This YouTube video came up in my algorithm and I found it fascinating. Really cool old time footage of a canoe trip. And some huge fish on the stringer. Not my family, but a really great look back 90 years or so in time.

1935 Canoe Trip in Canada

My trip is in two weeks to Quetico and I'm really looking forward to getting eaten alive by the bugs. New Draumr hammock too. Excited!

Mike

Super cool find. Thank you for sharing. I am sure my father will get a kick out of this.

Wow! They carried a sheet-metal cookstove! I started out in the era of canvas tents and tarps and we did use a reflector oven, but I never would have imagined carrying a sheepherder stove.

Amazing to see how much has changed and how young overall the forests looked as they likely had been logged 20-30 years before that video. But those beavers haven't changed a thing about how they construct a dam!

Hey UglyPike... have a great trip to Q. Which entry point and where are you headed? My buddy and I just got back from Q last week after a Stanton Bay entry into Pickerel.

This is such a cool video. I need to see these things when I start to whine about portaging my ultralight gear...they had canvas canoes and an entire cookstove. And they look like they're having a grand time.

Mike

My last trip I went in thru Stanton Bay, down thru Beg, Bisk Bud, Fern, Olifaunt, over and back up thru the Deux Rivieres and back across Pickerel.

This trip we are flying in to Clay, going down the creek and Wawiag River, Kawnipi, and then down and out through the Falls Chain and a tow back to Voyageur Outfitters. Probably going to base camp somewhere on Kawnipi for a couple two-tree days and then look for one more base camp on the way out. My son and I like to fish a bit and are taking 8 days to sort of leisurely make our way south.

Going to be hammock camping this trip. Im also going to do my darndest to keep the fishing gear to a minimum. Im so bad at wanting to bring the entire aresnal. Always have too much fishing gear.

It has been a couple of years. My son and I went in 2019. Then the pandemic hit. And then last year, I was planning a trip but we found out we were moving to the UK and we sold our house so the canoe trip got scrapped and I went on a late trip up to Pipestone Lake and Cedar Lake Lodge for a quick musky trip. Didnt catch a thing. Sad Me. But it was still Canada.

Moved to the UK in January. Randomly met a great guy while my wife and I were walking one morning and turns out he loves to fly fish and has a small pond about 15 minutes from where we live that he stocks with trout every spring. So Ive been able to fly fish 3 or 4 times this spring and early summer. At least Ive been able to scratch the itch a bit!

Fishing here in the UK is bonkers. They love their carp fishing. And everything here is private so you have to join a club or pay a fee to fish anywhere.

Ive got just about all the gear I need now minus the canoe and paddles. When I move back to the States in another year and a half or so (I think...) I will be looking for my first canoe. Ill probably end up with a couple of them. Im gonna look for something maneuverable and smaller for solo trips and a second larger, stable, good fishing and flatwater tripping canoe. Not sure if I can talk my wife into the northwoods or not...she isnt very fond of the mosquitos. Or sleeping on the ground.

What do you think the pathway was, lake wise, from Seagull, down to Kiwishiwi River..........interesting!

BorealTriangle: "What do you think the pathway was, lake wise, from Seagull, down to Kiwishiwi River..........interesting!"

If you look real close at the map you can see one they passed through labeled as "Little Sag". So I'm guessing Ogish-Gabi-Little Sag-Malberg (with several other lakes in between of course) to get over to the river, and then Alice-Insula-Number Lakes to follow.

Wow, what a spectacular find. I love every second of this film. Heavy canoes, portage signs, bushcraft picnic tables, no pfds, no Fisher maps, that oven!!!! - the list goes on and on about how so much has changed. I bet they didn't see a soul on what is now a very popular area.

Love seeing Duluth in 1935. So Winton was the epicenter then and not Ely.


What was that dam at 17:00?

Thanks so much for posting this. Going to watch it again and again.

MikeinMpls: "This is such a cool video. I need to see these things when I start to whine about portaging my ultralight gear...they had canvas canoes and an entire cookstove. And they look like they're having a grand time.


Mike"

In eighty years they will watch our videos bewildered by the stone knives and bear skins we use today. We all smile carrying this stuff. Plus the pace of innovation increases exponentially. If the gear we're using now is ten times better than what they used in 1935, The gear available in 2105 will probably be fifty times better than what we use today.

And after the tents are up get to work on the table, and fresh homemade pie, fabulous. What a find. Thx!

Wow thats some golden stuff. Can't imagine doing that route when I was 20 years old with that equipment.

What a cool video. Thanks for posting this find. What a slice of history.

uglypike: "This YouTube video came up in my algorithm and I found it fascinating. Really cool old time footage of a canoe trip. And some huge fish on the stringer. Not my family, but a really great look back 90 years or so in time.

1935 Canoe Trip in Canada

My trip is in two weeks to Quetico and I'm really looking forward to getting eaten alive by the bugs. New Draumr hammock too. Excited!

Mike

"

Wow, the footage from the paddling trip from 88 years ago is very well preserved. Better even than the actual historic footage spliced in to make it look coherent.

The Greatest Generation!!! The fantastic film shouts that on this 4th of July weekend. I wonder how many fought in WWII, and how many came back. I'm in awe of their portaging and what they portaged. They could skip boot camp and go straight to Army Ranger School, today. I am in awe of this generation and their sacrifices for our freedom.

The dam on the kawishiwi that jwy 1 crosses over?

DownStrm: "The Greatest Generation!!! The fantastic film shouts that on this 4th of July weekend. I wonder how many fought in WWII, and how many came back. I'm in awe of their portaging and what they portaged. They could skip boot camp and go straight to Army Ranger School, today. I am in awe of this generation and their sacrifices for our freedom.

"

I was thinking the exact same thing. World War 2 was right around the corner. Did any of them serve? Survive? What a sweet, wonderful movie! My first movie camera was a wind-up, so no batteries needed. I wonder if that's what the photographer used. Thank you so much for sharing that wonderful piece of BWCA history!

Dave

DownStrm: "The Greatest Generation!!! The fantastic film shouts that on this 4th of July weekend. I wonder how many fought in WWII, and how many came back. I'm in awe of their portaging and what they portaged. They could skip boot camp and go straight to Army Ranger School, today. I am in awe of this generation and their sacrifices for our freedom.



"

Thought same

Amazing video! It really struck me that the BWCA looked a lot diffrent before it was actually the BWCA (i.e wilderness designation). For example, the signs at the portages, the docks, the built up campsites. Sometimes I find it interesting that this place we all love so much for its wild features was really heading toward a lot less of a wild palce in the first half of the 20th century. Shoot, there used to be fishing lodges on Crooked!

Thanks for posting!