Sunny 80’s

Sunrise 5:11, Sunset 9:00

Total Miles Traveled: 12.3

Lakes Traveled: Brule, Cone Bay, South, Middle, and North Cone Lake, Cliff, Wanighigan, Winchell, and Gaskin

I wake up to a less chilly morning as our site is facing the east this time. I pull out the stove and cook up some more of my fresh eggs and hash browns, with a little less Tabasco this time they are perfect. I start to realize I eat breakfast better in the BWCA than I do at home.

I pull my rain fly over to the rocks to get rid of the early morning dew. After about 2 hours we are packed and ready to move on. The wind is blowing strongly out of the east as we leave the shelter of the Island.

We head north and float through the 30r from Cone Bay to S. Cone Lake, not too bad; we had to get out a couple of times to avoid any scraping of the Kevlar. We decided to float the 25r from S. Cone to Middle Cone Lake and ended up having to walk the muddy bottom and lifting the canoe over several rocks. We quickly regret our decision as it was a pretty difficult as we kept sinking in the mud. I did take solace in the fact that the rocks where very pretty, lots of green, red, and blue paint transfer from others who were just as foolish as us!

We end-up having to portage the 5r of all portages due to rocks into North Cone. We move to the 160r into Cliff Lake. The map shows a lot of elevation on this one so we decide to double portage. Brian grabs the canoe and off we go. About half way through Brian is in the lead and doesn’t see a tree fallen over the path at about 5’6 off the ground and hits it hard with the canoe knocking it off his shoulders. Bill grabs the canoe and finishes the portage. Overall the portage wasn’t difficult, a bit overgrown, but this is how we like it, the road less traveled.

I single portage the two 14r’s to get us into Winchell Lake. It’s just so easy to do with the Duluth pack. We get into Winchell and the wind is blowing strongly out of the SE. Paddling is a bit tough and we avg. 3mph with effort. Winchell looks to have had either a fire or controlled burn in the past couple of years as the trees are burned but there ground cover is really green as the area is returning to life.

I grab the canoe to single portage the 60r from Winchell up to Gaskin. The bugs are bad at the landing so Brian and I grab our bug nets. Bill laughs as he realizes he has been using his for his dirty laundry and can’t get to it. I take the lead and the portage is easy and going fairly well, Brian is a bit behind me with Bill brining up the rear. I get with-in sight of the lake’s southern shore when I hear the sound of snapping trees and crashing through the woods very near to me. I freeze as I know it is a moose. I elevate the front of the canoe a bit to see if it was heading towards me when I see the back end of the moose about 15 yards in front of me running away. I was a bit relieved after that one. I continue on to the portage and discover it is a mess. It is 10’ wide and 12’ long of pure mud with 4 logs running at 90 degrees from the shore to stand on. I slowly make my way to the end of the logs and right when I am 3’ from the water my right leg slips off the logs and with the weight of the canoe and my pack I sink my right let up to my belt. I crouch down as much as I can and throw the canoe off of my shoulders and it lands in the water. I am able to through my pack into the canoe and work myself out of the mud and check for leaches.

We decide with the Moose around the Island site is more preferable, we head to it and find it occupied. We start moving back west along the north shore looking for a site, as we approach the first site we see a cow and her calf drinking from the lake. Curse my camera! Brian snaps a couple of shots with his disposable camera and we decide to head further down to stay away from the pair. We keep going about 2 miles down and I get out to check out a site and come running back to the canoe when I hear more crashing in the woods! Boy the amount of Moose in this area is amazing!

We finally settle on campsite #634 at 4:20 and set up. I rinse out my socks and pants from my muddy encounter with portage. I slip on my dry socks; again the feeling of dry socks is wonderful.

It’s Bill’s turn for dinner tonight and he makes cheese tortellini with spinach. He mixes in some portabella mushroom and bacon, boy was that good. We talk about next the next day’s travel and realize we are getting closer to the edge of the BWCA and may have more trouble finding sites, so we are going to take off early. I read for a bit and update my journal and crash for the night.