As long as I am trying to jar my memory, I know for many years we didn't need a RABC permit, just stop at Customs at Prairie Portage and show them your drivers ID. Just trying to remember the year of the change. It must be like 25 years or so?

Sounds right to me but could have been even earlier. It has been a long time since I remember making the two stops at the portage. Time flys. Now that I think about it perhaps 35 years ago?

Canadian Customs closed its Big Saganaga outpost in 1998, I believe. We found it hard to believe there was going to be an RABC process, which was as of either 98 or 99 (?). I was always an "eastsider" then so I'm not sure if it all happened one year or was different for PP or points west.

KawnipiKid: "Canadian Customs closed its Big Saganaga outpost in 1998, I believe. We found it hard to believe there was going to be an RABC process, which was as of either 98 or 99 (?). I was always an "eastsider" then so I'm not sure if it all happened one year or was different for PP or points west."

That is another question, I don't think all the Customs stations closed the same time.

Also Quetico off season permits were free(I think) in the 90's for a short time. Than half price-than full -than back down to half price again.

I do remember the guy at Prairie that ran the customs shop. A lot of inappropriate jokes and man alive he did not like the Boy Scout groups. Always friendly with us though.
I have to admit the current process is far better than the long line to get your permit and clear customs. I remember waiting once for just over two hours to get it done. Let’s hope they keep the current process when the border reopens

GraniteCliffs: "I do remember the guy at Prairie that ran the customs shop. A lot of inappropriate jokes and man alive he did not like the Boy Scout groups. Always friendly with us though.
I have to admit the current process is far better than the long line to get your permit and clear customs. I remember waiting once for just over two hours to get it done. Let’s hope they keep the current process when the border reopens "

The RABC pass pretty much ended groups of Boy scouts going. I think at one time at the Boy Scout camp on Moose lake they had a person there that could clear them thru Canadian customs. Things were real lax in the 60's and 70's and before.

I worked for an outfitter in the 80's on Moose Lake. I was one of the kids that motored people up to PP. Talk about a dream job for an 18 year old kid.

Anyway, I got to know one of the Canadian customs guys a little and I remember him as a young guy with a cavalier sort of personality. The funniest memory of him was that we would occasionally see him in Ely on a Friday night at a bar tossing back beers and having a good time. I don't know about the legalities of that sort of thing but both he and us sort of laughed at each other when we met.

A little off subject: The outfitter paid me $3.50 an hour and took out $5 a day for food and another $5 a day for lodging. I was living in a cabin back in the woods behind a parking lot. We called it 'The Swamp' because of the boggy area it was built in. Together I shared it with maybe five other kids who also were paying the same amount. I don't remember it having running water. Together we paid $600 a month for that cabin. It was criminal. The owners sold their business many years ago.

Tom