Hi folks, this will be our first trip and we'll be taking my two young adult children. Looking for a scenic, yet good fishing lake. We don't mind a portage and hopefully it's not a really busy lake. Any thoughts?

dusty, welcome to the forum. More information from you will get you more and better responses:
When and how long is the trip?
Will you be using an outfitter?
One portage limit or a few to get you to a good lake?
Travel each day or basecamp?
What kind of fish are you hoping to catch?

If you have a specific entry date permit availability becomes important. You can check that at

BWCA permits

Stay tuned:)

dustytexuss: "Hi folks, this will be our first trip and we'll be taking my two young adult children. Looking for a scenic, yet good fishing lake. We don't mind a portage and hopefully it's not a really busy lake. Any thoughts?"

If you go in the June-Aug, to get away from people, you need to go deeper (more portages). After labor day things slow down normally (who knows this year?).

All but one of my trips started in Moose Lake. From there...Ensign seems to be crowded, so I avoid it.

Based on your screen name you may have traveled a long way for this trip. If you will be entering on a lake where a tow/shuttle is possible consider it. It will often allow you to get deeper faster and avoid some less than desirable paddling. It will save you the major portion of two days paddling (one in and one out) allowing you to spend time doing what you came for. Even if you are self outfitting you can still arrange for a tow from a number of outfitters depending on your entry point. An additional plus is depending on your paddling experience you can avoid some of the larger lakes where wind can be a problem if not an outright source of danger or bar to travel.

alpinebrule: "Based on your screen name you may have traveled a long way for this trip. If you will be entering on a lake where a tow/shuttle is possible consider it. ..."<
/quote>

Indeed. I am also from T but not the dusty part. I always get a tow that saves me 8 miles of paddling.

Well from a current BWJ article his number 5 most important rule was planning. You seem to be on the ball on that! So many good options. I’ve done a Quetico Trip in college(long time ago) and a BWCA trip last summer with my son with Boy Scouts and a guide. Now I’m heading in with the whole family to BWCA this year actually August 2nd.

Not Knowing what is going to happen I’d stick with BWCA for first trip, You know you won’t have an issue with the border being closed. Also nice for first timers to have an actual grumper/toilet. Digging holes although not a big deal is a next step. I was pretty amazed last year at how beautiful the BWCA was and I’m kind of wired to want to push further north and go for Canada.

I’ve been from Ely on Moose Lake and over to Saganaga and the end of the gunflint trail. Is the goal fishing? Is it catching a Lake trout? If it’s lake trout you need to deeper colder lakes. You can mix it on a trip and fish for all.

Ensign has great fishing and is an easy reach from Moose. Probably to easy since it’s a busy lake but does have a lot of sites. Couple more short portages leaving from Moose gets you to Knife Lake. At that point you’ve got a lot of paddling before you need to portage. Isle of Pines, Thunder Point, Eddy Falls on the South Arm of Knife. All without portaging again. Wind can be more of an issue if it comes up on these bigger long lakes though.

Personally with the burn area I wasn’t really a fan of Alpine or Jasper Lake last year. I know they have good fishing but I was glad to leave the burn area behind when we got to Ogishgemuncie. It’s neat to see it but not where I’d want to camp for a week. Some maps show the burn zones so you can tell where they are.

Ottertrack with the high cliffs was pretty epic and my son picked out the ottertrack formations that the lake is named for. He was in a different canoe that day so I didn’t get to see it.

Plenty of other areas to go that I haven’t been. My next trip will either be Quetico or a different area of the BWCA.

Ryan