Wilderness Wanderings: Pinckney Blind Lake Backpacking Dec '25

Saturday, December 27, 2025

Pinckney Blind Lake Backpacking Dec '25

This was my first and only opportunity for backpacking at Blind Lake in 2025. While the rest of the family was in North Carolina visiting Sarah's family, I had free time to get some hiking in. The weather reports were mixed for today and that had some effect on my plans. I had at one point contemplated doing the entire Waterloo-Pinckney Trail again but the Friday weather really made that a bad idea. I decided on a night of backpacking and then to hike the full Poto loop the next morning.

Trip Info:
Potawatomi Trail Trailhead Elevation: 888 ft.

December 26 Hike In
Distance: 2.73 mi.
Elevation Gain: 313 ft.
Start Time: 6:20pm
End Time: 7:20pm

December 27 Hike Out
Distance: 2.76 mi.
Elevation Gain: 320 ft.
Start Time: 8:05am
End Time: 9:05am

Trip Report:
I used the Osprey Volt pack for this one. I carried in just a liter of water to use for cooking and a little drinking. I was figuring I could filter any more water I needed. I did the very short hike in starting at the parking for Pickerel Lake. I did this primarily because I wanted to hike the full Poto in the morning, but I wanted to do that with my daypack. That meant hiking out to the car in the morning and then retracing my steps to start the big loop.

For supper I ate on the drive up to Pinckney so that all I had to do was hike into camp and then setup. I planned to hike in the dark and wasn't too concerned about arrival time. The Nitecore UT27 head lamp was great, I love that thing. When I arrived at Blind Lake I was the only person there and I settled on site 5.

My big mistake for the evening and the trip as a whole was not bringing a long my microspikes. At home all the snow was well melted out on our trails so I didn't think for a second that might not be the case at Pinckney. When I pulled up to the parking at Pickerel the road was quite icy and I quickly realize my error. The trail was passable without spikes but many sections required some real care to avoid slipping. The downhills especially with the large rock obstacles for the mountain biking were especially difficult. Most of the rock slabs were glazed with a quarter inch of ice. Fortunately I only fell once on the hike in.

I had a fun moment with a raccoon on the hike in. I saw some bright eyes ahead with my headlamp. Couldn't tell what it was at first. I walked in the trees closer to me and that's when I realized it was a raccoon. It climbed up into a tree cautiously watching me. I likewise slowly walked around to get a photo shot of him in the tree while he remained hesitant.

It was light drizzling most of my walk in but I never felt my shirt getting wet. The weather forecast suggested it should stop around 7pm but it was much later than that. I was quick in getting my tent setup at camp because of the light precipitation coming down. I was also quick to just get into the tent to stay dry and get warm.

I spent the evening watching The Dark Knight Rises using my Daydream viewer. This allows me to lay flat on my back in my sleeping bag and watch the movie as though I were in a theatre. It means carrying a little extra gear, but it is worth it for the fun.

The night went well and I stayed warm in my 20 degree Sierra Designs bag. The overnight low was around 28 degrees. Around 5 am I was borderline cool and so I slipped into my sleeping bag liner within the big bag and that really warmed me up. I know I was constantly up through the night but I still seemed to get a fair bit of sleep. I set an alarm for 7am and it did wake me up to get the morning started.

I did a quick tear down of my tent and then worked on cooking some breakfast. I brought a long a Mountain House Breakfast skillet meal. I went to the water pump at Blind Lake to fill my pot hoping to save the water in my nalgene. As I was boiling the water my fuel was running out so it was taking forever to boil. As I checked the water again and again I realized how cloud it was. I finally decided it seem to be too cloudy and had a slight color tint to it. I dumped it. Just not sure the water from the well pump was that good. I ate a few of my snacks and decided to hit the trail.

The hike out was a little easier with the ice using daylight to spot. I was also enjoying seeing some of the new trail reroutes in this section of the Poto. There were two sections between Dead Lake and Blind Lake where they made improvements.