Thursday Day 2 Lakes (Little Trout, Misquah, Vista, Horseshoe, Gaskin, Winchell)

What a beautiful morning, we are blissfully unaware of the reputation that accompanies our first portage. We take our time waking and making breakfast. This is the first of two slow paced mornings. Because I over packed on the fresh milk by accident, we have milk to add to the making of the pancakes. No sense carrying the extra weight any longer than necessary. With the removal of the heavy chili and the 8 oz of milk, Chris is prepared to skip lightly across the portage path with the food pack, or not. 

Once on the water, we expect a short paddle to our portage. As we left our camp site we spotted camo man from the previous evening. He's very chatty and keeps tabs on us while we paddle back and forth across our bay looking for a portage. We find the portage with camo mans help, he says that he's considering traveling across the portage himself if Trout fishing gets slow. Typically one can spot a portage by the worn foliage areas where people take out canoes, or the gap in the trees where the path begins. Not this portage. There is no foliage at the take out area because it is a boulder field. Imagine those large landscaping stones people use to decorate front yards. They use one or two and the kids like to play on and climb over them. My parents have one. That is the size of the boulders strewn in all directions at the portage landing. The “gap in the trees” is off to the right, tucked behind some bushes and a very large rock at the other end of the boulder field. To get to it, one has to hop from boulder to boulder across the field until you reach dirt. It's at this point that camo man informs us that this particular portage has a reputation as one of the hardest in the Eastern Boundary Waters. 

We head off across the boulder path portage. Topographically the portage has two good sized hills which act as bookends for a swamp in the middle. It is definitely a challenge. What makes it so much fun is the fact that you can't just walk putting one foot in front of the other. Each step must be planned as you contort your body over, across, around rocks as you go up and down the slopes of the hills. The "flat" ground between the hills isn't any better, mostly because there wasn't any ground.  The path was typically under water (nice test for our new boots ) where one could choose to walk through the water or along the muddy edge. In some places there were logs to allow one to cross the water. Very slipper logs. Baby steps were in order on the logs, they tended to move and shift and balance was a challenge. There are "tough" portages and then there are portages where you're just glad when no one gets hurt in the process. I was just glad no one got hurt on this portage. 

Nothing in particular stands out regarding the rest of our day until we got to the portage into Winchell, except to say that while the portages were shorter, the were still hilly, rocky and wet. I don't even remember where we had lunch. As we approached the portage to Winchell, we could see that rain was on the way. We wanted to get to our campsite before it started to rain, in hopes that we could set up a tarp to stay dry. We single portaged into Winchell in order to save some time, which left Chris carrying two pretty heavy packs. Then we put our backs into paddling to find a camp site. Winchell is a about 7 miles long going West to East but only about ½ mile wide North to South. It's 7-9 campsites are all along the northern shore. We passed the first couple camp site locations with a slight breeze in our faces hoping to make our way a bit farther down the lake. Just as we got to where we could see the third camp, two things happened. One - we saw that it was occupied, bummer. Two - a nasty head/cross wind slammed into us, and we could see a wall of rain that would arrive in about 10 seconds. Rain Jackets on, hoods up. Bam. Waves were not a concern, but I've never had my canoe moved from side to side like that before. Now we paddled like wet rats into the driving rain and wind up to the next camp site. We pulled over to check it out. It was a little bit too close to the occupied site we'd just passed for our liking, but we were exhausted. It was time to stop. The site was up above the water with a good tent pad and food pack tree. The rain let up and we began the process of making camp. The day's travel had started and ended with a bang and we were tired. 

Tent and Tarp were set up, more fire wood gathered and work on supper begins. Joel prepares a Steak and foil wrapped potato/carrot/onion side dish. Once again, dinner preparation was done mostly in the dark. Dark is a good time to eat my camp cooking. It helps one evaluate the items consumed based on taste rather than looks. Have I mentioned how much we made use of our headlamps on this trip? They really help extend the travel day, because you can function fairly well in the dark making food. I'm not sure that a longer travel day is what Chris was hoping for, but my headlamp has replaced my other flashlights, and it weighs less. 

We stared at the fire for a while after supper before heading to bed. I don't believe we read any books after the first night on the this trip. I don't know if the book topics just didn't resonate this time, or if we were too tired, or if the tradition is fading away. I know that I won't be bringing 4 books up again. (I'm not sure that Chris knows he carried that many around with him for the week)   

Thursday Day 2 Lakes (Little Trout, Misquah, Vista, Horseshoe, Gaskin, Winchell)

What a beautiful morning, we are blissfully unaware of the reputation that accompanies our first portage. We take our time waking and making breakfast. This is the first of two slow paced mornings. Because I over packed on the fresh milk by accident, we have milk to add to the making of the pancakes. No sense carrying the extra weight any longer than necessary. With the removal of the heavy chili and the 8 oz of milk, Chris is prepared to skip lightly across the portage path with the food pack, or not. 

Once on the water, we expect a short paddle to our portage. As we left our camp site we spotted camo man from the previous evening. He's very chatty and keeps tabs on us while we paddle back and forth across our bay looking for a portage. We find the portage with camo mans help, he says that he's considering traveling across the portage himself if Trout fishing gets slow. Typically one can spot a portage by the worn foliage areas where people take out canoes, or the gap in the trees where the path begins. Not this portage. There is no foliage at the take out area because it is a boulder field. Imagine those large landscaping stones people use to decorate front yards. They use one or two and the kids like to play on and climb over them. My parents have one. That is the size of the boulders strewn in all directions at the portage landing. The “gap in the trees” is off to the right, tucked behind some bushes and a very large rock at the other end of the boulder field. To get to it, one has to hop from boulder to boulder across the field until you reach dirt. It's at this point that camo man informs us that this particular portage has a reputation as one of the hardest in the Eastern Boundary Waters. 

We head off across the boulder path portage. Topographically the portage has two good sized hills which act as bookends for a swamp in the middle. It is definitely a challenge. What makes it so much fun is the fact that you can't just walk putting one foot in front of the other. Each step must be planned as you contort your body over, across, around rocks as you go up and down the slopes of the hills. The "flat" ground between the hills isn't any better, mostly because there wasn't any ground.  The path was typically under water (nice test for our new boots ) where one could choose to walk through the water or along the muddy edge. In some places there were logs to allow one to cross the water. Very slipper logs. Baby steps were in order on the logs, they tended to move and shift and balance was a challenge. There are "tough" portages and then there are portages where you're just glad when no one gets hurt in the process. I was just glad no one got hurt on this portage. 

Nothing in particular stands out regarding the rest of our day until we got to the portage into Winchell, except to say that while the portages were shorter, the were still hilly, rocky and wet. I don't even remember where we had lunch. As we approached the portage to Winchell, we could see that rain was on the way. We wanted to get to our campsite before it started to rain, in hopes that we could set up a tarp to stay dry. We single portaged into Winchell in order to save some time, which left Chris carrying two pretty heavy packs. Then we put our backs into paddling to find a camp site. Winchell is a about 7 miles long going West to East but only about ½ mile wide North to South. It's 7-9 campsites are all along the northern shore. We passed the first couple camp site locations with a slight breeze in our faces hoping to make our way a bit farther down the lake. Just as we got to where we could see the third camp, two things happened. One - we saw that it was occupied, bummer. Two - a nasty head/cross wind slammed into us, and we could see a wall of rain that would arrive in about 10 seconds. Rain Jackets on, hoods up. Bam. Waves were not a concern, but I've never had my canoe moved from side to side like that before. Now we paddled like wet rats into the driving rain and wind up to the next camp site. We pulled over to check it out. It was a little bit too close to the occupied site we'd just passed for our liking, but we were exhausted. It was time to stop. The site was up above the water with a good tent pad and food pack tree. The rain let up and we began the process of making camp. The day's travel had started and ended with a bang and we were tired. 

Tent and Tarp were set up, more fire wood gathered and work on supper begins. Joel prepares a Steak and foil wrapped potato/carrot/onion side dish. Once again, dinner preparation was done mostly in the dark. Dark is a good time to eat my camp cooking. It helps one evaluate the items consumed based on taste rather than looks. Have I mentioned how much we made use of our headlamps on this trip? They really help extend the travel day, because you can function fairly well in the dark making food. I'm not sure that a longer travel day is what Chris was hoping for, but my headlamp has replaced my other flashlights, and it weighs less. 

We stared at the fire for a while after supper before heading to bed. I don't believe we read any books after the first night on the this trip. I don't know if the book topics just didn't resonate this time, or if we were too tired, or if the tradition is fading away. I know that I won't be bringing 4 books up again. (I'm not sure that Chris knows he carried that many around with him for the week)   

Friday Day 3 Lakes (Winchell, Gaskin)

What a gorgeous morning, the only day of the trip that didn't include rain. I took some pictures of the sunrise that look pretty good. We decided to make this our rest day and do a little exploring. A little exploring ended up being a good 7-8 miles of paddling with a little bit of portaging tossed in. We investigated some of the water inlets and outlets for Lake Winchell and did a bit of lure wetting. I'd say fishing, but we'd already caught our one fish for the trip on Thursday. "Lure wetting" sets the correct tone for our expectations. 

Late in the afternoon, we decided it was nap time. This was the only day that the hammock was put to use. I'm not quite sure how Chris and his 10 year old son Michael managed to hang his orange hammock in May, but apparently Michael's expertise is required for the feat, because Chris and Joel didn't seem up to the task. Let's just say that the hammock set up time was probably longer than Chris's nap time. I left for the tent to take my nap, Chris prepared for his in the hammock. Not fully confident with the hammock entrance and exit procedures, we set up a series of signals should he require help extricating himself. 

This was one of those gorgeous, peaceful, uneventful days that characterize one of the main reasons we head to the boundary waters area. Uneventful, however, makes for poor story fodder.

Saturday Day 4 Lakes (Winchell, Wanihigan, Grassy, Mulligan, Lily, Brule, Brule Bay, Vernon, Swan)

Repeat after me, wet, cool (I reserve Cold for when it snows), windy, muddy… and that was the trip to the latrine. The trip plan for Saturday was fairly aggressive. So we started the day with cold cereal and broke camp early. Well not as early as I initially tried to send us out. You see, when we went to bed I'd made the statement that we should get going when the sun came up because we had a long way to travel. Chris agreed. Well, I woke up and it had started to get lighter out, so I figured the sun would be up soon. I began to get dressed and rustle about. Chris woke up and asked, "What in the world are you doing?". I told him it was getting lighter out so I thought I'd get up. He graciously informed me that it was the middle of the night and to go back to bed. I stuck my head out the tent door. Sure enough, moon and stars. Bright moon, but still, just moon and stars. There must have been a break in the clouds.  I went back to sleep…

Once the sky did actually get brighter via the sun, we were on our way under a gray sky. As we got to the first portage, it began to rain. It was one of those short portages that follow a small rapids beneath cedar trees. My favorite kind. Well when we got to the other side with our first load, the wind began to blow and it started to rain harder. We decided to put our rain pants on after moving the second load and wait out the heavy rain under the cover of trees. My rain pants slide on quickly. Chris begins to grumble that he can't get his boot through his rain pant leg. Why would they make rain pants that force you to take off your shoes in order to get dressed? So he sits on a rock and carefully removes his boots one at a time, slips his foot through the leg and quickly into his boot to keep his feet dry. Chris re-laces the boots, and tries to pull up "his" rain pants. Turns out "his" rain pants are really Michael's rain pants (Michael being his 10 year old son) and Chris can't pull them up beyond his knees without losing circulation to his feet. We have a little chuckle (belly laugh) over that one. Chris foregoes rain pants for the rest of the trip.  Apparently it is difficult to portage with your knees bound together.

Once the wind died down (notice I didn't say the rain let up) we worked our way over portages and lakes until we reached the portage into Grass lake. In this case Grass was mud stew. The end of the portage was a good 75 yards short of water. Between the water and the end of the portage was a field of soupy looking mud. We surmized later, that the large amounts of rain water earlier in the month must have washed out a beaver dam, draining most of the lake. We chose to bushwhack along the edge of the lake alternating between fighting through trees or slopping through the shoreline mud. In this manner we portaged, to the portage out of Grass/mud Lake. It was here that we met a couple of moose hunters on the there way in for a second attempt at a moose for the fall. Good luck to them. 

We worked our way down to Brule lake and found a spot to eat lunch on an island campsite as it started to rain harder. After lunch we paddle in the rain across the expanse of Brule Lake. The portages didn't need the extra rain. They were already squishy with excess water. The only bright spot to the travel conditions was that it was not cold. Once off Brule, the rain subsided. For the rest of the day, the rain was much lighter and intermittent. 

Once we reach Swan Lake, we pick an elevated camp site with a unique entrance. The location to get out of the canoe is tucked off to the side in a small alcove of trees. A short path connected the landing area to the camp site. The tent and tarp were set up for one last time. The dry spot under the tarp was very much appreciated. The Noah tarp was a good purchase. In this case we set up the tarp over the camp fire grate as we did not plan to build a fire.  For a final time supper is prepared by the light of a head-lamp. The soup and grilled cheese are something easily prepared with the camp stove. This had been a tiring paddle day, we do not linger over the camp stove once supper is consumed.

Just a quick note about this camp site. Wow, was the ground soft for the tent pad. Exhaustion and soft ground, nice combination. Only draw back was that one of the grommets on the tent pushed through the strap. Chris did a nice job securing the tent poles so that the tent stayed up all night.  

Sunday Day 5 Lake (Swan, Skidaway, Dugout, Marshall, Bower Trout)

This is exit day. Still had a good bit of rain as we paddle. Two Bald Eagle sightings highlight our paddling. On the first we spot an eagle perched high above us in a tree on the hillside. The height of the tree accentuated by the fact that blow down and fire have been through the area in the past couple of years. The eagle watches our entire passage across the small lake. Our second eagle sighting is made impressionable by the fact that it is on a shoreline rock eating something. As we paddle quietly closer, the eagle takes off carrying the entrails of whatever it was eating. Very cool.

We make our way to the exit point on Bower Trout Lake. This is the first time that we've ever tried exiting at a different point than where we went into the BWCA. In this case our two entry points are only a mile or two apart so Joel heads off with the canoe on the portage. At the parking lot he sets the canoe down and makes his way to the truck parked at the other entry point. Every five steps he checks for the vehicle keys, paranoid that he forgot them back with Chris. Images of getting to the car only to find that the keys are a mile away dance through his head. 

A quick drive back to pick up Chris and we are on our way to Grand Marais for our long awaited pizza at Swen and Ole's. Emphasis on "long-awaited". The Vikings are playing the Packers on T.V. We watch the second and third quarters while we wait in line and wait for our pizza.  Once served, it is delicious.