Hey All

I'm planning on driving from Wisconsin and entering the park on a Saturday- does anyone know the hours of the Beaverhouse Ranger Station? I can get there and have boats loaded and in the water by 2 pm, but I'm worried that I might miss my opportunity to pull my permits on a Saturday afternoon.

Any help on this one?

Thanks!!

It’s about an hour paddle across BH to the ranger station. They’ll still be open at 3:00. To confirm that, call the park at (807) 597-2735.

I’ll add that if you get tied up at the border, flat tire or whatever, the Atikokan ranger station is open until 4:15 everyday. You can also pick up your permit at the Dawson Trail campground until 8:30pm everyday. Dawson Trail is an hour east of of the Flanders Road turnoff to Beaverhouse and a half hour east of Atikokan, but it’s an option should you need it.

Where are you headed?

I'd go up through Grand Marais and come in from the east. Then you can pull your permit from either of the 2 stations listed. It's not much further and it is much prettier.

Jackfish: "Where are you headed?"

This trip is exciting - bringing along both of my teens and my father, who despite his lack of canoe tripping experience, is absolutely enthusiastic.

We're going in BH, Quetico, Conk, Jean, Burntside, Claire, Bentpine, Trail, Little Pine, Snow, Your, Fair, Badwater and West Bay. We have 8/9 days, which should allow for a layover and some fishing as well.

It looks like the weather will be hot!

Sounds like a great trip. Good luck!

Btw... I grew up in the Kickapoo valley. With your moniker, can you say the same?

Jackfish: "Sounds like a great trip. Good luck!

Btw... I grew up in the Kickapoo valley. With your moniker, can you say the same?"

Absolutely! 54639 to be exact!

Now, my family and I reside in the West Fork Valley- I own and operate a restaurant in the region that is very specific to this place. Do you come back often?

Nice! I grew up downstream at 54631. Looking to get back to visit my mother over the July 4th weekend. We get back a few times a year. Haven't made it into your restaurant yet, but I promise to get there one of my trips home.

Save the hassle of paddling to ranger station and pick up in Atikokan, especially if there is any wind in the forecast as Beaverhouse can get nasty. Just came in from that area, It is a great area. Have Fun, and be safe!

Kickapoo: "

Jackfish: "Where are you headed?"

We're going in BH, Quetico, Conk, Jean, Burntside, Claire, Bentpine, Trail, Little Pine, Snow, Your, Fair, Badwater and West Bay. We have 8/9 days, which should allow for a layover and some fishing as well.

It looks like the weather will be hot! "

I did the same trip last year. It's a great area. You probably already know the Badwater portage is pretty long and swampy but not too bad if it's dry. Just take your time.

The Beaverhouse ranger station is a wonderful cabin in the woods in the back of a protected bay and well worth the travel to visit it and get a permit. However, Beaverhouse gets real mad in windy weather so if there is wind on your put in day, you really will need to get the permit in Atikokan. One time I went in, it was so windy that we physically could not reach the ranger station and ended up going into Cirrus without our permit. A few weeks later I got a 'shame on you' letter from Quetico for failing to purchase a reserved permit. If they only knew.

I went in there last year and it was like glass all the way across so you never know.

Otherwise, lots of walleye in the water, lakers on some of the lakes but they will be harder to catch now since the water has warmed up. Much of the route is not too heavily traveled. Jean has very few good campsites.

Tom

If you guys can leave Friday night and get a hotel in Thunder Bay, that is an awesome way to start the trip. There is an hour time difference between TB and Dawson Trail CG so you can leave TB as late as 7:00AM and get to the station around 8:00 even though it is a 2 hour drive. That gets you on the water in the AM and a fair way down Quetico lake by evening. I also love this part of the park and have trip envy as I have never been to Bentpine and it is on my list. Enjoy.

Amazing trip in an interesting part of the park!

Hot conditions provoked much swimming on Quetico and in Jean. Burntside produced some decent walleye action and put us into position to access Claire and then Bentpine. This portage is miscalculated on the Mackenzie maps- it reads 66 rods, but in reality is more like 166. Its a beast!

Bentpine had great fishing and tons of solitude.

The way out of Bentpine (March, Trail, Snow and Your Lakes) was tough- especially the Trail Creek section of the trip- be advised! This section isn't floatable! You will need 15 feet of painter line on the front of your boat to literally pull it through the floating bog for about 600 yards. A word of caution- watch your footing. A misstep will send you into the muck to your hips.

Badwater was moody and gorgeous. Fire smoke started to drift in from Dryden, so a haze covered the sun. It still made for amazing swimming off the cliff face at the campsite.

The Badwater portage was all that and a bag of chips!

I do have a question for any historians out there: it seemed that the historic logging efforts only took trees on the shores of the interior lakes based on the remaining stumps. Is this an accurate statement?

Thanks!!!

I would think the logging company's would take every tree they could. They dammed up a lot of water ways and raised the water levels. Perhaps you were seeing old stumps previously submerged. A lot of those would be cedars.

AmarilloJim: "I would think the logging company's would take every tree they could. They dammed up a lot of water ways and raised the water levels. Perhaps you were seeing old stumps previously submerged. A lot of those would be cedars."

Agreed. The pine stumps have long rotted away. Only the cedar stumps are left. This is evident on Bald Eagle Lake in the BWCA too. The shore is full of cedar stumps from a long time ago.

Since we're on the subject of logging, I was wondering why there are so many old-growth Pines at the portages in the Q? There were some dandy 300 year old pines along the Sturgeon lake route going into Olifaunt on the on the portages. These are areas where the loggers would have had to travel. I thought maybe they were left as markers for navigation. Easy to see the trees from far away when everything else was cut. Just a thought.