Busy planning a trip to Quetico next summer but will have my nephews (11 and 13) and 75 year old Dad with me (he's tough and slogged into Kashalpiwi with me through McNiece last year which was hellishly over grown and took us 2.5 hrs to get through that portage with trees down and overgrown and out through Yum Yum). Thinking of heading as part of trip from Jean through till Lonely Lake and can not find description of portage from Little Jean Lake to Yeh Lake and Yey Lake to Lonely Lake.

Can anyone fill me?

Thanks Margaret Waechter

First off, Guest... Please register on the site. No sense in posting as a no-name.

Secondly, the Yeh to Lonely portage is 300 rods long (just short of a mile). Don't let the death march-type descriptions scare you. It's easier now than it was when those other portage reports were written. The first couple hundred yards are modestly tough as you cross a swamp, but after that, it's simply a trail through the woods. No mud, no bogs, no slop. Yes, a few ups and downs but there are many tougher portages.

I regret posting that hellacious description, Guest. Sorry. I might add that years ago there were two spots on the Yeh side that looked like portage trails, but one was a dead end. Maybe others can chime in on this . . . --Goose

You're correct, Goose. The Yeh end used to go through a fair distance of swampy crap, in large part the reason for the rough descriptions. The landing on Yeh is now down at the very end of the bay, maybe 100 yards south and around the corner from the old portage landing. As mentioned above, maybe a couple hundred yards of corduroyed swamp, then a regular trail through the woods after that.

Very encouraging, Bull. --Goose

My apologies if I offended anyone with my previous post, especially you Goose. In all honesty my experience on that portage was probably just a mixture of bad luck and frustration with having to admit that it got the best of us. If I had the chance to take another crack at it I would. If it gets better beyond the point we got to before throwing in the towel then it would most certainly have made the initial challenge of that portage bearable.

I will say that Little Jean wound up being one of our favorite lakes and we wouldn't have enjoyed that lake as much if at all had we not had a reason to paddle through it to Yeh that day.