I awoke early and slogged my way out of the tent. It was already warm. I located the stove and fuel and set about boiling some water for coffee. I was using a coffee cup with a built-in French press and it worked great. I love that thing! I had coffee and grabbed my fishing rod.

The first cast I caught a small smallmouth bass on a crankbait right from shore. I enjoyed those first few moments of the day. Yes, I was stiff and sore from the prior day’s exertions but standing on a granite ledge watching the sun come up in the BWCA Wilderness is well worth it…every time.

Joe awoke sometime later and had coffee and I whipped up a quick breakfast. We packed up camp and headed upstream to explore the falls.

Lower Basswood falls were extraordinary! The amount of water rushing through those two spots is amazing. The fact that you can get so up close and personal is even better. We played around the falls for about an hour and set off downstream. We stopped for a picture with the boundary post on the small island just downstream of the falls.

I set out my rod to begin trolling our way down the Basswood River. I built a clamp on style holder for the fish finder and rod holder. It spanned across the canoe in front of me and pinched on to each of the gunnels. It had a hole drilled in one side to hold my rod. It worked perfectly. The transducer I put in a foam block inside of a baggie of water. It shot right thru the hull under my seat.

I caught my first walleye just as we approached the pictographs and hung him on the stringer for dinner. We paddled and trolled all the way to Table Rock before stopping.

There was a spot not too far before Table rock where I noticed a small island with a great weed/reed bed on the deep side or lakeside. I just knew it was going to hold a pike, so I paddled over and took out my favorite weedless spoon. I tossed it onto the reeds and swam it thru and out into the deeper water. Once it hit that break it was slammed. I have not felt a hit like that ever! It went on a run as I just in time loosened up my drag. At the end of his run, I tightened back up and put some pressure on it. Whatever it was gave me the biggest head shake I have ever felt. My rod whipped back and forth and then he was gone. I was heartbroken. I reeled in my lifeless line only to find that whatever it was had ripped my snap swivel open and the spoon simply slid off the end. That head shake though…

Table rock was awesome. We played around there some and even waded out offshore a bit and caught several fish. Walleye, pike, and bass all from the same spot. There was a campsite behind and in the brush a bit which would be really neat to stay at but I imagine you would be inundated with travelers stopping to see the table.

It was still incredibly hot and we went through a lot of water that day. I had two Sawyer mini filters that worked great. As Joe paddled, I would dip the bag into the water and fill it and then squeeze it right into our Nalgene bottles. Only took a few minutes to fill both.

After much debate, we decided not to venture into the PMA. Our colds were sapping any extra energy we could muster and it just didn’t seem like the right thing to do. I don’t regret the decision but would still like to do a bushwhack camp someday. We paddled by the portage into the PMA and went through a narrow gorge in Wednesday bay and found site # 1859.

1859 sat high on a granite bluff overlooking a beautiful stretch of Wednesday bay that was dotted with islands. There was an impressive cliff right behind camp and we climbed it the next day. The views were breathtaking. This was my favorite site on this trip and we spent two nights here.

There wasn’t much for tent pads and someone had cut some of the branches off a live pine to make a better tent pad. We utilized the area and even used the cut branches (still green needled) as a broom to sweep off the huge granite floor of the campsite. We walked around barefoot after that. Someone had also built a sawhorse looking structure out of pine logs. I’m not sure for what purpose but I wished I would have dismantled it and burned it or at least tossed the logs back into the woods and burned the rope. We let it sit untouched.

There was a great swimming hole right in front of camp and you can jump off the edge of the granite and into the water. It was refreshing as the temps were still in the 90s. They would finally break on the second night of camp 1859. We fished a lot in front of camp around the islands and caught several eater size walleyes. We ate fish twice at this camp. Once just fried in a pan and the other was fish tacos. Delicious. I will remember next trip to bring long socks or gaiters to protect my ankle from those damn flies. Man, those little guys can bite! I think bug spray is like ranch dressing to them. Nothing deters them! They even bit through the mesh on my water shoes!