BWCA Entry Point, Route, and Trip Report Blog
April 20 2024
Entry Point 9 - Little Indian Sioux River South
Little Indian Sioux River (south) entry point allows overnight paddle only. This entry point is supported by La Croix Ranger Station near the city of Ely, MN. The distance from ranger station to entry point is 44 miles. Heading South from the Echo Trail. Difficult route. Four portages to Bootleg Lake. This area was affected by blowdown in 1999.
Number of Permits per Day: 1 permit every other day
Elevation: 1362 feet
Latitude: 48.1420
Longitude: -92.2079
Little Indian Sioux River South - 9
Number of Permits per Day: 1 permit every other day
Elevation: 1362 feet
Latitude: 48.1420
Longitude: -92.2079
Little Indian Sioux River South - 9
First trip to the western area BWCA
by paddelingruth
Trip Report
Entry Date:
August 19, 2019
Entry Point:
Little Indian Sioux River (north)
Number of Days:
5
Group Size:
2
Trip Introduction:
We left Lincoln early on Friday and headed to Fargo to make Sauerkraut, and stayed with Dan’s brother and family; it is always great to see them. Headed to Duluth on Saturday and camped at Indian Point Campground, it was just for a quick night of sleep and then headed to the North Shore area to drive on Lake Superior, we both love this area and we had to see if the Blueberries were in our usual place. Yes, the blueberries were there and we would have them for our pancakes in the BWCA. We then headed to Ely to find Voyager North for sleeping. We walked around the town and had a great supper and wonderful Custard at Red Cabin. YUMMY! Ely has a lot of neat shops.
We stayed at Ely at Voyager North, Bunkhouse on Sunday evening. This unit had 3 separate rooms, each had 4 bunk beds & the common area was shared with 2 showers & one toilet. There was a microwave toaster, coffee maker, various teas & sugar etc. Well worth the stay. I am always amazed at dad’s who take their daughters into the BWCA, by themselves. There were 2 dads staying with their daughters. The kids were really excited.
Day 1 of 5
Monday, August 19, 2019 We decided to get up around 6:00 am to head out to Brittons Café, very good food & reasonable. There was only 3 other people in the café when we arrived. It didn’t take long for the place to start getting busy. There was a group of 6 people who came in that I thought that I recognized that had been at Trail Center last year, when we stopped for breakfast. I asked them if they had been at East Bear Skin last year. They said yes, they were curious, I explained we were there also. The one asked me if we had the black and white springer and I stated yes, talked to them for a little while. They have an adorable little granddaughter she is about 3 years old , and had a huge pancake the size of a dinner plate and was embarrassed how big it was. We laughed and exchanged emails. They had never been in this area either always did the East area of BWCA. We were headed to BWCA Entry Point 14: Little Indian Sioux River, Upper Pauness, Lower Pauness and Loon Lake We have our own Wenonah Boundary Waters, 17ft canoe that we bought used from Canadian Waters Outfitter on our way to the last canoe trip. He had showed Dan on a map about this canoe trip, so we decided to try it out. That is why we were in West area this time. We were on our way by 7:07 am, the road we were looking for was hwy or road #116 called the Echo Trail, it is listed as 88 on the hwy sign. After half hour of driving we ended up back at Hwy 1 to Ely. Some where we missed a sign. But that is okay we stopped for gas and we both used the facilities and off we went again. This time Dan took out his packed GPS and sure enough we found a very faded 116 sign and white and green street sign that said Echo Trail, so we arrived around 9 ish. By the time we got unloaded and walked to the put in we were canoeing by 10:10. There were 4 other groups putting in about the same time. Very busy portage. On the next portage there was 3 other groups coming out. It was cloudy and 74 degrees. The rice grass was pretty thick at times on the Little Indian Sioux river and the river was pretty low. It was two hours of paddling to get in to the Upper Pauness. We saw a group looking for camping spot so we moved on. The big site by the portage to Lower Pauness was full. The next site was open so we moved in. We were both beat seemed like we had to hurry the whole morning with so many coming and going. Windy We set up camp and took a nap, then headed out fishing. Dan caught a small bass and walleye. We saw otters, beaver, and a deer, eagle and 2 loons came to welcome us. We must be back in the BWCA, when the loons come and welcome you. We had our usually steak supper and mashed potatoes for supper over a nice fire. We then headed to bed. 
Day 2 of 5
Tuesday, August 20, 2019 About 6:00 am it started storming. We had planned to get up early, get packed up and move on. We decided to go ahead and sleep in and stay where we were, we slept in until 9:00 am. When the rain stopped, we were still debating about going ahead and pack up and move, but it still looked like rain, plus we had no idea with all the people we saw coming and going yesterday if there would be an open campsite. We ate pancakes with blueberries then headed out fishing. I caught a walleye and Dan caught a few other fish. We started seeing other canoers coming in from area #14, two groups went all around the lake but didn’t stay. We saw 2 canoers come off of the portage into Lower Pauness, they told the 2 canoers waiting for the portage that Lower Pauness was full. The other 2 canoers took the site closets to leaving and the other 2 canoes moved past us toward the back of the lake. While we ate supper, another canoe came looking for a camp site. We had Mountain house Chili Mac for supper we ate early. We spent some time packing things and getting some stuff dried out it was Sunny and breezy now. Dan says we are expecting a low of 48 tonight. Tomorrow we will try to move on to Lower Pauness , Shell or Loon Lake. 
Day 3 of 5
Wednesday, August 21, 2019 We were up at 7:00 am and packed up and ready to head out to Lower Pauness by 8:45. We were on the Portage & met a couple that just day tripping. We checked out a site we wanted it had campers so we went to the site across from the portage into Loon Lake. It was open so we took it. We were there and set up by 10:00 am, time to do some fishing. We both caught northern, Rock bass and small bass. Dan caught two more walleye. We were just using jigs. No rain, cool, breezy and cloudy. We headed in for an early supper of Chicken and rice, then back out for more fishing until 8:00ish. No keepers but we did keep catching fish. We were to late getting into the tent the mosquito's were everywhere. We wacked mosquito's for quite awhile in the tent. Today while being around the Portage into Loon lake we saw a few sets of canoers headed into the portage but only saw one head out. Tonight, we started reading “A walk in the woods”. We take turns reading out loud, I had to plug my ears on most of chapter one. The book is all about bears and killings.
Day 4 of 5
Thursday, August 22, 2019 It was a toss & turning night. Dan said it sprinkled early. We were up at 8:30 packed lunch, made biscuit and gravy for breakfast, we headed to Loon Lake around 11:00 for a day trip. When we were ready to portage a group of two sets of different canoers where on there way out. Cloudy today, with just a touch of blue sky. Cool. Did I tell you how afraid I am about getting in and out of the canoe when it is odd like wet rocks, high rocks anything but standing on the ground and climbing in, well today on the slippery stone at our campsite when I was climbing in I went under the canoe right in the lake, I was soaking wet. Went up to camp put on a dry shirt, took off wet bra and under shirt. Left on my wet pants since they dry fast. I had to laugh. The funny thing is our dog Lil was standing right by Dan, by the canoe while he was fishing from the bank, in the same spot I had slid into the lake and she slid in also. Our plan was to canoe into Loon Lake to just before the Canadian border. We were on Loon Lake by noon. We checked out a couple of campsites, enjoyed a snack. The wind had really picked up and Loon is a big lake. We could see boat house far off & saw two motor boats on the lake. I hard one and said to Dan is that a boat motor or a mosquito. The flies were no problem today. Dan found a Moose head skeleton at the campsite, that is the closest we have come to seeing a moose in the BWCA. We fished but didn’t catch anything, it was a fun day. We headed back to camp, had a little difficulty finding the correct path in the weeds to get back to our portage. We just took a wrong turn. We headed in for Supper. No fish dinner. We saw a few other canoes on our lake but they were just passing thru. At dinner Dan said he thought we should head out on Friday. We sent out daily message to home using the in reach. Had a nice evening and headed into the tent by 8:00 p.m. to avoid the mosquito's. We read some more of the book and then lights out; this chapter was much better, no bear deaths 
Day 5 of 5
Friday, August 23, 2019 We were up by 7:00 am, started getting things together and ate breakfast, had a nice breeze and sunshine. We were able to put the tent and awnings on the rock to dry out, nice to have things dry, We were loaded and headed out by 10:00 am. There was a group of two canoes a head of us. They had put in on the same day as us. Then one other group of three guys seemed to be in a hurry, we let them go ahead of us. We did the paddle just fine today. Hated to leave the sunshine & warm weather. There were a lot of canoes headed in. We couldn’t believe the one group had no manners, they wanted to be on the portage and get their stuff in front of others. We gave them room. We were back to the put in by 12:30. We found our vehicle and loaded up. Headed back to Ely, stopped at Voyager to take showers, $10.00 for both. Very nice facility with a bathroom & shower together in individual room, two shower stalls also. We ate at DQ , had cheeseburgers! Yummy so good. We got out our cells to let family know we were out of BWCA and okay. It was 4:00 p.m. Dan decided to see how far he could drive, and we pulled into our driveway in Lincoln Nebraska at 2:30 a.m.
There is never a bad place to go in the Boundary waters, that is for sure, but we both felt like we enjoyed our past East areas more. There seemed to be so many people coming and going on this trip. I felt like the paddling in the Little Indian Sioux River was very hard with the tall rice grass. Thankful there was enough water there to paddle, but really had to reach out and paddle hard to get thru that area. 
discuss this trip report (5 comments) - last post on July 18, 2020