Up at 6:00a.m. We flipped on the TV to once again find a weather prediction of 100 degrees. There is a heat advisory in effect.

We head to town for breakfast. On an impulse we stop at “Journey’s End”. We haven’t been there before. Nice little place. Good breakfast. Good price. 

Then we head up the Echo Trail. The furthest up the trail I have ever been is the road to Mudro, so the drive itself was new territory and an adventure. At two different times we came upon deer on the road after rounding a curve. A nice, albeit slow, drive.

We reach the entry point parking lot at 9:00 a.m. We portage our first load downhill 40 rods to the LIS and return for our second load. Julie was about a minute ahead of me. When I caught up to her she had already made friends with a group of six guys and was having them pose for pictures (their cameras). They were a good, very polite, bunch of early 20-year-old guys from Iowa. We’d run into them often on the portages until Shell Lake, their destination.

We no sooner started to paddle than we saw distant lightning. In fact the skies were darkening and thunder could be faintly heard, but there was no rain. We pressed on passing a parade of unhappy looking canoers on their way out. Still, the paddle on the LIS was fantastic! What a beautiful little creek, just the kind of thing I love to paddle on, and our Wenonah Prospector 16 was well suited to it.

We reached the 60-rod portage that by-passed the rapids on the LIS. It was a well-maintained, easy portage. There were several short side trails for viewing the rapids and waterfalls that we took advantage of on the return portion of our double portage. Beautiful.

On our second trip across the skies really darkened. In fact, it was so dark it seemed to be 9:00 at night. It was almost flashlight dark! We readied our raincoats and even delayed launching our canoe certain that the storm was upon us. But, again, it didn’t rain, so we pushed on.

We continued the paddle down the LIS and finally came to Upper Pauness Lake. Here you have a choice: a 40-rod portage; or an 8-rod portage into Lower Pauness Lake …. Duh! The 8-rod of course! Well, to reach it we had to, as Julie put it, “Do some off-roading”. We had to paddle through a wild rice patty. It was actually kind of fun … of course I was in the stern so Julie took the brunt of it in the bow.

By this time the group of six guys caught up to us and watched us from the water. They couldn’t believe that we were right; “They wouldn’t put the portage over there!” is what we heard from one of them. They started paddling up Pauness towards the 40-rod.

Since the portage was next to a campsite I took the opportunity to check it out. The site was OK. It isn’t one that I would ever make a destination, but if it were the end of the day it would serve OK. The portage is right across the stream. It is very short but rocky with a little knoll to climb.

The group of guys caught up to us again at the 215-rod portage to Shell Lake. This, too, was an easy portage. I told Julie that I might set the canoe down after 20 minutes and go back for another load (i.e. leap-frogging), but I was at the other end of the portage when the 20 minutes was up. 

Shell Lake looked crowded. We wished the guys luck in finding a site for their base/fishing camp and we pushed on. We made the short 15-rod portage into Little Shell Lake and the weather was looking scary again. Julie and I talked it over. We decided if the lone campsite on Little Shell was decent and open we’d camp there. 

At 2:00 p.m. we pulled up to the site and it was open. We landed and began scouting it out. What a nice site! We talked over tent placements, where the tarp would go, etc. Julie went off to find the latrine. When she returned in 30 seconds she said, “Fish guts”, and lead me to a spot about 30 feet down a trail leading from camp where there was a mess. No guts but skin, bones, and heads of about 15 walleye. Obviously the fish were filleted there. The remains were probably a few days old because there were no guts or meat on the bones.

The weather was really getting bad now. We really couldn’t take the time to clean up this mess. We either needed to get a tarp up or move on. We decided to move on.

We were very happy we didn’t need to take the 4-rod portage into Lynx Lake. Mostly we were able to paddle through, although we had to step out of the canoe briefly at a low spot. Now the storm is very close. No rain yet, but the wind has picked up, it is dark, the lightening is flashing and the thunder booming. Now is the time to take ANY site.

The first site on Lynx Lake is occupied, but the second site (eastern shore, middle of the lake) is open. It is 3:00 p.m. The second our canoe nudges the shore the rain starts. We set up the tarp in the rain, but have it up with everything under it and everything secure when the storm hits. What timing! We break out our lunch, take off our raincoats, and relax while we watch the storm.

The storm kept coming in waves. It would let up a bit, seem like that cell was passed, and another would hit before the previous one was completely done. It went on like this until 6:00 p.m. After the storm passed we took the opportunity to set up the tents. Once they were up it rained again for a half hour. Then we swam to knock off the sweat from the day and to relieve sore muscles.

Hey! We never got the 100-degree day! It probably never even reached 80 degrees. In fact, neither did we get rain until we reached our camp. We didn’t get sunburned. There was no glare to hurt our eyes. We had a nice breeze, but the wind was never a problem on the lakes.  I’d say we had a pretty good weather day!

I gathered and split firewood. I seldom bring a hatchet but decided to this time. I found a 6” diameter pine log that was off the ground, cut a couple chunks, and split it. I then used my knife to make a pile of shavings. Found some birch bark. Had some commercial fire starter. Even though the huge majority of our wood was absolutely soaked, I had no doubt we’d have a fire.

We started dinner at 7:30 p.m. with a Caesar salad. Next I’d start the fire to make steak and potatoes. Neither Julie nor I could get the fire going. I couldn’t believe it. I have never not been able to get a fire going! We’d get some flames for a minute or two, but it would go out. All my split wood and shavings got used up quickly. The wet wood was just too wet.

At 9:00 I finally said, “Uncle!” and gave up. I cooked the steak and potatoes on the stove. My one and only disappointment of the trip was cooking those steaks on the stove. I guess when something like that is your only disappointment, that’s a pretty good trip.

After our trip was over we heard about the weather that they had in Ely that day. Down pouring rain that flooded the streets so much that people could canoe down them after the storm passed. They also got hail and some trees were down. We had it easy compared to Ely.

We went to bed about 10:00 p.m.