we all went back to the cabin and decided that skiing wasn’t so bad after all. We had dinner, talked of the day, went sledding over on the road near the cabin, had “school” and ended the night with another game of Star Wars Monopoly.
The third day was the most active of the four. We all went to this ski lodge, with a warming house and groomed trails and everything. It was really exciting. We had lunch in the warming house, and then went out to try the different groomed trails at the lodge. They were great, and a lot less difficult then the trail from the previous day.
We all had a good time, and at around sunset we all left to have dinner at this little restaurant called “What the Heck,” for pizza.
The trip in all was a good one, and I feel that we all learned a lot, not only from Doug, but from ourselves and each other as well.