**I read trip reports on our route and did google earth searches on all of our planned portages and there was nothing in our trip that I could see that we could not handle. The portages from Nina Moose River put-in to Mudro takeout are fairly easy portages. The trip IS doable in 6 days with a layover, if all goes well (key words "if all goes well"). We all feel that something bigger than us had a different plan for us. I have also talked to groups that have done this trip. A boy scout troop I know that had NEVER been to the BWCA before and never portaged before made it to Boulder Bay on Day 1.

**When planning an extensive trip, or any trip, always have a Plan A, Plan B, and even a Plan C. Plan ahead – we could have done our own breakfast earlier and got on the water earlier. We could have used an outfitter that was closer to our put-in point to save time. Oh we definitely could have said "forget the hamburger" and THAT alone would have saved an hour....

**Just because you have a “planned route” and you have to alter or change midstream, does not mean you did not finish what you started. Agree at the beginning that the trip is what it is, whatever happens is part of it.

**Most trips have bad and good, CHERISH the good moments. It is such a beautiful and serene place and I feel honored to be physically and mentally able to enjoy God’s beautiful creation.

**A satellite phone is a definitely GREAT idea. You could have a “beacon” with you but in our case, the beacon would not have helped because we intended to complete a trip and no one was seriously injured. It is well worth including a satellite phone in your gear, or rent it from your outfitter. When renting it, make sure the outfitter explains clearly HOW TO USE IT. It did not seem like the group who allowed us to use the phone that THEIR outfitter gave them knew how to use it. I really don’t think they had a clue. We literally had to paddle out to the middle of a lake, in a clearing, and keep the canoe turned a certain direction in order for the antennae to connect. OH and always have the outfitter’s phone number and an emergency number on you somewhere. The permit does NOT have the outfitter’s phone number on it anywhere. I just happen to have my cell phone on me with the outfitter phone number in my contacts (no one else in our group had the phone number). NOTE to ham radio operators: We also talked to the ranger station in Ely before heading out, asking them which frequencies we could use to contact them, who told us first that we could not use their frequencies (we know for a fact in an emergency we can), and that if we did get hold of them they would still have to call 911 (ok, so what, we have no cell service out there, so why can’t they do that for us?). Obviously they were not excited about giving us information in the slight chance we could connect to a ranger station with a ham radio handtalkie (Yes, “old virgin portage-shocked man farting with wolves” climbed to a high point in the campsites trying several frequencies to no avail – TAKE a satellite phone).

**Know your groups’ physical abilities before heading out to the wilderness or agree ahead of time that someone else is going to be able to pickup on someone’s inability to carry their weight.

**Listen to those little things happening. Maybe a different route or a different plan is in order. We had all kinds of little warnings telling us maybe this wasn’t the trip or the route for us. We are all strong paddlers and did not make headway on day one no matter what we did. Wind and whitecaps against us. Spars broke on our catamaran. THREE water filtration systems did not work (REALLY?!!).

As with my sister’s group (PinkCanoe), who did not care for the outfitter, we have a few complaints but would not totally discount them. Our reservations went without any issues. We DID have to recalculate our bill but it was "less than originally planned because we came with only 5 people instead of 6"..They did load a canoe on the trailer (they use old canoes) that had a hole in it and had we not seen or inspected this, we would have been in a world of trouble. Oh yeh, and they lost our hamburger. They took it, marked our name on the bag and put it in the freezer. How does hamburger disappear over night? Other than that, the outfitter from beginning of our planning two years ago until now was very accommodative and always available for any questions we had while planning. They already had us set up when we arrived back from our trip a day early in rooms. Thank you to Canadian Borders Outfitters.