We drove up from the Twin Cities Thursday morning. Picked up our permit and watched the video, and we confirmed that the roads were intact to get to EP 37 as there had been many washouts with the flooding. Roads were fine, and we made it down the windy Sawbill trail and to the Kawishiwi Lake. We ate an apple, some granola, and put the boat in the water around 11. We made quick work of getting to Kawaschong- no portages were needed other than one jump around an impressive beaver dam that was about a 3 foot drop.

The longer of the portages to Polly was quite wet with the rock walk being underwater- slightly more than ankle deep, but nothing that really slowed us down. Polly had a few open sites as we were passing through, but the majority we could see were taken. We got to Malberg and the rapids running around the rock on Malberg was really flowing. I had seen pictures of people sitting on the big rock, but there was no way I was going out there. The current was strong and I was wary with all of the capsizing I had heard about, but this was manageable. We did see a plane that looked like a rescue plane fly over pretty low, and we hoped whoever had called for it was okay!!

We paddled through Malberg, knowing that just about any site will do with just two of us and one tent. We ended up at the far North Western site (1042) by about 3 o'clock. We set up camp, and went off to fish! We had good luck through the various narrows trolling natural colored shallow and deep diving Rapalas as well as jigging where the water is coming into Malberg from Koma. An eagle was perched up on the rock in the rapids- hoping to catch his own dinner!

Bedtime was a mad dash into the tent as the mosquitos were plentiful and HUNGRY! ~Kawishiwi Lake, Square Lake, Kawasachong Lake, Koma Lake, Malberg Lake