BW Journal Day 8 7/11 Home Bound

We broke camp early to give ourselves plenty of time to arrive for our pick-up at American Point at 8:30a.  We started none too early because we paddled hard and got there just as the pick-up boat was pulling up.
Here we are as happy bearded campers on our way back to civilization.  We'd give just about anything for a warm shower and a soft bed.

It's always interesting when you come back from the wilderness after being gone for a week. All kinds of things change.  I found out that our building super, with whom I met just before leaving on my trip, tested positive for Covid-19 while I was gone.  So based on that fact and my symptoms while on the trip, I am going for a scheduled test tomorrow.



Here is the Mall of America (and the JW Marriott) waiting for us in Minneapolis)




Below is a map of our adventure from American Point through 3 portages to Lake Ester off of Ottertrack Lake. The light blue line shows our GPS track. It shows our day trips to Rabbit Lake and Zephyr lake.  To see the whole map, please use the scroll bars. The Red dots are campsites; most of which were empty and the hiking symbol denotes the beginnings and ends of all the portages along the way.

This was the adventure of a lifetime and I think it changed us all for the better.

BW Journal Day 7 7/10 Last full day in the BWCA

This is our last full day in the Boundary Waters. Obviously we are torn between leaving the beautiful environment of which we've enjoyed this week and the longing to get home. Here are some of the great (OK, maybe grim but fun) memories we'll always have.

After a couple days, our backs really started to ache. And we realized that we never had a way to sit in a chair or relax anywhere that supported our backs. Our primary options were single logs. A heavenly exception to this rule were the hammocks. Here I am in a hammock with 100% Deet on my legs and a headnet over my hat. Although it allows you to relax, you still hear the frustrated black flies buzzing past you; unable to bite. But this sounds like the pod races in Star Wars.



As you saw in an earlier post, the sunrise is pretty spectacular. Well, so is the sunset when the winds calm down and the water is like glass. If this isn't zen, I don't know what is.

 Here are me and Brian doing our chores. You have to wash the dishes after every meal because you only carry the minimum of pots, pans and dishes.

During the end of the week, Brian caught at least one fish and so did I. This breaks a 30 year dry spell for me for catching fish in the Boundary Waters.  As you can see from the map in the next post, we took a day trip to Zephyr Lake and had the whole place to ourselves. There it's easy to catch a fish and it's also easy to catch a rock.  I caught both.

As we made our plans for the long paddle back to our pick-up point at American Point, Brian and I became concerned about having to paddle into a headwind.  So I created this structure which is really just a big windvane. You can just barely see the long black telltale flying south near the top of the picture.

BW Journal Day 6 7/9

Our last major portage took us right along the border between Canada and the US. The portage has a series of monuments delineating the border. Here is Brian standing in Canada.
Now that we're all safely back to the Western end of Saganaga we are taking it a little bit easy. It's Scott's turn to recover from being under the weather. And the severe headache he's had to deal with is almost gone. Our new campsite affords us a view of the last portage we took.
Here you can see several canoes preparing to make the portage from Saganaga to Swamp Lake. You can also see the rocks at the beginning of the portage. Those rocks will tear the skin off a Kevlar canoe. So for each portage we must jump out into the water and lift the canoe over the rock and on to the soft grass or mud behind the rocks.
This particular portage was so short you can see the next lake through the trees.

Here's our power generation system. During the trip it has kept our two phones charged and the GPS. This has allowed for full time satellite navigation and communication. It has also allowed for watching a couple movies in our tent after the sun goes down.

Because of the potential for incoming rain, we got Brian all decked out in his foul weather gear. He will likely wear this on the boat ride back to Voyageurs from American Point.

Unlike the campsites in the Quetico, all the Boundary Waters campsites have latrines. Here's our luxury latrine...
It's nested back in the woods in a very private spot at the end of a pretty long path.












There are a number of small paths leading from our site. My theory is that they are bear paths because several of them have a load of fresh bear scat at the beginning of the path.
Brian disagrees with my theory. He thinks it is moose scat. We have placed a 3 dollar bet on that which we will resolve when we return to the outfitters. (it turns out he was right. This is moose poop!
Another key feature of our camp site is our kitchen. Please note the gas stove and granite countertop.

BW Journal Day 5 New Campsite 7/8

After a lot of concern by both Scott and Brian, I woke up feeling much stronger. This picture of the sunrise from the lookout point of our campsite was inspiring.

We left our camp on Lake Ester about 7:30 and headed back towards Saganaga. I felt strong on the portages even though Scott asked me to carry lighter packs.
As we cleared our last portage on to the western end of Saganaga, I got turned around and headed us the wrong way. Scott asked me not to use the GPS anymore because it was glitching out and I offered to let him navigate; which he accepted.
Later that day, after our new campsite was set up, Scott came down with a severe headache. He went back to the tent to lie down. Later that night he felt like he might have a fever.

BW Journal Day 4 The Pike 7/07

I woke about 1AM on the morning of day four in the most violent shivering fit I have ever had. It persisted for about 10 minutes while I helplessly rode it out. I realized that I might be going into shock, so I crawled into my sleeping bag and zipped it up. Meanwhile, all I could think about was Covid-19. At this point we were 3 portages and 3 hours of paddling away for our outfitters pick-up point. I never actually had a fever this trip but it felt like I might. When you couple the shivering with the cough that I had for a day, my health was cause for genuine concern.

I woke up about 7am feeling under the weather, so that day was all about rest.
Meanwhile, Scott and Brian took off for a nearby lake to do some more fishing. They never made it to their destination. While trolling in route, Scott nailed a 15 pound, 33" Northern Pike.
Needless to say, we had fish fillets for dinner. In spite of my aversion to seafood, I had to admit it was delicious. Scott filleted this bad boy and served up tasty and non-fishy tasting fish bites.

Because of my condition, we decided it would be a good idea to break camp and head out tomorrow for a site that was closer to our Saturday pickup spot.

BW Journal Day 3 The Storm 7/06

We were recovering from our big day of paddling and portaging. So we just relaxed. We took a short trip to Rabbit Lake. Scott and Brian reeled in this "small" fish. 

After we returned to our campsite, we relaxed a little more and started to make dinner. That's when we noticed the angry sky. Scott had rigged up a wonderful rain tarp over our eating area and we sat through a rain shower earlier in the day without getting wet. But we had no inkling of just how intense this new rain storm was going to be.

The wind slowly built up as the rain started. We were convinced it would just be a brief shower. Then all hell broke loose. The wind drove the intense rain horizontally, so the tarp provided no protection. Still, we stood there and let the storm batter us. Eventually, we got soaking wet and realized the rain was not going to let up any time soon. That ended up being a worthy decision because the rain didn't let up for another hour. We grabbed something for dinner out of the food box and beat a hasty retreat to a warm and dry tent.

Here's picture of us playing cards in the tent after dinner.

BW Journal Day 2 Sun 7/05

This was a day of recovery and rest and Lord knows we needed it. Just standing up brought a chorus creaks and moans from our entire bodies. As trying as it was, Scott's strategy of aggressively pursuing a prime site appears to have paid off. We saw several people paddle onto our lake and over to our site; hoping to occupy it.
We soon learned to watch the sky for incoming rain. The promontory in front of our tent gave us a good view of the western sky.

While sitting around recovering our bodies, we really came to appreciate our head nets. In fact, I am wearing one now as I write this.

Next we wanted to make an effort to find the latrine at this camp site. It's at the end of a little path that leads into the woods. Upon exploring that path we found this big snake consuming his frog dinner, whole!

After our exciting snake discovery we wanted a swim. We have a nicely slipping rock shelf in front of our site thay slopes all the way into the water. It has algae growing on it which makes it as slick and dangerous as ice. So Scott improvised this rope railing with knots every two feet.

We had chicken and rice out of a pouch for dinner and the retreated to our tent before the skies opened up. What do you do in a tent in the middle of a rain storm? You hang up a head lamp in the center of the tent and play gin rummy.

BW Journal Day 1 Sat 7/04

Lots of gear and weight.  Time to make some decisions about what we absolutely need to carry. For example, we won't need 6 bottles of propane for our stove.

Then down to check the canoe and scenery. Here's the view off of the dock.

We had a hot night in the bunk house. It was basically a shed with two bunks in it. They did serve us hot pizza and two cold beers which with the heat, really hit the spot.

We got up at 6a to pack our gear for final preparation for our boat ride to American Point. That's the furthest point into which a motorboat can go. It eliminates over a day of paddling to our destination.
They served us a hearty breakfast at 7a. During breakfast we observed a very pretty young photographer shooting candid shots with her SLR and a long lens.
At 7:30 we put all gear in a flat bottomed aluminum boat. It had a rack on to which they mounted our 3 man canoe. As we were heading out the channel there was the cute photographer poised to take a picture of 3 generations of Northrups headed out for a new adventure together. Half an hour later we were at American Point and our canoe was in the water.
We paddled about 5 miles to our first portage. It was only 10 yards long but mostly uphill. We paddled another mile or two through narrow and winding creeks to our next portage. It's called Monument portage because the trail goes past several monuments that mark off the US/Canadian border. It is a hilly third of a mile with lots of rocky up and downs. I thank my lucky stars that Scott is so willing to carry the canoe and food pack. He has insisted that we organize our gear into packs that allow us to finish the portage to two trips.
Another mile of paddling and another portage into the lake where we want to camp, Lake Ester. This portage has more elevation change, more mud and steeper "stairs". How Scott manages to carry the canoe and a full food pack up these hills is beyond me.
Another two miles of paddling and we reach our ultimate destination. It's a beautiful camping spot with tent site perched on a rock outcropping that overlooks the lake.
There's a fire ban so we cook our steak dinner on a little gas stove. Then we collapse into our tent for some well deserved rest.

Traveling in Covid

it's an eerie quiet and semi-abandoned gate. All the travelers that are here are solemn and quiet. The plane is less than half full. At least we will probably leave on time.

Packing 7.2

It's a trade off between convenience and weight. Here's my suitcase which is sort of a pack within a pack. The pack I am taking in the canoe is in the suitcase.