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7 Canoe Camping Tips
Efficient canoe camping comes with experience and seat time. By using these seven tips for canoe camping, you will have a solid head start. Packing and Portaging Use a portage pack (if you don’t own, then rent) instead of daypack or backpacking pack. Portage packs fit into the spacing between the thwarts and a yoke in a canoe. In a tandem you can put up to two in front of the yoke and up to two behind. Cooke Custom Sewing’s Pioneer Packs work perfectly for tandem trips. Line your portage packs with compactor or contractor bags. Twist the top of the lining bag closed and double it over. Then wrap…
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A Year in the Wilderness: a BWCA Adventure
Imagine living in wilderness for an entire year. Imagine living with only a canoe for transportation in the summer and only dogs to haul gear in the winter. Imagine living in a tent in northern Minnesota when the winter temps drop to -40. Imagine watching the northern lights over lakes so clean that you can dip your cup into them and drink the water. Imagine being away from it all for a full year. That’s what Amy and Dave Freeman, 2014 National Geographic Adventurers of the Year, are going to do next. They’re going to live inside the Boundary Water Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCA), a million acre wilderness and America’s…
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Spring(?) Kayaking on Brule Lake in the BWCA
This spring has been slow in coming. In northern Minnesota, we’re between 14 and 20 days behind median ice out, and it’s wearing a little thin on the nerves. This week some of the bigger lakes in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness finally started to go out, so with that in mind, Jeffrey and Michelle Forseth of Sea Kayak Safety and I went to paddle on Brule Lake. The put-in was completely ice free and it was 50°F, so we figured that we were golden, but as we paddled east along the shore, we started to run into ice and soon ice coated as far as we could see,…
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Canoeists Getting Older and Introducing Fewer New People to the Wilderness
Lots of news in the paddling world today, but the scariest is a report just released by the U.S. Forest Service about the Boundary Waters Wilderness Canoe Area: In it, we found out that the average user age in 1969 was 26 and in 2007 it was 45. We also found out that first time visitors have dropped from 30% of visitors to 6%. This means that fewer people are being introduced to the BWCA. I’d guess that also means that the age of the average visitor will continue to rise and current users grow older. As a point of reference, the average age in Minnesota is 36. The study…
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To Protect Minnesota’s Water and Natural Heritage
One of the issues that America’s most-used Wilderness Area, the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCA), faces is pollution from sulfide mining, which has a 100% track record of polluting. I’ve written about sulfide mining in the BWCA before. The political and money machines continue to march forward on this plan despite not being able to prove that they won’t pollute nor providing any reassurances that they will clean up the pollution in the future. It’s a raw deal for the BWCA, one of the most beautiful areas in the U.S. Friends of this website site Dave and Amy Freeman and former legislator and Grand Marais resident Frank Moe plan…
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Boundary Waters Day Trip: Bower Trout Lake BWCA
The eastern side of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area has many great day trips, but one of the best starts at the Bower Trout Lake BWCA entry point. This route is an out and back paddle, so you decide how long of a trip you want. The fishing is good on several of the lakes, and moose often frequent Bower Trout late in the evening. Combine those factors with the burned area further west along the route, and you get a diverse day trip with plenty to see. Start early in the morning on this one, because there’s so much to explore Distance: 1 to 10 miles – This is…
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Boundary Waters (BWCA) Primer
The Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness in northern Minnesota protects 1.09 million acres of Boreal forest and lakes under the Wilderness Act of 1964 and the 1978 BWCA Act. The U.S. set aside the area to provide a place “where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.” It is one of two protected canoe areas in the U.S. The other one, the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge Canoe Trail System, is in Alaska. A typical BWCA experience takes a visitor across lakes and the portage trails connecting them into an unspoiled forest. Because most the area’s 1,000 lakes and over 2,200 backcountry campsites are only accessible by water, the…
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Sea Gull Lake Loop Trip Report
Since I moved near to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, I’ve spent less time exploring it on extended trips than before I moved here. At first, I tried to continue doing one-week solo Fall trips, a few long distance longer trips, like when I paddled theVoyager’s Route, but most my Boundary Waters trips since moving here have been overnights or day trips. It’s likely my love of Lake Superior and being able to kayak on an ocean-like body of water (or the warm bed nearby) that keeps me away. This year, I wanted to end the summer with a Boundary Water’s trip and Ilena’s vacation matched up with the…
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New National Geographic Maps Cover the Boundary Waters Canoe Area
There’s a new player in town for Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness maps, and it’s National Geographic’s excellent Trails Illustrated Maps. The current players in the BWCA map field include McKenzie Maps, Fisher Maps, and Voyageur Maps. Each of the current vendors follows the philosophy that more detail is better. To cover the entire BWCA, they require 25, 32, or 10 maps, respectively. Trails Illustrated does it with 2! Trails Illustrated Boundary Waters maps are printed on double-sided waterproof and tear resistant 27″ x 39″ paper. When folded, the maps reduce down in size to approximately 4 1/4″ x 9 1/4″. They weigh 3.3 ounces each. The scale of 1:70,000…
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Last Day in Paradise: a Boundary Waters trip report by Richard “Doc” Gams
When the Ham Lake Fire of 2007 closed all the entry points on the eastern side of the Boundary Water Canoe Area Wilderness, Richard Doc Gams and his crew were forced to change their plans. Some quick last minute planning and their trip to the BWCA turned out heavenly.
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Up a Lazy River: A solo canoe trip in the Boundary Waters
This is an account of Shipp Webb's solo six-day trip in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, a trip that covered 13 lakes, 4 rivers and 28 portages totaling about 72 miles. Thirty-one hours quickly passed paddling and portaging. It was a trip with varied weather and an abundance of wildlife sightings including eagles, moose, deer, and most importantly a wolf.
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Day Trip: Top Falls in the BWCA
The 8.5 mile day trip from Bearskin Lake to the Stairway portage is a classic day trip in the Boundary Waters. The reward at the portage is a beautiful waterfall and one of the best views in the Wilderness Area.
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Vern River Loop
Route Name: Brule Vern River LoopRoute: Brule, Juno, Vern, Vern River, Weird Lake, South Temperance Lake, and BruleDistance: 21 milesTotal Days: 2 Description of Boundary Waters Route Five hours of bush whacking, route forging, and pulling your canoe up and over miles of blow downs await the brave canoeist that tackles this fine route. The route starts out on the picturesque and big Brule Lake, but quickly ducks into Jock Mock Bay and then does a quick loop through the Vern River, which if paddled once a year, it would be considered a good year. The Vern River if cleaned out and some portages added would be a short but…
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Interview With a Solo Canoeist: Part Two
During a 9 day, 200-mile solo canoe trip, solo canoeist, Bryan Hansel, interviewed himself. His trip started in Voyager National park and ended on Lake Superior. Since Bryan didn't get enough out of himself, he decided to interview himself again. Here is the follow up interview.
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Solo in the Boundary Waters – Fall 2003
A Journal by Bryan Hansel 9-22 Day One Baker Lake, Peterson Lake, Kelly Lake, Jack Lake, Weird Lake, S. Temperance Lake, N. Temperance Lake, Sitka Lake, end on Cherokee Lake (site west of last portage) approximately 11 miles. Put in today at 10:00 AM after driving threw the night and only stopping at a rest stop for 3 hours. I missed the turn for Baker Lake and drove a little further, so I’m going to cut the gas close for the return trip to town. On the drive from the ranger station to Baker I saw a dog like animal standing in the middle of the road in the haze…
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