Tuesday, July 29, 2014 South Lake, North Lake, Little North Lake, Little Gunflint Lake, Gunflint Lake

The Height of the Lands portage was as described to us, a muddy mess, with a river heading down the trail into South Lake. It was still neat to see the monuments, and I mounted a camera on the canoe to film the entire portage.

After completing the portage, we stood in the waters of North Lake, and completed our Voyager's ceremony - sprinkled each other with a wetted balsam branch, vowed to do this ceremony with another newbie when we crossed over, vowed to never kiss another voyager's wife (unless she asked), and then took a swig of rum. We didn't have guns, so we couldn't do the gunfire :)
The crossing of North was nice - 68°, sunny, and little wind. We took off left, which led us into confusion as the bays of North are deep. We eventually ended up in Canada as we tried to determine where the channel to Little North Lake was, and saw the boundary markers: We finally settled into a decision, and found the right channel, gliding up between the banks and listening to the birds.
I wondered how we would identify Little North Lake, but it was really apparent to see, as there was two peninsulas of weeds separating.
The rapids between Little North Lake and Little Gunflint lake seemed to be navigable (with an experienced team), but we took the portage, which was an old boat transport rail system for most of the portage: Since it was wide and short, we unloaded, pulled the packs across, then luggage-carried the canoe over.
We ran into a few Scout groups going across Little Gunflint, and eyed the thunderstorms brewing in the north. As we got across Little Gunflint, the storms began in earnest, and we paddled hard to get off the lake, stopping at the beach on the west end of Gunflint while watching the weather cross the big lake (and, of course, joking that we have a beach vacation as well, with boat drinks.
After the weather broke, we headed to our final campsite - Camper's Island, which was right aside of Bridal Falls. This was an awesome campsite, with even a picnic table!  We spread out a tarp to handle the inevitable rain, made dinner, and generally relaxed on this little oasis. Even the latrine is fun, since it sat in a circle area of dense pines, with the path directly to it (we called it the Throne Room): The campsite is evidently popular, since 2 other groups decided to come by later. Dinner, and a bedtime chase by the mosquitoes.