BWCA Entry Point, Route, and Trip Report Blog
May 03 2024
Entry Point 23 - Mudro Lake
Number of Permits per Day: 5
Elevation: 1166 feet
Latitude: 48.0356
Longitude: -91.8301
On the Water- Monday July 20th-
On the water late considering how far we need to go today. Up the Horse river to the falls by 6pm. Started raining and NO campsites available. Mudrow-Alruss-Tin can Mike-Horse Lake-Horse River-Basswood. 13 miles by water. (not counting portages)
Tuesday July 21st-
Rain all night, all morning and all day. Went north by petroglyphs, table rock and the the Crocked Lake Narrows across Thursday bay to campsite. Basswood-Crooked Lake-Wednesday Bay-Thursday Bay. 11 miles in the rain.
Wednesday July 22nd-
Up early and calm winds to take advantage of, considering the big water we have to cross. Found beaver dam to lift over and did a portage from hell between Pandos lake and Chippewa Lake. VERY steep and slippery after rain. Many mud holes. Then the mile portage after Wagosh Lake to Gun Lake. Never saw another soul in a canoe or campsite the entire day! Thursday bay-Friday Bay-Pandos Lake-Chippewa Lake-Wagosh lake-Gun Lake. 11 miles by water.
Thursday July 23rd-
Finally had a dry night. got everything dry!!! A few portages today to Fourtown Lake campsite. Easy day by comparison. Gun Lake-Fairy Lake-Boot Lake-Fourtown Lake. 6 miles. Put the long miles at the first of the week for a buffer for contingencies!
Friday July 24th-
Last day. Stormed last night bad. A few portages today with one bad one between Fourtown Lake and Mudrow lake. To entry point by 1pm. Ready for a hot shower! 4 miles
Total-
45 miles by water
13 miles by portage (3 trips each)
58 miles total.
Boulder Lake and Wild Animals
Entry Date:
Entry Point:
Crab Lake and Cummings from Burntside Lake
Number of Days:
7
Group Size:
7
We canoed through Crab Lake and into Clark lake. I've been to Clark Lake before and it is a great little lake with a nice camp site. The camp site has had some modifications done to it. But it is neat. There is an old road that runs right into camp. There are signs of the past, with an old pick, wheel barrel. If you follow the grown in road you will fine an old dump sight with a bed frame, bath tub and other signs from the 1970's.
From Clark we traveled to Boulder lake. We went through Phantom lake and Spirit lake. Boulder was a very pretty lake. We did a lay over day so the kids could swim and fish a lot. My son caught a 3.5lb small mouth and pile of northern pike. the island campsite was spacious and great for swimming. But the lakes name clearly comes from the thousands of boulders scattered in the water. We would snorkel around and find rocks to stand on that were 50-80 feet from shore! While exploring my son had a common garter snake attack him while he was standing on a beaver hut, he had to use his paddle to flip the snake in the water! On the opposite side of the lake my father was cleaning fish and a garter snake slithered up and bit his finger, and yet a second snake rose up like a cobra to scare him up. This was the strangest behavior I've ever seen from these snakes. We watched this buck from across the lake. We attempted to follow the creek to Bear Lake on our lay over day. But when it dried up we decided not to attempt it. The last thing we wanted to make it difficult for the kids.
The next lake we traveled to was Battle Lake. This was another pretty lake. When we had arrived a canoe with a DNR Fisheries guy came up and introduced himself. Andy was full of great information. We were even surprised to find out that the best man in his wedding was a guy that lived only one block from my parents house only 7 hours from ely! Small world.. We had storms rolling in, causing the wind to blow pretty wild. The winds seem to have upset the bees. My nephew got stung on the finger and just an hour later my niece got stung on the lip and her face swelled up pretty bad.
We did a grouse and her chicks.. she did not attack anyone!
From battle we traveled to Crab Lake and enjoyed two days of off and on again rain and t-storms.. even in the rain everyone still had fun and caught all the fish they could. After crab we portaged our way back to civilization with the hopes of Dairy Queen blizzards, and cheese burgers!