Wednesday, June 18, 2025 We got a tow from La Tourell's to Indian portage ( Sucker to Birch). We had asked for an 8 am tow since we were slow getting up and out the last time, but they were nice enough to change it to 7am since we were worried about how busy the Knife portages would be. We managed to have all our stuff ready to go and down at the dock by 6:30, moved the car, and got underway a little before 7. We were glad we got there when we did since most of the traffic was still moving west to east, making it less hectic to get through most of the portages.

We met a solo paddler named Mona that was making the border trip all the way through to Lake Superior that we saw at each portage. She said she would put up a trip video on Youtube, but I haven't found it yet. I told her to reference it here, too. Most of the other groups seemed to be planning on staying on Knife. One group of 2 canoes going west had a duffer in each sitting sideways with their feet over the side dressed as Marcel Marceau, makeup and all. Not sure what was up with that, or if we wanted to know. We said hello and kept paddling. Then we had to go around a group of 9 in 4 canoes floating aimlessly next to the Bonnie portage. They didn't seem to be interacting with each other or us and looked pretty disgruntled. Getting off the main route was seeming like a good idea.

There were only a few other groups on the Knife portages, some of them single portaging, so they got through fast. We had about 200 lbs of gear, including the canoe, for two 65 year olds, so we were double portaging. We wanted to make it as far as possible and were hoping for the usual west wind to help us along. It was mostly from the west, but not strong enough to help much, but still better than a head wind. We made it through pretty fast and decided to aim for Kekakabic. I remember some difficult landings and put ins along the way, but none of the portages are too bad. Bonnie lake portage was a little hillier than I remembered, though. We made it to Kekakabic about 5:30 and were happy the 1st campsite to the west was open. We were pretty beat. Rain was threatening, but we just wanted to get camp set up, eat dinner and collapse, so we didn't set up the tarp.

Dinner was homemade BBQ brisket soft tacos, instant rice and rehydrated dried Ranch Style Beans. It started sprinkling off and on while we were cooking and really raining when we were sitting down to eat, so we grabbed the food and ducked into the tent to eat. We really should have put up the tarp, but it was just one more thing to put up and take down for a short visit. I spent 10 minutes frantically looking for my hat only to finally realize I had put on my raincoat and it was under the coat with the string holding it on around my neck. I chalk that up to fatigue. I also counted 20 raised inflamed bites around my neck that lasted a few days. I didn't spray down because we had permethrin treated clothes and I didn't see mosquitos. I think it must have been a black fly. We got everything cleaned up and the bear bag and ursaks stowed and then finally crashed.

Route: Sucker to Birch, 7R, Birch to Carp, 51R, Carp to Seed and Knife 24R, 22R,34R,73R. Knife to Bonnie 42R, Bonnie to Spoon 32R, Spoon to Pickle 20R, Pickle to Kekakabic 85R 14.3 miles total: 10.6 miles paddling, 3.7 miles portaging due to double portaging 

Best tent pad at back on the right