Little Saganaga Trip

So it might not have escaped you that while I have been working in the BWCA for over three weeks now I had not actually been on an overnight trip into the wilderness yet. This was because I spent my first day off in Grand Marais to get some supplies and then banked my second day off in order to take a longer trip later this summer! The time for a trip finally arrived, so last Monday at 3:00 pm after work myself and a friend and co-worker, Andrew, headed off for a one night trip in the BWCA.

Neither Andrew or I had seen much of the area around Tuscarora so we decided the goal of our trips was to "Make Tracks" and see as much of the area in a short amount of time as was possible. I would have to say that we were completely successful in our goal as in 23 short hours (12 of which we were in camp) we covered 21 miles, 22 portages (totaling over 1,300 rods), and over 20 different lakes!

Our Route (Click to expand it)

After setting out Monday afternoon Andrew and I left Round Lake and headed to Tuscarora Lake, where we originally had planned to camp for the night. On our way we got to do the legendary Tuscarora Portage which depending on which map you consult is anywhere from 360-425 rods (anyway you look at it, that is long and over a mile!). To boot I carried an aluminum canoe over the entire portage! When we got on Tuscarora it was still early and we had favorable winds so we decided to keep going instead of making an early camp. The result was we were able to make it to Crooked Lake and find a suitable campsite by 6:15 pm. In camp we enjoyed the delights of expired dehydrated foods (which we get for free from Tuscarora Outfitters as they cannot sell it to clients), a campfire, a beautiful sunset, and starry night (complete with loon calls and beaver tail slaps).

Me at Tuscarora Lake (After the big Portage)

Camp Site at Crooked Lake

Tuesday morning we were up at sunrise (around 5:30 am or so) and had packed up camp and were canoeing again by 6:15 am. As there had been decent winds the day before we decided we wanted to get out early in order to get to Little Saganaga before any major winds camp up (Little Sag is a big lake, despite its name, and unfavorable winds would make canoeing it very difficult). When we arrived at Little Sag the wind was just getting going for the day, but lucky for us it was mostly at our back. As the wind increased we decided that we would take a chain of smaller lakes back to Tuscarora Outfitters in the afternoon as opposed to going into other big lakes such as Gabimichigambi and Peter Lake. The result of this decision was a lot of portages! Despite our aluminum canoe though we only had one big pack and a small backpack so there was no double portaging for us.

Sunrise at Crooked Lake

Portaging away from Little Saganaga to Virgin Lake (Senic Overlook of Little Sag)

While Tuscarora, Crooked, and Little Sag Lakes were all beautiful a lot of the lakes on our way back were not quite as scenic. The area was heavily hit by the Cavity Lake Fire in 2006 that burned a lot of the blown from 1999. Gillis Lake though was still in pristine condition. After crossing Gillis we stoped for a quick lunch around 11:30 am on Bat lake before completing the last leg of our journey back to Tuscarora Outfitters by 2:15 pm on Tuesday.

View of Gillis Lake from Portage to Bat Lake

Overall it was a great trip! We managed to see a big portion of the BWCA that is right in our backyard. Now when I take clients to different entry points around here I will be able to tell them a bit more about some of the lakes in the Area, if they are interested.

Lakes I would Recommend From this Trip: Missing Link, Tuscarora, Crooked, Mora, Little Saganaga, and Gillis Lake.

Lakes/Areas I would Not Recommend: The Northern Portion of my route, Virgin through Brant Lakes (Gillis Excluded). This is due to it being a burn zone which was less then scenic and the fact there are a lot portages connecting a bunch of very small lakes (I prefer larger lakes that you can canoe longer distances as opposed to constantly getting in and out of your canoe to portage every 200 yards).