Friday, July 26. We wake up at our Hibbing,Mn. motel to a light drizzle and cold temperatures. We plan to drive straight to our Beaverhouse entry, but as we cross the border at International Falls, we see the winds are picking up. The plan to paddle across Beaverhouse Lake to pick up the permit at the ranger station is changed to a pick up at the Atikokan office. Under an overcast sky and a strengthening north wind, we put in at Beavehouse Lake around 2:00pm. We immediately head for the Quetico River portage.

It is boot sucking, almost knee deep mud. On the other side, we meet a party that warns us that it is pretty rough out on the lake. In the meantime we enjoy the protected calm of the river coming out of the lake.

The river opens into a completely different scene on the lake! The wind is blowing at about 20 miles per hour or more out of the north, northeast, and the white caps are building up quickly. We had planned to paddle across the open stretch of water into the east arm of the lake for our first night. The waves are parallel to our path, so we are forced to turn south and land on a long sand beach at the south end of the lake. We are three canoes, two tandems and one solo, and one of the tandems is close to a capsize as we land on the windswept beach.

It is impossible to set up camp on this beach, but we find the five rod portage to the West Bay, where the narrow row of trees on the sand isthmus blocks the wind at ground level. This is also a sand beach in brush, not very attractive, but at least we are out of the wind and can set up camp! It also is beginning to rain, and we are all wet and cold. I think the temperature is about 50 degrees, not counting wind chill!