BWCA Entry Point, Route, and Trip Report Blog
December 13 2024
Entry Point 4 - Crab Lake & Cummings Lake
Number of Permits per Day: 3
Elevation: 1406 feet
Latitude: 47.9337
Longitude: -92.0269
Crab Lake & Cummings Lake - 4
Lunetta Lake
Entry Date:
May 24, 2013
Entry Point:
Crab Lake and Cummings from Burntside Lake
Number of Days:
4
Group Size:
2
Day 2 - I woke up around 7 AM and took down the food pack to get started on breakfast. Ben woke up shortly afterwards and helped cook. The pancakes didn’t turn out as nice as other trips because Ben was cooking on the Dragonfly stove instead of the Coleman (it wasn’t working). The heat distribution on the pan wasn’t even, making the pancakes cooked in the middle and not on the edges creating a big mess when trying to flip them. We also forgot to pack margarine, another ingredient to help them taste better. We still ended up eating the pancakes despite not tasting great. After breakfast we went fishing again around Lunetta Lake. The weather was not as nice as the day before. It was cool and cloudy the whole day. Ben caught another largemouth, this one bigger than the first one. The wind started picking up so we headed back to camp. Ben decided to do some exploring on his own while I stayed back at camp later in the afternoon. He decided to hike through the woods to the portage entering Hassel Lake and hike to the campsite on Hassel. It was an adventure filled with hiking on a portage with several downed trees, seeing a campsite not used often, and other wildlife. I decided to go for a swim. The swimming area wasn’t inviting. The lake water was dark brown, concealing rocks close to the surface near the swimming area. When I took a plunge into the water, it was shallow enough for me to touch. It wasn’t a long swim, just in and out because the water was freezing. Ben cooked up a ham dinner with pears and peas. It was another nice evening as the clouds began breaking up, showing some blue sky heading our way. Day 3 – I woke up again around 7 AM to get breakfast started. It was looking like a nice day; the sun was shining, and the wind had died down during the night. We cooked up some pancakes along with oatmeal (I wanted oatmeal and pancakes). After cleaning up dishes and making sure camp was in order, we headed out on a long 6-hour day trip to Cummings Lake. We packed lunch for the way and our fishing gear. As we were paddling onto Little Crab, we noticed a large group staying at the one campsite (we hadn’t visited it yet), so Ben was a little disappointed he wasn’t able to see it then. We sighted a Bald Eagle on the river perched on a tree leading into Korb Lake. We tried getting a picture but weren’t able to take it fast enough before it flew away. The water level was high, so we didn’t have to do the 1 rod portage around some fast moving water and rocks. We saw the campsite on Korb Lake wasn’t taken, so we stopped to check it out. The Korb Lake campsite is up on a cliff overlooking the lake. It had the kitchen area right above the cliff with the fire grate facing away from the lake. The wind had started picking up and we could feel the breeze from above. There were a few decent tent pads further into the woods in front of the kitchen area. I liked the view and thought this would be a great campsite to come back and stay at someday. We took the 70 rod portage leading to Cummings after exploring the Korb campsite. Ben and I put out our fishing rods trolling the Eastern side of Cummings. Ben reeled in several good size smallmouth bass. We stopped at the three campsites on the Eastern part of Cummings. I liked the second one the most with the sand beach and pines. All three, though, were very nice campsites. As we were completing the loop back to Korb Lake we decided to stop and fish at the portage by the rapids. Ben had great luck right away! He reeled in a good size bass after a few casts. Shortly afterwards, he reeled in a huge largemouth bass (19-20 inches). This more than made up for the one he lost on Lunetta. We both went for a short swim as the location offered plenty of sun and cover from the wind before packing up to go across the portage. We stopped at the Little Crab campsite on the way back to take pictures; the previous campers had left. When we arrived back at Lunetta at 2:00 PM, we decided to stay at camp the rest of the day eating up the food and relaxing in the sun. We had bacon, lettuce, tomato, and avocado wraps for dinner that night, one of my favorites. That evening we packed up everything we could to prepare for the early start the next day. Day 4 – We woke up a few minutes before our watch alarms went off at 4:50AM and started taking down camp. We were all packed and on the water at 6 AM, a half hour ahead of schedule. The weather was sunny and mostly calm. There was a slight breeze, but nothing significant. We made good time paddling averaging about 3.6 mph. We did the 408 rod portage again the same way as before, except it was warmer than the first day. The wind started picking up when we were halfway across Burntside, so we were glad we got an early start. We made it back safe and in good time (2 hrs 51 minutes).