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Rob Johnson
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Went through there in 2012. Remember thinking those were the worst sites in the BW thanks to the fire. One site didn't have a single tree for shade anywhere in sight. I think it is shown in one of the pics above.
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bruceye
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Hey Hawbakers.We share the same B-day!
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brantlars
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We were through that area last year. West fern is heavily burnt and I am not sure about Virgin. There are many sites on Gabi that were not touched by the fire. We have camped in the burn sites but we go early May so not too concerned about shade. High winds can be a problem as one night we had our tent collapse in 40 mph gusts and it snowed on us.
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Chilly
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My fireman friend from what i can recall said Peter had the highest temps of that fire. There is a map of the temps and will look into adding them to this thread if possible. In any case it got burnt darn good from the word on the street.
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Hawbakers
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My husband & I are thinking of checking these lake out on our way to Little Saganaga. We know they were burned by the Cavity Lake fire.
Has anyone been there more recently? We are wondering if it's in better shape now and how campsites were. There seems to be one campsite that has comments on the overview map but no reports on most of the others.
Plus we haven't been to Little Sag since before that fire and want to know how fire was there?
Thanks
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Hawbakers
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Lightfoot, thanks for the link to your trip report. GREAT photos. Nice fall colors! Exactly what we're looking for. Your shots of Little Sag are spectacular! I see Chris has a REI Quarter dome tent - just like ours!
Thanks again!
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Hawbakers
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Wow. Thanks, Cheryl. Great photos as usual. Two years ago, eh? Was that the early ice out year? When it reached 80 degrees on my birthday, March 13th?
Which site was that? Did you stay or just check it out?
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PINETREE
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Last time I was on Peter we camped on a point and it was -35 degrees F.. But warmed up into the 30's in a couple of days. Love that area in the winter.
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JimEb
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Thanks for all the replies. Guess I’ll plan to bring my tent as well.
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HighPlainsDrifter
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Came into Virgin last spring from Little Sag. Someone (thankfully) had built a small rock cairn to mark the start of the portage trail. A burnt shoreline is very confusing because all of the "tell tale" signs of a portage location went with the flames. Virgin is a small little lake and a very sad sight.
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shock
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quote brantlars: "We were through that area last year. West fern is heavily burnt and I am not sure about Virgin. There are many sites on Gabi that were not touched by the fire. We have camped in the burn sites but we go early May so not too concerned about shade. High winds can be a problem as one night we had our tent collapse in 40 mph gusts and it snowed on us." i can attest to the wind factor in burn areas, last may it ripped my rain fly in half(it had been on alot of trips)and wrecked havoc on our camp. we made it work and the lake trout fishing was spectacular !
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fishonfishoff
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From our trip September 2012. The lake looked absolutely beautiful hiking from French Lake.The landing to put the canoes in reminded me of a trout stream with the different colored rocks. Once we started paddling Peter Lake had almost a "holocaustic aura" to it! The entire lake was devastated by the fire. We paddled by most of the campsites before choosing the one closest to the French Lake portage. Even though it was the best one for us on the lake, it was by far the worst one out of the 6 we used on our 7 day adventure. We did see cow moose and the trout fishing was very good. I'm glad we visited this lake on our burned/not burned route but would definitely not make this a base camp for more than 1 day. Wish I could show you pictures but both of our cameras were fatally wounded by dips in the water! :-( FOFO
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fishonfishoff
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http://www.bwca.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=trip.report_view&sel_trp_id=3206 If the link doesn't work , the trip report is called EP #52 Brant Lake, 50% Chance Lake Trout & Loonlings. I describes the area you are looking at including Peter and Little Gab. Have Fun FOFO
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Hawbakers
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Link to Trip report
Thanks for sharing also! I am getting more excited just reading these again!
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Mocha
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these are from late april/early may 2012. peter lake. the last photo you can just barely see my paddle partner through the trees... she's checking out the brand new latrine. there was nothing in it. not sure when the new latrines were installed after the 2006 fire.
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Lightfoot
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We went through the area from Brant Lake entry to Little Sag in 2012. I posted a trip report that you can checkout.
2012 trip report here.
Mainly, the lakes from Gillis to Little Sag were hit hard by that fire.
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cowdoc
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quote HighPlainsDrifter: " Came into Virgin last spring from Little Sag. Someone (thankfully) had built a small rock cairn to mark the start of the portage trail. A burnt shoreline is very confusing because all of the "tell tale" signs of a portage location went with the flames. Virgin is a small little lake and a very sad sight."
That portage is mismarked on my Voyageur Map. We paddled around awhile to find it. Neat portage though. This is the landing on the Virgin side.
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JimEb
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Dredging up an old thread here. Planning to do this area next summer, which will be 19 years since the fire. Hows things looking now? My concern is I’m a hammock camper and kind of need some trees. Can always bring my tent as a backup but really don’t want the excess cargo.
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TreeBear
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My experience, which was three years ago mind you, was that parts of the area were getting really close to being able to hammock, but it's still in that "is it bad leave no trace" stage of "will I break a tree doing this?" The jack pines are pushing five and six inches dbh, some more, some less. If you want a safe bet, stop short or long as there are unburned sites on Gillis and on Gabi. All of those lakes in between from Howard down to Elm burned REALLY hot. Artifact of the '99 blowdown damage through there I suppose.
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OMGitsKa
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I wish I was able to experience this area before the fire! Such a beautiful area even as it stands now.
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Pinetree
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Hawbakers: "quote bruceye: "Hey Hawbakers.We share the same B-day!"
Hey! Cool! Don't think we'll get to 80 degrees this year! Hahaha. In Minnesota anyway. Happy Birthday early!"
2012- I went open water ice out canoe-fishing in the BWCA up the Gunflint on March 29-31, 2012. Some of the smaller lakes just inside the BWCA were like 70% ice free.
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RoundRiver
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JimEb: "Dredging up an old thread here. Planning to do this area next summer, which will be 19 years since the fire. Hows things looking now? My concern is I’m a hammock camper and kind of need some trees. Can always bring my tent as a backup but really don’t want the excess cargo."
Concur it would still be very iffy to rely on hammock camping. Lots of smaller but getting slightly larger diameter aspen and pine. Often in very dense clusters. Campsites that were burned are still pretty spartan. Which means they would not be great in bad weather either. Just enough trees in some to get a tarp up, with some creativity at some sites. Also my recollection is that most of these sites are small. I talked with a USFS ranger a couple of years ago about this area - in particular about the 3 or so campsites marked on older maps that I have not been able to find after searching through the woods. She was on the post fire crews back in the day and said the decision was made to eliminate at least 3 sites to keep one site on the small lakes rather two, which I appreciate. While not for most, burn areas are interesting to me so I go in them fairly regularly, but I am almost always solo when I do and I understand the expectation for camping in them.
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Pinetree
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Lightfoot: "We went through the area from Brant Lake entry to Little Sag in 2012. I posted a trip report that you can checkout.
2012 trip report here.
Mainly, the lakes from Gillis to Little Sag were hit hard by that fire. " I was the first person camping in the area after the Bat lake-Gillis fires. You could see where they dragged the hoses out and on Bat you could see where the fire fighters camped on the east side of Bat and watched the fire burn on the west side. I didn't see another canoe that trip. Remember Crooked lake on a island the fire burned much of the Island but the toilet remained on top of the hill, sitting in the wide open and you could see forever from the crown.
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TuscaroraBorealis
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If you haven't done so already, checkout the maps section . Might be some newer info/photos there.
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Michwall2
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Here is photo from 3 years ago. This is the portage from Little Sag to Virgin Lakes looking back at Little Sag. You can see the birch and poplar are much too small to handle a hammock. The pines along the way through this area were taller, but not thicker in the trunk.
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Hawbakers
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quote brantlars: "We were through that area last year. West fern is heavily burnt and I am not sure about Virgin. There are many sites on Gabi that were not touched by the fire. We have camped in the burn sites but we go early May so not too concerned about shade. High winds can be a problem as one night we had our tent collapse in 40 mph gusts and it snowed on us."
Bummer! Yes, we have been snowed on in the past in those early May trips. We had a dome tent back then which I felt was better to shed the wind.
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arctic
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That part of the BWCA burned HOT and much of the organic matter and seed base in the soil was destroyed. Virgin Lake seemed like it was above timberline when I went through there a year after the fire.
There were a few sheltered pockets that didn't burn though, and I remember seeing a spruce grouse in a small island of unburned timber at the west end of French Lake.
Really cool area to explore.
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Hawbakers
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quote bruceye: "Hey Hawbakers.We share the same B-day!"
Hey! Cool! Don't think we'll get to 80 degrees this year! Hahaha. In Minnesota anyway. Happy Birthday early!
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shock
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sometimes tarp tying can be a challenge in burn areas. the trees that are standing are generally loose in the trunk area. but no shortage of firewood :)
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heavycanoe
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quote Rob Johnson: "Went through there in 2012. Remember thinking those were the worst sites in the BW thanks to the fire. One site didn't have a single tree for shade anywhere in sight. I think it is shown in one of the pics above. "
+1 we almost went to take a picture to post and ask if anyone ad seen a worse site. If I remember correctly, it was otherwise a pretty lake. very clear water and steep banks around the shore.
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