We awoke to nice weather, had our coffee and struck camp early. Breakfast was a protein shake for each of us (powdered mix with water added), a handful of vitamins and we were off. The protein shakes are a great way to have a quick meal while traveling and really save on space in the food bag, as well as fuel for the stove. We were off to the portage to Gun lake by 8 am., and there met an Outward Bound group coming into Fairy who were on day 4 of their 22 day trip and had their aluminum canoes loaded to the gunwales. We did what became our standard portage, Laurie making 1 trip, me making 2; canoe first and returning to get the pack. It was nice to enter uncharted territory for me, I hadn't been on Gun lake before, and found it beautiful and of a nice size. It looked like good fishing could be had around the rocks near the "top of the grip", but we were moving onward and so headed for the portage landing for Gull. The weather was amenable, with broken clouds and light winds, making for a nice paddle across the lake. The landing at the Gull portage is an interesting one, with a good drop-off that makes coming along-side the right approach (as opposed to head on). A nice waterfall could be heard through the trees, making the uphill portage easier if not even shorter. There had been a couple of groups camped on Gun, but we found Gull abandoned, and lovely. The East campsite on Gull lake is top notch, I've not seen its equal in the BWCA, but more on that later. We paddled on past it, along the lovely North shore and another campsite before finding the portage that leads Northward to Mudhole. A sandy-gravel landing loaded with minnows was a welcome change, and we took the opportunity to soak our feet and douse our heads with cool water. This portage (given the name of the lake on the other end) looked intimidating from the South side. The trail disappeared into tall grass within a few feet of the landing and one had the idea that you would soon be struggling through floating bog-like terrain for the whole fifty rods. Not the case at all, but rather the trail passed through the grass (with FRESH moose tracks in the soft earth) and then into a lovely little forest trail that was a joy to walk through right to the Mudhole landing. There were fish-nest swirls in the little sandy landing at Mudhole, so there ARE fish of some sort in that little lake...and it seems deep enough, to be sure, but the water is very darkly stained from the peaty bog surrounding the water. I should think the lake is spring fed, as it seems to be the headwater for some of the Gull-Gun-Fairy-Boot-Fourtown system. One of the interesting features of Mudhole is how rapidly the water depth drops off from the "shore" on all sides...we could paddle right next to the bog without scraping any bottom. Additionally, it seemed the put-in from the Gull side had been "cut-out" of the bog and, if so, it was hard work well done by someone.

We found the portage out to Thunder without much trouble, and it required another broadside approach to gracefully dis-embark from the craft. Plenty of mosquitoes here what with the ready breeding grounds available, and so we didn't tarry but got right to carrying over to Thunder. This portage was a mess, with a lot of mud on the Thunder side to make carrying just a bit difficult, and I was also troubled with picking up tidbits of trash I found in the trail along the way. We finally gained the Thunder side with canoe and packs, and set off across the lake. The first camp on the South side looked small-ish, though we didn't look about. The second one on the point across looked nice and expansive, with ready fishing off shore and we considered this a fall-back should our objective camp on Bear Trap be found already occupied. Thunder is a beautiful lake, and I'd love to return and fish it seriously some time as it looked to be filled with "fishy" shoreline. In the narrows that follows the second campsite we paddled upon a mother Redhead hen and her red-headed chicks (eight of them) which made us smile broadly...they were so cute. Thunder wound around again to the West, and soon we were at the small creek and portage, with its nearby campsite (vacant at that time), and we hoisted canoe and gear across to the remote and quite lovely Bear Trap lake. I crossed my fingers in hopes that the camp-site would be open and it indeed was, so we made landfall there and unloaded the boat and began setting up camp. We'd been there about an hour before another canoe came 'round the island to the North of the site and, seeing us there, headed back for Thunder. We'd achieved our objective in good time that day. The camp site at Bear Trap lake is a nice one, but it used to be nicer for there was a large wooden setup with nice benches and logs for sitting once upon a time. That has been de-constructed now and the logs have been mostly scattered in the trees around the site. What was worse was that the spring rains had left the ground water so high that the latrine was full and had obviously been "fuller" with evidence that it had spread widely around the latrine in past days, then evaporated. This was not ok with Laurie or I, who had no desire to leave our mark in the woods or use the latrine in its current condition. We talked about abandoning camp and moving back to Thunder, but assumed our site of choice there would now be full with the folks who had seen us camping here and gone back, so we resolved to stay just 1 night and start back, perhaps to Thunder, the next day.

With camp up we took to fishing, looking for our first good meal of walleye on the trip, and we headed off to the island just North of the campsite. We drifted past the NW and W sides, and then into the channel between the island and point, having to reel in due to the shallow rocks in that area. I had made an impromptu anchor of an old torn up tent sack loaded with rocks and dropped it on the far side (East side) of that narrows and we casted in various directions before Laurie landed a 15 inch "eater". Further casts yielded no further fish, but we gleefully made landfall on the North side of the island on a narrow rock point and there enjoyed our walleye dinner with a fillet each, and M-H Beef Stew (not the best dried meal of the trip by far). Beef stew may not make our list on future trips, but the walleye melted in our mouths. By meals end the sun had set and we were working on twilight time, so we beat feet back to the camp and hung the food sack. This campsite has the best food hanging tree I've seen, with the limb hanging out over the water and a "brother tree" nearby to wrap a single rope around. We retreated to the tent and relaxed, only then stopping to count the portages and carry's we'd made that day, and realized that for a couple of old folks we'd had a pretty good day of it, and we were happy to be spending the night in the remoteness of Bear Trap. It was fun to be there, having spent the past two months staring at the blue spot on the map and reading about others trips through the area, though I knew we'd have to leave a day earlier than planned due to the latrine situation. Oh well. Even so we were serenaded to sleep by beautiful loon-song and awoke only twice to the gentle gnawing of a mouse or something such outside the tent working on getting into something...hopefully not one of our packs!