- Coordinates
- 45.6036° N, 85.5617° WGoogle Maps: The unnamed trail west of Lake GeneserathDownload KML
- Eras
- Modern era
- Concepts
- lost-trailstrailscartographyrecreationModern era
- Within
- Beaver Island
Summary
A trail the 1986 USGS quadrangle draws west of Lake Geneserath, running roughly north-south for about 1,599 m, which no current sheet carries and no source held here names.
It is filed as a lost trail: the archive can locate it on a historical register and cannot find it on a modern one. That is the opposite problem from the Blue Trail, which is published and lacks geometry.
It is not abandoned on the ground. A walked GPS track of 16 August 2026 follows this corridor for about nine-tenths of a mile at a median 8 m from the digitised line, at ordinary tread pace. Whatever the maps stopped saying, the route is still walkable — which is precisely what makes it worth an article.
What each register says
| register | what it holds |
|---|---|
| Mapped, 1986 | A dashed trail symbol along the whole corridor, on USGS Beaver Island South |
| Walked, 2026 | 254 GPS fixes within 40 m of that line, covering 2.51–3.43 miles of a traverse, median offset 8 m |
| Published, current | Nothing. It is on no township sheet, no trail-association sheet and no OpenStreetMap way |
| Named | Nothing. No source held here gives it a name |
The 1986 line was digitised by hand from the georeferenced sheet and checked
against the raster by overlay; it sits within about 15–25 m of the printed
symbol, the same order of accuracy as the BCT-xx candidates taken from that
sheet elsewhere on this island.
Why a walker ends up on it
This is the practical point, and it is a hazard rather than a curiosity.
The route leaves the neighbourhood of the MASH sign — the signed junction where Buffalo’s Camp Trail meets the way south — and runs south through open hardwood. A walker heading south from the sign is on it within a few hundred metres, and nothing marks the transition: no sign says the maintained route has ended, and the tread underfoot does not obviously change. The 2026 traverse did exactly this without recording any junction.
About 1.2 km on, the corridor passes an elevated timber-framed structure on Michigan DNR Wildlife Division land, roughly 20 m west of the mapped line. It is a landmark, not a waymark, and it does not mean the walker is on a maintained trail.
Roughly 0.4 mile further south the 2026 traverse lost the tread entirely and spent eighteen and a half minutes covering 0.23 mile pushing through cover, on ground that is only 1 % mapped wetland — dry ground where the way simply stops being followable. See the account in Buffalo’s Camp Trail.
Access and ownership
The corridor crosses Michigan DNR Wildlife Division parcels inside the Beaver Islands State Wildlife Research Area. Being on state land is not the same as being on a maintained or designated trail, and no source held here records this route as either.
Open questions
- Did it ever have a name? The Wojan-Cashman sheet shows dotted “faint walking trail” symbols in this part of the island, but at the resolution of the copy held — a web reduction of the whole island, roughly 7 m per pixel — none could be matched to this corridor with confidence. A better reproduction of that sheet would probably settle it. Recorded as checked and unresolved, not as absent.
- What was it for? Its bearing and straightness through Section 8 are consistent with a logging or survey line, which is what most island routes turn out to be, but no source held here says so.
- Does it continue north of the digitised extent, or south past the point where the 2026 traverse lost it? Both ends are where the evidence stops, not necessarily where the route does.
- When did it leave the published record? It is on the 1986 sheet and absent from the 2015 trail map; nothing held narrows that further.
If you can answer any of these, or correct anything above, the archive wants to hear it — see Corrections.
Maps for this place
These Atlas plates provide regional context. They do not establish a precise boundary, current ownership, access right, operating status, or field condition.
- EnvironmentSoils, wetlands, hydrography, and terrain
- GeologyGeneralized geology and landforms
- HydrologyMapped water and wetland context
- AccessMapped routes, facilities, and protected areas
- Land surveyPLSS geometry and historic GLO patent-location context
Sources
- USGS Beaver Island South, 7.5-minute series, 1:24,000, provisional edition 1986.Draws a dashed trail symbol along this corridor. Georeferenced from the sheet's own embedded transform.output · gis · review · beaver-island-south-1986-topo
- Bommarito, Michael. Walked GPS track, Buffalo's Camp Trail trailhead to waypoint V, Beaver Island, 16 August 2026.Follows this corridor between 2.51 and 3.43 miles along the walk, at a median 8 m from the digitised 1986 line.fieldwork · gps_tracks · beaver-south-2026-08-16-5.59mi
Cite this article
Beaver Island Archive, “The unnamed trail west of Lake Geneserath”, https://beaverislandarchive.org/places/unnamed-trail-west-of-lake-geneserath/, accessed [date], citing USGS Beaver Island South, 7.5-minute series, 1:24,000, provisional edition 1986. (and 1 further source listed on the page).
Last revised 2026-08-21. Fill in [date] with the date you read it — this page is static and cannot know that.
BibTeX for “The unnamed trail west of Lake Geneserath”RIS for “The unnamed trail west of Lake Geneserath”