I will be going into the BWCA late August via little john, paddling the royal river, north fowl, moose to mountain lake. I saw some reports of the royal river being over grown and difficult to paddle. Can anyone help me determine the degree of difficulty. Thanks!

Five years ago, celebrating our 70th birthdays, we found by much trial and error that the open channel lies along the South shore of Royal Lake. If you stay right as you are headed to Fowl Lake, you should not have a problem with canoe-stopping vegetation. Hope someone with more recent experience chimes in.

Lots of vegetation, usually a path through it. Aim towards the bluffs in the east. I’d give it a 1. Usually if you stand in your canoe the Channel is more visable.

I took it with my brother about 20 years ago. My input will be much dated. I’m sure that many have gone through since then. It was super overgrown with tall cattails. I needed to orient my map and get a compass bearing to find the portage. I remember standing and getting a better look around also. There were thousands of spiders and bugs at fell off the weeds into the canoe. We had to literally pull our way through the stuff.

When you say 1– do you mean it’s easy. Only 1 out of 10 difficulty. Hoping that’s the case :)