A little known secret in Minnesota is the Chippewa National forest. We camp there a lot and normally tell few about about it because we do not want to see anyone else. lol. It is like the BWCA, however there are cabins on a lot of lakes (its like what the BW would have been if they never protected it).

Anyway the reason for this post is up till this point there was no map with portage or campsites on it. However, I stopped at the ranger station last month and they just created a HUGE data base with all the portages and campsites on it. They even have pics of the over 300 camp sites and have they rated from poor to great. This is a huge deal! Only problem is you must get the map (for free) from the ranger station. I picked up my copies and am just blown away by the amount of info on them. Just wanted to let you all in on this secret!

Thanks for the tip!

We also love the Chippewa National Forest sites. I will look for a copy of that new map next time we are up that way.

Nice! Thanks for the info. We did a lot of camping in the Chippewa when I was younger. Still do about once every couple years now. Looking forward to getting this map.

Canoearoo, is there drive in car camping sites and cabins or only paddle/portage in sites?

there are lots of options in the chippewa, mom and pop resorts, boat/canoe in camp sites, and forest service drive in sites that can be reserved on recreation.gov

one of my favorite routes is wabana to little trout to trout, several boat in sites on all lakes. On trout is the joyce estate fun place to walk around, water is clear, fishing is better on little trout and wabana, the shallow channels between the lakes are awesome, water is clear and they are full of small sunfish and bass darting everywhere, watch out for the low bridge

i canoe/boat/camp/fish in the Chippewa a dozen times or more each year.

quote giddyup: "Canoearoo, is there drive in car camping sites and cabins or only paddle/portage in sites?"

All of the above

I FINALLY got around to scanning in the maps. There is other maps you can get with other campsites on it as well but it was to big for me to scan.

are the camp site pictures on-line or by request?

you can only get the map at Marcell ranger station. The camp sites are first come first serve. Remember in CNF you can camp where every you want as well, you don't need a site.

Also, the maps were bigger than my scanner, so I couldn't line them up perfectly after. I had to scan one map 2 times, one for top and one for the bottom.

There is also another map they have called sharing our secrets. That was was way to big to scan in.

At the Marcell ranger station they have pictures of every campsite in their 3 ring binder. So you can see what they look like before you go

There is also portages in CNF, but I see the maps don't have them listed. The ranger station can tell you where they are

Those are great Canoearoo! Thanks. Makes the planning just that much easier and I'll definitely stop in for a map.

Great info! Thanks for sharing. Do you just pay per night at the ranger station for the sites?

all disperse sights are free.

You only need to pay for the national forest campgrounds

also here is the link to the rules for CNF

Glad I remembered this thread. I now pass through that area frequently. I may need to start packing some hiking gear in my trunk in case I just feel like sleeping outside.