BWCAW

Our annual trip to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW) in Minnesota took place the last week of August. We took the red-eye flight from LAX to MSP and rented a car, after stopping in St. Paul for a brief visit with my cousin Chris and his family near the airport and a great breakfast with my good friend Jennifer from Plymouth, MN. We drove up to Ely where we met my good friend Greg from Willmar, MN at the local hotel where we met up to coordinate and launch our trip. We all went out to dinner at the Ely Steak House for a great dinner. The next morning we all headed out for an early breakfast and headed to the outfitters for a 9AM departure to be towed to our first portage into Birch Lake. The day was sunny and clear and warm for a wonderful day of paddling through Birch Lake, through 5 portages and Carp Lake, into Knife Lake where we set up our campsite at about 2pm. It was clear and sunny, but at nightfall the mosquitoes made their presence known. We all escaped into the tents at night to be free from their persistent biting, and enjoyed our first evening under the stars. We had a super cold evening, with temperatures getting close to freezing. It luckily didn’t freeze and the remaining nights we had warmer low temperatures. (although it may have killed some of the mosquitoes)
We spent the next two days fishing, and exploring Knife Lake. Max got is very first small mouth bass, and we had some great tasting fresh fried fish for dinner a couple of nights. We enjoyed and relaxed and ate very well, and had no problems. On our 2nd to last night we canoed back through the way we came in along skirting the Canadian border, back down to Newfound Lake. We found a very nice campsite there, where we set up camp for the night in a small bay in a Cedar grove. The entire day had been rather overcast. It looked like it was going to rain, but didn’t all day long. It was not until that night about 10pm that it started to pour, and it rained much of the night, and was done by the time we got up in the morning to paddle out of the wilderness. We packed it all up and were back at the outfitters dropping off our canoes by 1PM. It was a superb trip, and with some great campers, everyone got along, and had a very, very wonderful time in the wilderness. It is a world of difference from Los Angeles and Long Beach, and yet was such a welcome change and a relaxing time. We drove to my dad’s place in Menahga for a visit and then to Baxter to visit my sister Anna and her family, and then to Spooner, WI to visit my sister Anita and her family. On the way back to the airport in Minneapolis, we stopped at Jill and Jeff’s place in Apple Valley for a wonderful dinner and visit.