BWCA Neewin and Niswi ?? Boundary Waters Trip Planning Forum
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redbeardcanoeworks
member (47)member
  
06/01/2021 12:45PM  
Just got back from BWCA. EP # 1, circle loop from Trout to Cummings and back on LIS to Trout. Great trip, some fish though most small.
Did a day trip into Neewin and bushwhacked into Niswi- not an easy accomplishment.
Neewin has a small population of NP, caught one around 28" the others in the 22" range. There is a campsite on Neewin, right where the maps section on this site shows it to be. The site is not bad, not hardly used, only two pieces of toilet paper in the hopper. It would be a 2 star site on a main lake but a 5 star for a PMA.
The portage in is about 100 rods, pretty easy, still maintained. Kind of a neat side trip. Neewin is very dark, heavy silt build up on all the underwater trees, kinda spooky. There is a big cabbage patch on the south side of the island on the east shore. Pike in there but not thick like you'd think.
So Niswi. I'm only posting this to find if anyone else has done this. In searching this and other boards there was a lot of chatter around 2016 of people who wanted to go there but no one seemed to have ever made it. Jswartman (sorry about the spelling) had been there years ago skiing it sounded like. So there was a portage trail in the past and someone has been in there trying to follow it and left some orange tape that sort of petered out in a bog. We found a lot of open granite areas with cairns left decades ago but it was very difficult to follow any trail from open area to open area. It is very difficult to find the portage start, there is no tread or cleared areas in the woods on any of the portage trail. There is no indication of any trail even in the cairn areas, the moss is unmolested.
The lake is spectacular. A lot of open granite knolls plunge right down into the water, there is a beautiful island, and a lot of erratic's, roundish granite boulders up to 8' tall perched on the open granite shores. And yes, there is actually a USFS fire grate on the south shore where it shows on this sites map.
So, the fishing right? I carried a rod but no canoe. I saw multitudes of 3" SMB minnows. I never got a hit. I see a 1983 fish survey showed NP. The same survey shows the lake is only 8' deep. I'm doubting there are any real fish in there.
I'd like to find out if anyone else has had any experience with this area that they would share. I would discuss the portage conditions with anyone interested.
DAVE
 
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