Boundary Waters

Last September over Labor Day, Jenny and I took a trip to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW). This was one of the most serene and beautiful experiences in my life. I had been wanting to take this trip since shortly after we moved to Minnesota and I heard of the existence of this place.

There is a vast system of lakes and creeks on the boundary between Minnesota and Canada. An enormous portion of this has been dedicated as wilderness area. That means no motorized boats, no modern facilities of any kind. To get around you canoe and sometimes portage. To portage means to carry all that you have, including your canoe on your back across a dry portion of land. You must also carry all of your food and anything else that is needed. Of course, during the trip, there's just a hole for a toilet, and food that can survive being carried around for long periods of time is sometimes not the tastiest. Let's not get started talking about black flies, mosquitoes, or strange noises in the night. Aside from all of this, being slightly imbalanced, this sounds like great fun to me.

When we first tried to take this trip over July 4th in 2005, we were not exactly ready for all of the demands of our proposed trip. The primary problem is that we brought our then 55 (now 95) pound yellow lab, Tex. After 10 minutes of canoeing, Jenny, Tex, and all of our supplies were floating in the lake. Tex had tried to lick the waves as a motorboat passed our canoe on a lake that we had to pass through to get to the BWCAW. Thanks to some kind boaters, we made it out safely. We promptly returned our canoe and went home.

We tried to go again over July 4th of 2006. We had to cancel this trip to go home and be with Jenny's sister, Christa, as she was going through complications in Sebastian's birth.

On the third and final attempt we had a wonderful trip, and Tex stayed in a kennel in Minneapolis. We had spent two full summers backpacking, so we were infinitely more prepared than we would have been the first time. Here are the pictures from the trip:

Boundary Waters

My favorite experiences from the trip were being all alone on an entire lake. One night we occupied the only camp site on a small lake. Another night, we had an island on Pine Lake all to ourselves. We didn't see anyone else on that lake either. We did see some signs of life though. We watched beavers swimming all around our island, and heard an as yet unidentified scary noise that night. The loon's song breaking the deafening silence of a wilderness lake is something I wish everyone could experience.

The hardest things about the trip were the long portages. Another challenge was a many mile long creek we had to navigate through to get to our dinner and bed. It was full of weeds and reeds, making the paddling strenuous. At another point, Jenny and I spent an hour wandering up and down the bank of a lake looking for a portage trail.

Overall, the experience was amazing and enjoyable. I hope that I can do it again someday.