Tuesday, July 11, 2023 We left Duluth around 8 am all packed and ready. The kids were excited as they just finished another camping trip on Rainy Lake. The boys, MJ (5) and JJ (3) had experienced camping, but not paddle/portage/paddle with the minimal gear that we bring to the BWCA. We stopped at the ranger station and the kids learned all of the "rules" and were very intrigued and were strict on them the rest of the trip. We arrived at the landing only to find 20ish MPH winds directly from the direction we needed to paddle. White caps and all, we decided to go for it. The kids sat in the middle paddling with their hands, as my wife and I worked hard to get us to the portage. I recalled previous trips when the wind was the strong, and remembered a straight head-on wind is better than one from the side. The portage was quite easy as we met a group of wonderful ladies that lugged some of our stuff on the way back to get their own gear. We paddled with the wind on Alton, and moved south along the east side until we found an open site. We stayed at the further southeast site before the portage to Wonder. It was a pretty sweet site for the kids as there was a huge rock they could climb over and over and over and over again. We set up camp, and let the kids explore the site. We went out fishing for just a bit after dinner and caught a couple smallmouth bass. We were visited by a loon that came fairly close to us which was great to see. The flies attacked our ankles in the canoe and limited the time we fished. We had a small campfire at the site before turning in. In the middle of the night, the loons were extremely active. They made all kinds of different calls (yodels, grunts, hoots, ect.)