Wednesday, May 28, 2025

We wake up to sunshine and warm temps. With having little to no shade at our site, even those that prefer to sleep in find it too warm to do so. This ultimately didn’t help us move any quicker. I felt a little behind not getting to Quadga Lake on the first day. Breakfast consisted of oatmeal, fried fish, and coffee. I brought a few different fish fry breadings and used the cajun flavor this morning. Delicious. I liked having the fish for breakfast compared to dinner, a nice change of pace.

In the moment it crosses my mind but I never document the time we get on the water. Frankly compared to other trip reports I've read, I’m a little embarrassed with how late we get moving. But that’s what works for my groups and it hasn’t been an issue yet (famous last words?). The current helps with our pace today and with the sun shining, spirits are high. I can’t believe it’s still May. My biggest concern this year was the weather and somehow it’s exceeding my expectations.

We hit the back to back portages before Quadga Lake which prompts the question “would you rather do these as 1 bigger portage or 2 smaller ones?” While at the time the answer was debatable, I think the clear answer is 1 bigger portage. Landing then unloading and loading the canoe takes time. Once you’re portaging its not so bad. On one of the 30 rod portages, I’m standing in a rock shin deep in water. I lost my footing and fall into the water. Thankfully it’s warm out and nothing important got wet. I knew this would happen at some point because I was a little careless at these portages.

After doing the longer portage by Quadga, we have a brief lunch. We also see another person on the river who was doing a day trip from the site on Quadga. It’s nice to eat a little lunch by the rapids but the bugs came out quicker than expected. Thankfully it was only these moments when we were stopped on portages that we really noticed the bugs. We continue on the river with no notable moments other than passing another pair of swans on the river. Crazy to see so many! Beautiful birds.

We continue down the river and get to a short 11 rod portage. With the water levels this year, it looked you could run the rapids. Discussions were had and ultimately, we portaged. I have no doubt we could have easily made it in both canoes. However, having a 3-person canoe still causes me to pause in my confidence of being able to run it. Not long after that we are moving slowly on the river and our 3 person canoe (which I’m in the stern of) hits a rock. We slowly glide over the rock and stop so the rock is right beneath the middle person, essentially acting as a fulcrum. Son of bitch. Right away I know this isn’t a good situation. But I remain calm. We get the other canoe to come back and try to help us out. No dice. Discussions on what to do turn into arguments with anger levels rising. At this point there’s no other choice. I get up, jump in the water and move us off the rock. Thankfully I could touch the bottom and got back in with no issues. It wasn’t exactly fun but I knew it might have been the only choice the moment we got stuck.

We continue on the river and have our eyes on the last site before the 145 rod portage that will connect the river directly to Bald Eagle Lake. I was hoping we could take this site so that way we’d spend 2 nights on the river and 2 nights on lakes. And of course, when you’re hoping for a site….it’s occupied. That’s the way the Boundary Waters goes sometimes. We chat with the solo man at the site for a little then head on our way. This would be the longest portage of our trip and of course, it happens on the longest traveling day. Yup. Although it’s a long portage, my friend and I reminisce on the long portages we had on the trip last year.

Making our way up the Isabella River into Bald Eagle, we notice that once again, the first few sites are occupied. I’m starting to get a little nervous. As the lake starts to open up, we see more swans. There was a total of 12 within eyesight! I’ve never seen so many. Amazing. We get lucky and notice that site 1724 was open on the West side. The entire group is relieved to see an open site. And the site ends up being a lot more spread out than the Stonehenge site (which isn’t saying much). But everyone is happy.

Dinner tonight was smoked chicken wraps. Once again, some fresh veggies on them really elevated the meal. It was my first time doing wraps on a trip and I think I’ll do them again. Easy to heat up the chicken in a pan and let people make their own. Barely any dishes as well! This was the site that had me thinking it’d be nice to bring a camp shovel because the fire pit desperately needed the ash to be dug out. As I’m typing I wonder, what would be the proper disposal method of the ash? Tossing it in the woods seems like the best option but also not the right decision. Looking back I’m torn but it was hard to keep a good fire going tonight.

With the long day, everyone is exhausted and in bed before 10. It’s a great feeling knowing you won’t have to portage tomorrow. I lay in bed taking notes for this trip report; I wonder how much gear I’ll end up not using. This is always a question on these trips. The same thing applies to the food. Thankfully this time, I did a better job recording the portions of how much food I actually brought. How much to bring depends on the level of intensity, the people involved, etc. The key is to never run out! Bringing Uno + the camp maps again for around the fire has been a welcome tradition. Thinking more about gear I’d also like to do a better job splitting up the food into bags for easier management. They did this on our first trip when we fully outfitted the food and I thought it was silly. Now I look back thinking it’s the way to do it.