We lost our 4th for a trip this September, so i'm going to rent a solo for the first time. I want something to be stable to fish from, and also somewhat still keep up with a tandem, i am leaning towards a Northwind solo. Besides piragis does anyone else in ELY rent the northwind solo?

Email or call Spirit of the Wilderness. It's not listed on their own website, but in the outfitters section of this website it is listed in the write up about Spirit of the Wilderness.

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I've rented a Northwind Solo on my last 3 solos and love it. I've rented it from Rockwood, Sawtooth, and Piragis. Piragis was the only one in Ely that I knew of at the time that rented it. I saw the listing on here about Spirit of the Wilderness after my trip so I didn't check with them to see if they carried it. Please report back if you find out that they do.

Ducks how is the stability of the Northwind solo, i've only paddled solo a few times in a smaller bell 13' and it was a lot to handle unloaded.

Also, will let you know what i find.

I rented one last year. It was nice and pretty stable, although I didn't fish from it.

The thing is rock solid stable......... I trip w/ a 90lb lab named Echo and I haven't had any problems w/ stability.

I bought a Northwind Solo a couple of years ago and took it on a car camping trip shortly after my purchase. I was a bit concerned about the stability issue, this being my first true solo canoe.

Well, the howling winds upon arriving at the Gunflint Trail had me pretty intimitaded. I finally decided to test the canoe out even with whitecaps rolling and gale force winds howling.

I put on my swimsuit and headed for the beach at the landing on Seagull Lake. If you've been there, you know that the shallow water and sandy bottom make for an ideal canoe testing site.

I had no gear in the canoe to make it more stable and I took off into the wind expecting to be blown all over.............well, my very first impression of the canoe in the wind is how well it handled strong winds and how well it handled the whitecaps. I'm used to paddling a small tandem when soloing (sitting in the bow facing the stern) and I was amazed at the handling of the Northwind Solo.

The next impression I had was how stable this canoe is, even without being loaded with camping equipment. I tried just about anything I could to get it to tip over. I was a stable as a rock. I really had to screw up to get that canoe to dump me out.

It is a wonderful canoe and I'm glad I took the time to really test it under adverse conditions,

I own one, very stable. I even raised the seat up 1 1/2 inches

Where did you end up renting one from?

We picked up a 4th person the day before we headed to Ely, so i had to cancel my reservation and we used my SR 17 instead. Spirit of the wilderness had the Northwind Solo available, spent the week on knife got back yesterday, had some weather, so maybe a good thing i didn't have to do my first solo on such big water.

quote ducks: "The thing is rock solid stable......... I trip w/ a 90lb lab named Echo and I haven't had any problems w/ stability.



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The red pack in your canoe what brand is it, looks comfortable. Chi

quote campnfish: "We picked up a 4th person the day before we headed to Ely, so i had to cancel my reservation and we used my SR 17 instead. Spirit of the wilderness had the Northwind Solo available, spent the week on knife got back yesterday, had some weather, so maybe a good thing i didn't have to do my first solo on such big water."

Thanks for the info. I think my early spring solo next year will be out of Ely so it would be nice to rent canoe and bunkhouse from the same place. Piragis had the Northwind Solo/no bunkhouse and VNO had the bunkhouse/no Northwind Solo. Both places were great to work with but 1 stop shopping is more convenient. I have not rented from Spirit of the Wilderness before but have chatted w/ both Steve and Ginny (I think that's the father/daughter combo that run it) before and they seem like great people.

Sounds like things turned out well for you considering the weather. I love soloing, but after 4 solo trips I still plan to avoid big water.

quote SteveF: "

quote ducks: "The thing is rock solid stable......... I trip w/ a 90lb lab named Echo and I haven't had any problems w/ stability.




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The red pack in your canoe what brand is it, looks comfortable. Chi "

It's a CCS Guide Pack and yes it is very comfortable. It's the largest of their hybrid packs. For soloing the Pioneer would work better for me, but the Guide is what I had before I started soloing and I don't want to spend the money on a pack I would use once a year when the pack I already have gets the job done. The Guide barely fits in a Northwind Solo and might not fit in a narrower solo.

My wife in action..........