Thursday, July 13, 2017 Thursday morning brought more rain. We packed up our campsite, and managed to consolidate one of our bags down, as a result of the food pack being depleted. We sat down to look at the map, figure out the best route back to Disappointment, and discussed how we would portage, and the process we would take. We pushed off from site 1199 at 9:00 to continued downpour.

The paddle across Ima was uneventful as the wind was pretty calm. We hit the first portage into Jordan, and with our new plan in place it went very smoothly. One less backpack was also a huge plus.

Our progress continued through Cattyman, Adventure, and on to Jitterbug, which seemed to be a very shallow lake, and you had to really look for the portage to Ahsub. It was full of lillypads and reeds.

Ahsub takes you quickly to Disappointment. All of the portages are much wider than the northern route portages, and I would say easier too.

As I reviewed the map before pushing off into Disappointment we took stock of our situation, and kept our decision to call it a trip and head all the way out, rather than stopping. The route through the many islands and turns (definitely a good idea to keep your map and compass very close by as you navigate Disappointment) was a beautiful paddle. I could definitely see the lake as a great first trip, or a for a nice trip with younger kids. 

We made it across Disappointment, and landed at the portage. At this point there is a decision to be made. In retrospect, we probably made the wrong one, given the weather. You can either take the southwesterly portage towards Parent Lake, which is shorter, but then you have one additional portage from Parent into Snowbank. If you go that route, you are more shielded from the open water, and can hug the eastern shore of snowbank a little better. When the weather is bad or there is a lot of wind, this is probably the better route to take. However, we had pretty much had our fill of portages by this point. So we opted westerly route, which is the single, longer portage from Disappointment to Snowbank. The portage itself was a little muddy due to the rain, but overall was wide, flat and fast. 

As we surveyed Snowbank Lake, we noticed that there were a few waves, but it didn’t look too bad. We loaded up and pushed off. As we came out into the section of the lake that is open to the north end, the wind was really picking up. We edged along as close as we could to the shore, but we had to ride out some pretty big waves on the way over to the landing. In retrospect, it might have been better to hold off a little while, but we successfully managed the crossing, and landed at the entry point at about 3:30. 

All in all, it was a fantastic adventure. We learned a lot,had a great time, snapped some memorable photos, and of course, took advantage of all the quiet and solitude that the BWCA can offer! As soon as we returned home, we immediately starting talking with our neighbors about joining us on our next trip in 2018 (Report to follow!)

Bonus: If you have time before or after a BWCA trip out of Ely, I would highly recommend the short hiking trail to Kawishiwi Falls. The view is breathtaking.