My buddies are I doing this route over 5 days Labor Day Weekend. First time at BW. We'd like to be able to set up camp and hike/fish for a day or two and not canoe every day. Outfitter has the route as being 24 miles, which seems fine. Is that doable? Anything in particular about this route anyone recommends?
Any advice or tips on this route would be much appreciated.

Can you clarify your route? Mudro is the entry, but the path to Horse is one way and Gun another from Fourtown (which indirectly connects the two). What's the proposed 24-mi loop? What's your trip experience/ability?

Sorry, the route is: Mudro, Tin Can Mike, Horse, Fourtown, Boot, Fairy, Gun, Bullet, Moosecamp.

We're all younger guys, experienced backpackers and canoe. Mostly do the Buffalo River, hiking and canoe and all that. Never been to BW. Are there any specific camping sights folks recommend? From what I gather there are some better than others. Will we have trouble finding a campsite or is there normally something available?

I can't find my route planning book, but I thought the portage to Sandpit/Tin Can Mike was worse in one direction than the other, according to the author. The Mudro-Fourtown portage is worse in both directions, as it's a pretty brutal portage.

I enjoyed the area and have been twice. Although I considered the Moosecamp river, I didn't do it either time. My friends did it the following year and despite being up for adventure, I got negative reviews from them. I like small portions of river/grassy paddling but not several hours of it.

Fourtown is a very busy lake, but we saw fewer people once we got to Boot, Fairy, or Gun. A different year we even went up to Beartrap/Thunder. In both cases, we returned the way we came, through Boot. Father-in-law caught a 30" walleye on Boot, and my wife and I really enjoyed the campsite on the east side of Fairy that has a very high vantage point for viewing the entire lake and surrounding area. On Beartrap, we saw moose and no other people. There are some mucky portages that way, but nothing that stole our shoes.

With Horse and Fourtown being busier lakes, I'd suggest staying on Boot or Fairy the first day, and if you enjoy it you can stay a second night since they aren't as busy. From there you could move on with the loop down through Moosecamp River. Gun has very clear water but daytime fishing may be more difficult in warm weather.

Leave plenty of time to get back on your last day, you may have less steam than when you entered. Camping on Fourtown might be a good idea. I recommend a no-cook breakfast (power bars, granola, whatever) so that you can shove off earlier in the morning.

Not much hiking to be done in that area unless you mean bushwhacking in the areas around where you're camping.

So your outfitter is recommending you go on a figure 8 shaped route, ok fine. You have 5 days to cover the 24 miles but you don't want to necessarily move camp every day. You could, in theory, have 2 campsites - one on Horse, and another on Fourtown. One of the days you're on Fourtown take a day trip to Boot, Fairy, Gun, Bullet, Moosecamp, and down the river. I think that will be more agreeable to your group. Alternatively, you could camp on Horse, then Fairy/Gun, then Fourtown before exiting.

I didn't think any of the portages along this route were terribly bad, but it was also sunny and 60 when we did the triple portage from Fourtown to Mudro.

Portage from Sandpit to Mudro contains a hefty steep climb in that direction. Mudro to Fourtown is three portages- the long portage in the middle. The long portage climbs up to a ridge that parallels the river and then back down to the river at the end. More long than difficult, but when you're running parallel to the ridge it's a steep drop if you walked off the edge. Any place in your proposed route is easy travel back to the entry point. Very light work for five days.

Awesome. Thank you so much for all the advice. This is exactly what our group needed. Looking forward to it!

Another bit of info for you - I was in that area last month with a group of first-timers (5 youth, 3 adults). It took us about 3 hours to get from the EP through the portages into Fourtown and another 90 minutes or so to paddle up Fourtown. We stayed at one of the sites in the northern-most bay of Fourtown. A large site with great sunrise and sunset views but stinky fishing.

We day tripped up the Moosecamp river - took about 2 hours going up, taking our time and enjoying. Took about 1 hour coming back down - partly because weather was moving in so we were moving "with a purpose".

We moved over to Boot for a couple of days and day tripped up to Fairy and Gun. Caught a couple small northern but still not worth the effort.

There were lots of people moving through the Mudro/Fourtown portages when we were there. The Fourtown campsite was pretty quiet because it was kind of dead-end. There was a pretty constant stream of people going by the Boot campsite.

I'll see you up there! We are doing the border loop through this area Sat to Sat. Leave some campsites for us!

If you do the Moosecamp River make sure water levels are adequate. That can be quite a slog paddling through grass and lilly pads the whole time.
I did it in 2018 and still regret it!

The portage from Mudro into Fourtown while tough is really, really cool!

Also the steep portage into Tincan Mike or sand pit (can't remember) is fun!